DEATH.

Colonist, Issue 71, 25 June 1858, Page 2

DEATH.

On the 22nd instant, J. H. Lucas, aged 14 years, eldest son of Mr. Charles Lucas, storekeeper, Nelson.

POLITICS: WfiAT IS IT?

Ask the readers of public prints, journals, newspapers, and the like, and the majority will reply, —politics means every thing about what is said or should be said and done in Parliament. This English explanation may not be far from the mark. Although we think a keen Hibernian gave us a wiser meaning when he said," Sure, its O'Connelij and Ireland for ever!" And, when coaxed for more information, he added, with a wink, why, Sir, its every thing about every thing, and plenty of talking and joking to spare, and plenty to eat arid drink in the bargain, and plenty of us to beg for it, with plenty of good luck to get it, and keep it when it comes. Often and often have we remembered this sally, and admired it, while contriving to forget the " cut and dried" saws of the infallible Adam Surra. Politics comprises* all the

welfare of nations. .To spe&k somewhat rhymingly, it is their truest health and wealth, with the least possible stealth. It is their improvement in all the arts of peace, with the smallest use of .the arts of fraud or war. Referring to any common dictionary, we find the term explained by—" the science of Government, the art or pi act ice of administering public affairs." All legislative sagacity and executive ability must be intended, including the knowledge -and employment of every means promotive of the well-being of the general citizen, or the subject of the State under proper rule. He, therefore, who would cultivate politics, even in the field of a periodical sheet, must sow and plant greater as well as minor trutli3, after preparing the soil ,o;f the public mind as best he can,'or risking right principles to hopeful distributions, as by the fruitful borders of a subsiding Nile, or the Mississippi of a thousand retiring waters, in one urgent stream. If that current represent the favors of bountiful nature,- let it be the task of the genuine politician to cast his peculiar grain where the waves thereof have flowed, even should he have no better address than the Eastern husbandman who ; plants in the mud, by means of driving his oxen # asses, or other cattle over the seed. We are of those who believe that the understandings of man are* in the right season, a rich super stratum : and blessed is he who knows how to sow there for good, whether his sowing, as to either kind or quantity, or manner, amuse, please, or even displease the less wise or unwise, provided the good be genuine, and really suitable^ M ; ■ - --'! There is a 1 kind of politics, adapted to a youthful people, of far more value than all the labors of ordinary statesmen' or legislators.' It is the good sense and experienced energy that see^ to turn everything to honest personal or national profit,The sensible man who looks on his. country, and learns how to make any of its capabilities available for himself and others is a politician of the right sort. He is less a talker than a doer ; he is one whose deeds, even more than his counsels; help forward his fellow-countrymen. The burning eloquence of a Chatham, the invincible sword of a Wellington, or the philanthrophy of a Howard»' may win the lyres of poetry, and the acclaim of empires, but he who, from a sense of duty to his" family, his country, and his God, teaches mankind to drain the morass, clothe the waste with verdure, and change savage forests into fruitful orchards, is a patriot who builds the monuments of eternal usefulness in his works. By making one acre yield as ten acres did formerly, lie teaches men to con--vert at length" one world into ten; he not only gives ten new worlds to the solar system, but he gives to our earth the means of feeding populationsmore valuable to us at present than all the' secondary planets. This may appear grandiloquent, or too sounding, but it, is sober truth. Any " man of Ross " who' crowns the sultry brow of the mountain with • plantations, a duchess of Rutland reclaiming;* counties by her agricultural wisdom, and large portions of high society by her beautiful virtues, especially her homage of art and labor, and a Sir John Sinclair; and a Dr.. Smith giving a new' surface to the globe by immortal subsoil, supply " names that will brighten while posterity shall havfr" sons to bear the lineaments of sires. And here also, he who makes the* flax a staple of permanent benefit, or lime generally available for profitable husbandry, or, in imitation of the Chinese, pumps the hollow swamp dry, by means of wind, or steam, or opens our hilly woods by ingenuity, making hills a mighty labor powj^,..will be rogarded as our hero,'and he will make"hundreds of year 3 his debtors. ■ We have a common tree, a perennial, yielding > lai-ge quantities of gum equal to gum arabic. Onr common manuka teems with endless stores of manna. The very lea}-tufts of this latter plant, when a branch is cut off and laid on a mealy sribsoil, will fall off and vegetate in millions, so as toform, if properly placed, one of the finest fences, particularly if mixed with brier or thorn. By means of this tree we can-raise incomparable forests for fuel, fences, out-buildings, &c, anywhere and everywhere. All that is wanted is judgment in the use of it. Indeed it has rare vir" tues of a sanitary order. We allude to theso matters, for our politics teach us to do so,- and to brand him as an ignorant and boorish dolt, a misfortune to his country, who want 3 the wit or the merit to prove the truth or. falsehood of such remarks as these. For ourselves we shall be content to be stigmatised as conceited quacks, or. miserable, tricksters, if our words will not bear honestly testing., We have demonstrated, for our own fullest satisfaction, what wo say,- and wo know it to be strictly correct. There are no politics, like those which can be grown in our. hedges or fields, or dug up with our,'soils, or poured along deep and skillful drains, discoursing in right pure and eloquent runnels. Such are tho ■ politics of everyday economy. Depend upon it the politics we chiefly want are such as will instruct uSj for instance, to substitute a neat littlestove for a gaping, stupid, ruinous, and smoking fireplace and chimney. Of all the monomaniacs of our race they are tho most numerous who drink themselves to the old -enemy, or smoke themselves—before their time— out of life. People should have a little reason, just now at least, and think how much it costs, in the wear and tear of roads; while poor swains' are carting their poisonous smoke to Nelson. Better have half a dozen extra children-^-or a wasteful servant —than a chimney that cats up a forest. It - may be thought we are'going to vanish in smoke, no, no: it is the reverse. We, desire to banish smoke, and retain warmth, or anything else that "isi beneficial to our readers; but smoke is an ex-, pensive thing. The best way of making it into good politics,is'to confine it to a little stove and' pipe; but we should not put the pipe to our mouths —unless*we mean-carefully, and for the good of the public, to—swallow, not the pipe, but all that comes through it. It would be well to get up a memorial to the next Council to get a Bill to compel >atl chimneys to consume their smoke. What a saving to the turnpikes! What an improvement in* domestic politics would it occasion !

