South Canterbury Times, TUESDAY, OCTOBER 12, 1880.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 2362, 12 October 1880, Page 2

South Canterbury Times, TUESDAY, OCTOBER 12, 1880.

Wic have published in another column a further interesting report by the Colonial Marine Engineer “as to the damage caused by building a Breakwater at Timaru, and the further damage that may accrue therefrom.” This report is dated August 19, 1880, and is intended as a reply to the “ defence ” of the Breakwater submitted by the Harbor Board on June 10, or more than two months previously. Mr Blackett it will be perceived, with an honesty and frankness which is quite unusual on the part of the top-sawyers of the Civil Service, acknowledges his indebtedness for all that he has said, done, and recommended to Mr J, H. Lowe. Engineer for Constructed Railways, Middle Island. In fact Mr Lowe appears to have been the gentleman who prepared the balls that were fired at the Breakwater by Mr Blackett, and the public wrath which has lately been expended on the Colonial Marine Engineer has been quite misapplied. Under such circumstances there is nothing surprising in the entire harmony of opinion that prevails between Mr Blackett and Mr Lowe, seeing that their relationship hears a remarkable resemblance to that of the sun and the moon, or that of the gunner and his gun. Mr Lowe is the source of Mr Blackett’s figures and facts, and Mr Blackett is merely the medium by which they are communicated to Parliament and finally to the public.

We do not intend to enter into the vexed question at issue. Mr Lowe’s facts ami figures on the subject of the stoppage of the travelling shingle and the encroachments of the sea will make a delicious morsel for the Harbor Board and its stalf. But we would suggest that in their next reply the} - should avoid mistaking the echo for the voice. They will do well to remember that it is not with Mr Blackett hut with Mr Lowe that they have to deal. When the new timber wharf is completed and the opening ceremony is about to be performed in bumpers of champagne, care should be taken to secure the presence of Mr J. IL Lowe. The good opinion of an engineer who can measure the strides of the elements on the foreshore with superhuman accuracy ; who can calculate the loss of material on the shingle banks of the beach to a cubic yard ; who can ascribe to “ the stead}’ process of nature.” the damage done to the railway viaducts, which he attributes to the Breakwater ; who can justify the carting of coals to Newcastle and place Lyttelton dolorite and indurated clay in favorable contrast with Timaru blue stone; wo say the good opinion of an engineer possessing such wonderful gifts—powers that place Captain Barry’s ride on the whale’s back quite at a disadvantage—is something worth sacrificing a goblet of the best sparkling IJoederer to obtain. The Harbor Board blundered : and blundered lamentably when they consulted Sir John Coode, Mr Balfour, Mr Carruthers, and Mr John Macgregor, yet ignored Mr John Henry Lowe. Had they taken Sir Lowe into their confidence all might have gone well. By treating Mr Lowe in a supercilious manner, as if lie were nobody, they have also offended Mr Blackett and the elements, and the “ steady process of nature ’’ has set in against them.

The most charming tiling in connection with the reports of Messrs Blackett and Lowe is the way in which they trsnsfer their responsibility. Mr Blackett in effect says —Mr Lowe is my authority and what he says I must swear to. Mr Lowe says he lias no “ down’ ’ on the Timani Harbor Board, and that his only concern is the railway, naively adding—- “ I have nothing to do with the location of it.” The concluding passage in Mr Lowe’s report is as follows : “ In the reports I have made on the “ encroachments of the sea, I have con- “ lined myself to the discharge of my “ duties in seeing to the protection of “ the railway placed under my charge. “ I Invc nothing to do with the location “ of it, and doubt not the (iovernment “ is advised of the reasons which led to “ the choice of site and the feasibility “or otherwise of diverting the line “ away from the shore. AH these ques- “ turns raised by the Board do not fall “ within my instructions to go into ; “ neither have I a desire to lake up a “ position inimical to the interests of the “ Timani Harbor Board : but I think it “ is better for all parties concerned that “ the true position of the subject should “ be recognised and dealt with accord- “ ingly. No arguments will stay the “ steady process of nature which every “ resident in Timani can see gradually “ progressing under his eyes : on the one “ hand the accumulation of shingle on “ the south of the Breakwater, gradually “ but enevitably closing over it ; and on “the other hand the denudation of the “ shore northward, which can only be “ checked at very great expense. It “ seems to me apparent that these two “ effects are obtaining a magnitude “ never approached in former times, the “ the work of years in the past being “ accomplished in about as many days ‘‘ at present; and that this change is en- “ tircly due to the complete stoppage of “ shingle at the Timaru Breakwater.” The language is almost poetic, full of pathos, touching in its simplicity* sublime in its conceptions, altogether worthy of Mr John Henry Lowe, or Professor Pearson,of Invercargill,author of the oyster and other poems. We commend it to the attention of our Harbor Board.