THE STANDARD. SATURDAY FEBRUARY 1, 1873.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume 1, Issue 23, 1 February 1873, Page 2

THE STANDARD.

SATURDAY FEBRUARY 1, 1873.

“ W» •hull »eil to Justice or tight: We shall<kny to no man justice or light: We ehall defer to no man justice or right.**

Wb decidedly think we shall be extremely remiss in our duty, if we permit 'the sad occurrence, of Constable Hart’s death, and the particulars of the inquest held over his body, to pass by without remark. We would that we could do sb with a conscientious conviction that there will be no repetition of such a disaster, and that the circumstances which have deprived one human being of life, are not even now, culminating to a point which may involve the fate of another unconscious victim. The time has fully arrived when the Legislature ought to pass some more stringent measure than exists at present, by which the use and custody of poisonous chemicals are regulated. The people have a right to legislative protection, and immunity from the probable chances of unexpected death which stare them in the face at every turn on our sheep stations and runs, owing to a general exhibition of carelessness in disposing of drugs rendered necessary by the custom of the craft. The tragic lesson of last Monday w’eek at Waerenga-a-hika carries with it a moral which it w r ere well to study deeply. That lesson, dear though it be at its present cost, will prove a ruinous possession if the instruction it is intended to convey, passes unheeded by ; and what is that lesson ? Does it not write in characters of blood on the lintels of our moral understanding, the solemn —the awful fact that w r e are regardless of the sacrifice Of human life —that we care more for the lives of sheep than we do for the liv.es of men ? Let Mr Poynter be our witness. In a portion of his evidence at the inquest, he says “ The cask then stood ten or “ fifteen yards from w'here the men “ were cooking, and then had a portion “of an iron bedstead over the top of “it. It is- not usually kept covered “ when in use. The reason it is kept “ covered is to prevent ‘ stock ’ from “ drinking out of it. It has never occurred to me that it could be used “for drinking,-water by men.” Here is a direct testimony on oath that the safety of the ci stock ” was th# great care and regard of an establishment w'here deadly compounds w r ere used on a wholesale scale*. Yet there seems to be a strange inconsistency in the fact that although it had “ never occurred “to Mr Poynter that it could be used “ for drinking-water by men,” he “ par- ■“ ticularly pointed out the cask, and “ said the contents might be mistaken “ for ordinary water, as it was clear and in the face of these antagonistic conclusions, takes no more mean's of

security against the possibility of either hypothesis, than that the “ stock ” should not come to grief. We do not, by any process of reasoning, intend to impute a criminal design, or a seeking to entrap the lives of men ; there is no code of human law that holds a man responsible for the results of pure accident; but there is a divinity in the moral law which, as in this case, attaches a blame, although, peradventure, with lenient and remote consequences. We kno'w that Mr Poynter, and those around him, must feel with a keen re- ! morse that the life just taken comes within that category. We sympathise heartily with him in the heavy care that .must occupy his thoughts; but we must not let that disturb us from a dispassionate analysis of the circumstances that led to results which, probably ere this, sit at some hearts, even heavier than at his own.

The Act whichprofessea “ To regulate the sale and keeping of certain persons ” is powerless as * remedial measure, and stultifies itself > in every clause. The gnat who is likely, to .fly to the chemist for relief in, sixpen erth of -iaudamiiii, is ■properly bedrid- down, with

restrictions which there is no I escape, while the camel may transport | arsenic by the ton, to be scattered broad-cast over the land without let or hindrance, The protection society gets in one way, is stealthily abstracted in another. ThiA : “N$ person under “ 17 years shall buy or sell poisons, and “ no person shall sell any poison unless “in the presence of a v/itnesS, —he or the customer being the jailer —and the particulars of any -««i® feast be entered in a book to be attested by both buyer and seller. This is a sort of safeguard against intentional crime, and gives the police a clue in the detection df it none 6f those restrictions “ extend to the sale of poisons . 1 “ . . when they affect dealings between “one trader arid anbfKcr, 7"7v = 6r = W’ “affect wholesale dealing uponorders “in writing.” The logic of which is that slaughtering on a small scale requires. deal of j fsanctiinpnjous unction about it; that ,it sanction of parliament for a housewife to obtain a little almond flavoring for the family dinner under a -penalty hf £2O, while her husband can send “an order in “ writing ” to a neighboring store for enough virulent poison to depopulate the whole country. To show that no exaggeration -waits upon our pen, in condemning the thoughtlessness generally displayed in, these matters, we would refer to circumstances that oc.curred in this Bay not long since, when a bag in which arsenic had been kept was sent to a neighboring station for meat, which, when cooked caused violent sickness to all who partook of it. But in returning tq. the evidence before us, we repeat that it discloses an absence of proper precaution/. All the witnesses depose to having been cautioned against using “ the utensils ” about the place. Mr. Poynter ;says he cautioned “ all the men ” against using “ any bucket, pannikin, dish, or other “utensil, foy they were all poisonous “ but one,”. but to only “ one indi- “ vidual ” he “ pointed out the boiler, “in w’hich the arsenic was boiled, and

“ also the l cask spoken of /in evidence, “ and. told him they were both poison- “ ous.” So far, so good ; but why stop there ? Is it too severe to pass censure on measures, whose destructiveness lies in their incompleteness ? Why, in the presence of the fact that “ all the “ utensils, dishes, pannikins and buckets, were pronounced “ poisonous,” allow them to lie strewn,about the premises, in close proximity to a boiler and open cask containing a solution of potent poison? Mr. Poynter says he spoke “ more particularly to the Sergeant in “ charge. . Then why did he not call the Sergeant to prove that he had in his turn not been lax m his discipline over his men. Captain Richardson was also “ Warned “ of the danger to be incurred from “ arsenic ” (that, by the way, was merely stating a truism), but why was he not required io state how he recognizes the performance of his duty, by allowing the men to camp and cook amidst a profusion of poisoned utensils, within “ about ten or fifteen yards ” from a cauldron of arsenic, the contents of which. “ might be mistaken for ordinary “ water," as if was clear” Here we stumble against another dilemma. Constable Helps swears.that he “did not “ know there was poison in the cask.” Allowing that he was not one of the “six or seven,” whom Mr Poynter, warned, dobs that fact not point to the necessity of pursuing this investigation to a more. complete and satisfactory conclusion? .

The Act from which we have quoted, stipulates an express condition, which would ■'present arsenipal compounds being mistaken for pure water, had not the ‘‘wholesale dealing” clause been inserted. It provides for a coloring matter—-soot or 'indigo—being mixed with arsenic before sale* provided such mixture doeri not tender it unfit for use; and, although in, some cases, the wool might suffbr in its use, as a foot-rot wash, the, argument caffnot hold good. We endorse 1 tlie good judgment of the jury in,the substance of the rider to their verdic±,-and.trust that the Government will take immediate steps l towards enforeing Ae provisions 'of thb Act until Parhament meets, -and’ then to frame'snew'law whbse_ punitive effect will remove, the loss care is sheep or » of wzsu samos* " - I