Poverty Bay Standard. PUBLISHED EVERY TUESDAY, THURSDAY AND SATURDAY MORNINGS. GISBORNE : TUESDAY, AUGUST 28, 1883.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume XI, Issue 1348, 28 August 1883, Page 2

Poverty Bay Standard. PUBLISHED EVERY TUESDAY, THURSDAY AND SATURDAY MORNINGS. GISBORNE : TUESDAY, AUGUST 28, 1883.

Agentee et consentientes pari penna plectentur (the parties acting and the parties consenting are liable to the same punishment). Such was an axiom of the old Roman law, which stands good to this day, and is especially applicable to the meeting—if we may call it such—which was called on Saturday evening. We think it right that our patrons—the public—should be placed in possession of the facts connected with thisjftaseo. We cannot inform our readers what took place at Wellington — whether Mr Allan McDonald, having in wholesome remembrance the miserable failure of the last attempt, which will ever be remembered as “ Rees’s meeting,'’ shifted his tactics and made a cat’s paw of “ Brave Sir Geobge Whit, moiie.” How or why this arrangement

WAs made we are not in a position to state Anyhow, the result was that Mr Nolan received a letter from gallant Sir George asking him to get a public meeting called, and to try & get a motion passed condemnatory of Mr Brack’s Bill. The first move in this direction was to cast about and get a desirable .and pliaut tool. Though acknowledging by their selection, the truth of the proverb that “fools rush iu where angels fear to tread,” they seemed to have forgotten that a “ man of Bietia ’’ can scarcely be relied ou. Be that as it may, Josiah—well, we are again in the dark as to whether he actually ventured on the task of signing the prepared requisition, but suffice it that Ji’SiAii’s name was attached to this important document, which was to spread consternation in the enemy's midst, and Josiah became the worthy godfather of this precious bantling. Armed with brief authority, he sallied forth and found Ml? Rees conveniently handy and accessible. No doubt Josiah’s persuasive powers were taxed to the utmost before he could prevail upon this bashful and coy gentleman ■o sign, but as we have proof that Josiah’s eloquence did ultimately ivereome this demure gentleman’s reluctance (?) that is sufficient. Now we do not wish to rob Josiah of one itom —one particle—of glory in this matter, but we are compelled to ask our readers to form their owu opinion as to whether Josiah had received ample and full instructions who to call on or not, but when he had obtained the influential signatures of the proprietor and manager (Messrs Dufaur ind Chhihi 1 ), and their leader writer (Mr Browse), of the “ Evening Scrap took and Toadcater’s Chronicle,” he no ds?;bt though : the whole affair au f lit accompli. We must say that we know of two innocent victims to Josiah’s wiles. To pass over the rest. His Worship the Mayor, in conformity with the requisition, called a public meeting in Parnell and Boylan’s Hall. Is the advertised time drew nigh, a ■nimber of expectant citizens began to fill the hall, and by eight o’clock a ■wrong contingent of our burgesses were assembled to hear “this iniquitous Bill ” (riiZe The Evening Scrap Book and Toadeater’s Chronicle of Saturday evening) cursed by bell, book and candle, and consigned to the bottom of that Stygian lake from which no Bill was ever yet known to return, i'en, fifteen, twenty, twenty - five minutes, half-past eight, and no appearance of our highest municipal functionary 1 The meeting gets impatient, they begin to stamp and murmur, when, just as we heard some expressed intentions of closing the meeting and putting the lights out, iu came our Civic Potentate. We must say that he looked somewhat nervous and (lurried. Was it the effects of a hurried walk, or was it that visions of

a previous meeting, with all its attendant consequences, rose up before his mental vision? His Worship, having rend the published announcement calling the meeting, proceeded to read the copy of an obsolete Bill, which, he assured the meeting, was the Bill to be corsidered. We really do not like to think that His Worship was totally unacquainted with a subject which it was his duty to consider of sufficient, public importance to justify the outlay of a considerable amount of public money before calling a meeting, but we can come to no other conclusion, as he was much surprised when we placed before him a copy of the Native Land Act Amendment Bill, with n. few al its alterations and amendments marked, and requested him to read the same to the meeting, which he proceeded to do. The truth is, the meeting had been called to discuss—what? Why, a phantom Bill, which has been metamorphosed into—we know not what at present. After a while His Worship called upon Mr Reus to address the meeting, but he called in vain. He next called Josiah ' and was answered by the sepulchral screech of a departed cockatoo and the bleat of a long mourned for calf, which was borne on the sighing wind from the distant Patutahi. The effect was instantaneous and wonderful.- Jo-iah fled But listen; another momentous pause; and, amidst hushed breaths, the potential name of Thomas Chbisp is forcibly ejected from the throat of the merciless Chairman. But the meeting had surely mistaken the name, as the hall is quickly filled with squealing cries of “ Narah, Sarah, Sarah I” to be only answered by the echo, “ Sarah But he, whose scrap-book compiler had a few hours before designated the Rill “ this iniquitous Bill,” was also non est And, as name after name was called, amidst jests and hoots, not one single individual dared so to outrage justice and truth openly and publicly as to come forward and 1 denounce a measure which is directed solely against roguery, swindling and gross abuses—a measure which will for a long time to come connect the name of the Hon. John Bhyce with a measure which is likely to prove more beneficial to the cause of justice and public morality than any law yet passed in this colony. The meeting was closed by a vote of censure being 5 passed upon those signing the requisition in the following terms: “ I'hat this meeting considers the action of . those signing the requisition calling I this meeting to be a direct insult to ; the people and ratepayers of Gisborne.”