Random Notes.
When are things going to settle down with regard to licensing matters ? We have had ample room for the application of Touchstone’s philosophy during the past few weeks, but there has been little inclination «n either hand to apply it. We have heard the whole gamut traversed from the ‘ retort courteous to the ‘ counter check quarrelsome,’ and even to the ‘ lie direct !’ but none of the contestants ‘thought but of an if, which would have enabled them to ‘ shake bands and part sworn brothers.’ We outsiders have one thought to console ourselves with. Unlike Xmas, which each year brings its good cheer, licensing elections promise to come but once in three. Things may be brought to the condition of Donnybrook in miniature, but we are fortunately allowed a sufficiently long time both for anticipation before the arrival of the stirring time and an equally long period to look back upon the things that were. The closing of the seven doomed houses has wrought but little seeming change, and we will in time, I hope, be able to reconcile ourselves to the inevitable.
“ Philosophy is the guide of life,” they say, and I commend to him of scalping knife fame the following lines of ibpling’s, which with their deep philosophical meaning and healthful moral tone will enable him to bear up heroically under his recent calamitous defeat, and possibly lead him at next election to gird himself once more manfully for the fray : “You can work it out by fractions or by the simple rule of three, Eut the way of Tweeclle-dum is not the way of Tweedle-dcc; You can twist it, you can turn it, you can plait it till you drop, Eut the way of Pilly-winky’s not the way of Winkie-Pop!” Southlanders have occason to felicitate themselves ! Like Caesar of old, the Ruahine came, saw?, and conquered! She did not break her back on that mid-channel rock, nor run aground on those mud-flats of which our northern ■well-wishers made so much. She did just exactly what every one down here knew and expected she would do .— i.e., she sailed majestically into harbour, received cargo, and went on her way rejoicing, leaving us to rejoice likewise, while the cold-water-pourers of the sunny nor’-land climes look on, so glum and rueful, at the failure of their dainty bit plan. It behoves our Bluff Harbour Board to bestir itself, however. Let it keep pace with the’times, and not run the risk of becoming a ‘ fossilised anachronism.’ If the members prove themselves equal to the occasion we shall not need the eye of faith to discern in the immediate future the Gothics and other leviathans of the deep bearing from our southern port the products of our hills and valleys and wide-stretching plains.
Dunedin folks like to get something for their money, i.e., something tangible and metallic ; consequently they have decided to perpetuate the good old doctor’s name in a statue ! Counter proposals there were, almost ad infinitum , including one to establish a memorial free library. This stood second in the running; but why did it not come in many lengths ahead of the absurd statue proposal passes the wit of man to tell. No doubt statues have their uses. For instance, their manufacture is good for trade —-that is a good stock argument, and tells with the horny - handed. Secondly, they furnish roosting-room for the übiquitous sparrow, and thirdly, being things of beauty, they are consequently joys for ever. Had the departed one been consulted probably his voice would have gone for the library, but that would not count for much —he did not contribute his saxpence ! Strange it is that in our new colonies, where we are so far ahead of the Old Country in some respects, we should be so antiquated as to our notions of fitly commemorating the honoured dead! How many public institutions in the Old Country have in recent years
been established either as fitting memorials of departed worth, or as generous gifts to a grateful people P London will soon have its Fate Gallery, Liverpool now has its Walker Gallery and Library, while Glasgow boasts its noble Mitchell Library. Even in New Zealand, Wellington and Auckland have made some attempt to copy the example of old-world towns. But the offspring of the canny Scot in Dunedin prefers the useless and ugly mass of bronze set up as an obstruction to pedestrians, rather than a useful educational institution such as the rejected library, which would have proved a more appropriate monument to the memory of Dr Stuart. Vox.
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/SOCR18940721.2.39
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Southern Cross, Volume 2, Issue 16, 21 July 1894, Page 12
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763Random Notes. Southern Cross, Volume 2, Issue 16, 21 July 1894, Page 12
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