It is with extreme regret.that we have to call the attention of our readers to the Police Report in this day's impression. A Captain John MacdonaLd ' undertook, as it appears, the command of a barque called the Camilla, advertised in the London newspapers as one of a line of packets chartered and dispatched to different ports in New Zealand, and, as. runs their advertisements, ** favorite and well known for their punctuality and dispatch." We will carefully trace the history of this; vessel, from the day when, with all the glory .of a Lloyds Al certificate, she became a trap for the unwary. She is advertised to sail on October. 25th, and leaves the London Docks on January 12th, thus

i ■ . ■» ' '■ 'i' ■ '—-—■ ' I ,\ giving a fair chance for any passengers who having early encaged their cabins, sold their homes, and starting life on their little capital they have saved, after years perhaps of painful economy, to run the gauntlet of London lodging-houses, plausible men who abound in the vicinity of emigrant shipping, and the not less plausible clerks of a ship broker's office, who yearly ship their hundreds, as a woolgrower clips his; and, more careless than the flock master, lose all interest when their flock is once shorn. The shear-ing of an emigrant is a process which pays, if yon can effectually do it in one clever stroke. They do not, it is true, run the risk of death from anything above extraordinarily bad shearing, and the small bleating of an antipodeal settler, but little affects the prospects of such a firm as John Morrison and Co., of London, ii. Well, they have started to the Downs, and their vessel nearly follows their example; she absorbs twenty-seven inches of water per hour, thus affording her crew regular and healthy employment. Captain Macdonald, wise man, remains on shore xintil the vessel has passed her first night at anchor, and then, knowing her leaky state, proceeds. For the first few days, or even weeks, contrary winds, and that enemy to all sociability, sea-sickness, leaves her cabin table amply supplied. The yesterday's baked meats can coldly furnish forth her morrow's breakfast. But soon the voice of illness is. heard enquiring after certain medical comforts, which occupy so proud a position in the dietary scale published, and as far as the paper goes, libe-' rally supplied. Of these, suffice it to say, there is not one article. The weak stomach, and the aching head must alike seek relief in the medicine chest, and a dose of maqnes : sulph: must supply the place of assorted soups. The few really eatable things, with the exception of, flour, are soon amongst the things' that were, and then indeed commence the trials of the passengers. The flour, of which, there is abundance, is allowed in the proportion of about a pound a week, divided in three days, when puddings appear. Happy are i\\Q passengers on duff days; for the rest of the week salt beef, salt pork, peas, and rice, with biscuit, must be their portion. The water scants, and two quarts only is then served out. The vessel at the time is easily able to reach the Cape of Good Hope; but the master forsakes his post, and, as the evidence given in our Police Court shews, threatens with cartridges to destroy ship, passengers, and all, if annoyed. From the depths of his cabin he occasionally issues laboring under drink, until nature can no longer support him, and he falls down a victim to delirium tremens. This conduct continues (to shorten a tale we are sick of enlarging upon), until at last, with scurvy in the forecastle, with sickness in the cabin, and with watertanks dried up in yielding a daily supply scarce enough to bind together soul and body, she reaches II barton. Complaints are made; the passengers are advised by Lloyd's, agent, Magistrate, Emigration Officer, and all, to leave the issue of their case in the hands of the authorities here. They leave Hobarton again. Drunkenness again returns: till at last, wearied and worn, they chance all on reaching this port, where by a miracle they arrive. And now end their troubles, and we should hope Captain MacDonald's command. From the beach, where helplessly drunk a cart conveys him to the station house, he comes as an accuser of ill-conduct on the part of men whose lives he has so wantonly trifled with. He leaves the bar to pay his fine, and he then pleads for,protection, and asks the law to give him a right to the labors and the service of men who, had they followed his example, might justly he censured, but who it seems throughout all the passage rendered obedience, and cheerful support in all trials. There may be no help for them. The law may compel the authorities to treat their case as one where punishment is due, but the blow may" be so tempered that it shall not hurt.

We are given to understand that the passengers nve about to commence actions for breach of contract. We will not prejudge their case. Let them but prove that there has been a wanton transgression of all contracts, and we can asure them that the voice of the colony shall not be backward in redressing them. Far separated as we are^ from England, the law jvill yet protect ;> Justice, will yet shield the oppressed, and a word shall yet ring in the ears of those who forward illfound and worse commanded vessels, that though prosperous for a while in their shearing process, there is a Minoß whose shears can clip as close as theirs.