CORRESPONDENCE.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume X, Issue 1253, 22 January 1883, Page 2

CORRESPONDENCE.

BOBBING AN ORCHARD. TO THE EDITOB. I Sin —£10 for robbing an orchard is the fine imposed by Matthew Price, Esq.. . Resident Magistrate for Gisborne, and l the value of lhe fruit stolen was twopence 1 1 I Shakespeare, in describing . the seven ages of man, says—- “ And then the Justice, i In fair round belly with good capon lined, I With eyes severe, and beard of formal cut, . Full of wise saws and modern instances.” And later on, in his admirable description of life, the divine poet writes—- “ Last scene of all, That ends tins strange eventful history, Is second childishness and mere oblivion, Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.” I had not the pleasure of knowing Mr Price when he possessed a “fair round belly,” but I am very much afraid that he has arrived at the “ sans everything ” stage. If Mr Price ever was a boy I will venture to say that he robbed an orchard. If he never did so then he never was a boy. I would like to have £lO for every orchard 1 have plundered, but now that Mr Price has passed from the stage of the schoolboy to that of—well, I may as well put it plainly, because I think it—second childish, ness, it is about time that a kind and maternal Government should take him under its wing, and shield him from accusations of mis-administering justice. It is a matter of common talk that the state of Mr Price’s liver greatly affects his decisions, and I am somewhat inclined to believe it. But why if this be the case, should certain unfortunates have to suffer in consequence of a Magis’rate’s billions attack ? Would it not be better when in this unhappy condition if Mr. Price were to request two of the local Justices of the Peace to sit upon the Bench, in order to adjudicate upon eases such as that at present under notice? lam sorry to have to write in this strain, but really it is

time when a boy of respectable parentage for a most tririal offence is fined £lO for relieving a tree of two pennyworth of plume. I empatnically say that the administration of justice (?) in the M.M. Court as it sometimes is administered is calculated td bring the blind Goddess into Cotitempt,—l am &c., An Old Boy.