Tologa Bay.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume X, Issue 1034, 9 February 1882, Page 2

Tologa Bay.

(fbom ouk own correspondent.) February 6. I In a leaderette in the Standard on the 6th of December last you stated that in some remarks I made about the School here I was incorrect. That instead of some four or five children being educated at a cost of £l5O per annum (as I reported), 35 Maori and 21 European children had attended more or less regularly during the year. Now thii would

give a wholly wrong impression. It is not the daily, weekly, or nijnthly, or even yearly average, but the total number of children who have been at school during the year, which would give an average (including holidays) of one child per week. In justice to myself I ask you to insert this. The schoolmaster, when questioned as to the truth of the correctness of the attendance mentioned, endeavored to justify himself for the deception, but the impression conveyed is so manifestly incorrect that I cannot let it pass. There is great commotion up the Coast since the visit of Capt. Preece. R.M. Under the new Licensing Act publicans are prohibited from supplying the Natives with drink, and as custom from among the Native population is the mainstay of many, if not most of these country hotels, dire is the confusion created among the Bonifaces. The Natives themselves are none the less put out because they are to be deprived of their beer, and it is intended to get up u monster petition, with the view of having the regulation repealed. The prescribed district runs from the Turanganui River to Cape Runaway, and few “ puhs,” could make a living within that distance if deprived of Ma ni custom. One idea is pretty generally held, and that is that there will be more drinking among the Maoris than ever if this regulation is put in force. “ Stolen fruit is sweetest,” and so sure as the Natives find they cannot satisfy their want* legitimately, they will not be long in designing some scheme that will secretly satisfy their craving.

I do not know whether times are improving rapidly here, or whether some of our residents in the township have been fortunate enough to receive legacies or unexpected remittances, but one day last week t wo“ belltoppera ” were seen walking about near the Ferry. Perhaps the owners, considering the fine warm weather, had brought, them out for an airing, and gone down to the water's edge to s o the reflection of their grandeur in the “ briny.”