THE Evening Star. PUBLISHED DAILY AT FOUR O'CLOCK P.M. Resurrexi. THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 1875.

Thames Star, Volume VII, Issue 2103, 30 September 1875, Page 2

THE Evening Star. PUBLISHED DAILY AT FOUR O'CLOCK P.M. Resurrexi. THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 1875.

It appears that there is some probability of the session being somewhat shorter in duration than was expected at one time from the determined attitude of the conflicting parties in the House. Since the arrangement come to between the Government and the Opposition business has progressed swimmingly, but now and again a point arises which developes in full force the latent vigour of the Opposition. Such an incident was reported in our telegrams j'esterday, when the Colonial .Treasurer proposed to amend certain clauses in the Abolition Bill as reported to the House from Committee. Sir George Grey protested, and the Government gave way, preferring to take matters as they are to risking a discussion on Sir George's threatened motion to re-commit the bill. Whatever the Opposition as a body may think, Sir George Grey is evidently watching narrowly every fresh move of the Government, and will not bo deluded into a false security regarding the situation. If no other good comes out of this, it will keep Ministers on the alert, and probably the session will not be so barren of results after all. The estimates are beiug passed without much debate, and it is quite on the cards that as soon as they have been appi'Qved some of the legislation which was promised may be relegated to a new parliament. The Opposition have evidently gained an advantage in securing the various concessions forced from the Government during the progress of the.abolition debate, and this advantage they are not likely to forfeit by anything like trifling obstructiveness ; but at the same time the Opposition in the person of its leader is quite prepared to stand its ground and exact the terms of the compromise to the letter, Now that the great struggle of the session is over it would perhaps be judicious for the Government to deal lightly with many subjects they had intended to legislate upon, and reserve for the consideration of the constituencies some of the measures they were at one period anxious to pasi during this session. The Qualification of Electors Bill has been thrown out. Another very important measure is looked for, namely, the bill to amend the representation of the colony. To us this bill is all-important. [Since this was in type we have received a telegram stating that representation as a whole will not be disturbed, but only cases of glaring injustice and inequality dealt with this session.]

The finishing stroke has been put to th Abolition of Provinces Bill so far as the House of Eepresentatives is concerned, and the bill has been read a third time and passed. Sir George Grey and his most prominent supporters entered their last protest against the measure, characterising it as unconstitutional and uncalled for. To maintain their character for consistency they could not do less. Sir Donald McLean would not allow them to protest without recording his convictions that they were wrong and the Government right. The bill had forty supporters ; the number of " noes" has not been wired, but it is probable there would be a clean majority of fifteen or twenty. The Bill has now to pass the ordeal of the Council, but it is not very likely that its fate will bewjeopardised there. It is rather a ticklish Bill for the Lords to deal with at all, as it has money clauses.attached which cannot be interfered with in the Upper House. An affirmation of the principle is all that need be looked for in the Council, and this can best be gained by returning the Bill as it passed the House, for which there is some excuse in the.fact that its operation is to be left to a new Parliament.

The second team whkih. Auckland has sent round the colony to meet all comers on their own grounds has returned to Auckland—with one exception bearing on their bodies, we are told, as we expected to be told, marks legibly writ in black and blue, but in excellent spirits nevertheless. Their return necessarily differs from that of the cricket team who, under the captaincy of Mr "W. W. Robinson, won every match they were engaged in. The present representatives have had the ill luck "to be defeated in each of their matches, and as far as we can gather from the meagre items of news supplied by telegrams seem never to have had a chance with even the least formidable of their antagonists. But though every one in Auckland naturally would have been, more glad had they, like the former team, returned victorious, and gloried in a second success achieved by their Provincial Football Players, not the less do we hope that all will accord to the returned team that praise to which we consider them justly entitled; not for what they have done, but for what they have endeavored to do. There is a much hackneyed quotation so much used in the House of Commons formerly as to be the signal for laughter when attempted now, which seems specially applicable to our football representatives. It is as follows— • .

" 'Tis not in mortals, to coinnfti)i£ success, •, But we'll do more, Sempronius, we'll gesepys ft." And few wo think who know the difficulties with which the representatives had to contend in their struggle after a football success; or how those difieulties great enough in the first instance became greater each succeeding match they

played; and how iv spite of bruises and wounds they played on to the end, will venture to deny that they deserved it. The fact is that we expected too much, and are naturally, if not properly, disappointed. Many were so puffed up-by what had been clone by the unexpected success of the cricket team, that they unreasonably expected the same success from the football team. They remembered how that same cricket team had left Onehnnga not so long before with evil augurings as to their future success in the minds of many, and unkind words on the lips of not a few. They were presumptuous in going at all, so 'twas said, and doubly presumptuous In taking such a team with them and calling it a representative eleven. Some said they would lose every match; few thought they would win many ; no one expected they could win all. But the news of one victory after another fairly astonished the Auckland cricketing cognoscenti. Good bowling in every case beat moderate batting, and lour horses drew the victors along the streets of Auckland amidst the shouts of the Aucklanders, who seemed thereafter to think, and their parliamentary representatives re-echoed the sentiment in the House of [Representatives, that their athletes could whip creation. With this exalted notion of themselves and theirs, they seemed to think little of the difficulty of getting a football team together in the first place, and the still greater difficulty of that football team winning in the second. They forget, or did. not know, that a cricketer, especially a bowler, may be of the greatest use to an eleven, even though he had never played with any of its players before; but that for a man, however brilliant, to be of much use in a football team, he must have played often with the same men, understand their play and they bis, and be able thoroughly to rely on them^and they on him. To get a fifteen together who are in constant practice one with another is obviously hard, but the difficulty does not end here. Unless a man is really incapacitated from playing cricket by a strained leg or a split bond, the more he plays the better he and consequently hjs side becomes ; but the case with football players is different. Hardly a match is played in which some of the players have not had quite enough of it at the end of two hours. Vicious hacks are not got over in the couple of days which intervene between that match and the next; and a limping half-back, who, but for his pluck, has no business to be playing at all, testifies pretty plainly to the twist he got from that last charge the day before yesterday. All these difficulties our representatives hed to contend with ; they have done their best, and theirs be all the glory due to those who their best have done. If any other of the Provinces think that they can send a football team round the colony and beat all comers on their own grounds, let them j try it; but, credo experto, the less they expect the less will be their disappointment. < ne word more about these football matches and the excuses made for defeat. As far as we can see no excuse is needed. No ma* who knew anything about football would, we think, ever have expected much in the way of success ; and it is bad form, to say the least of it, having sent a representative team, to say—" Had Eees, Eobinson, Dacre, and others been there, the result would have been different." No one supposes for a moment that the best team the Province could produce was actually sent, and no one we should think ever imagined that it would be possible to send it. We simply sent the best team we could induce to go, and they have been defeated. Well, let "Christchurch, or Dunedin, or any other province send the best team they can get to leave their homes and play immediately after a sea voyage, on strange grounds and see what the result will be. We have simply failed in an attempt when success was extremely problematical, and it looks very much like 'weakness to make excuses when none are required. There is certainly no need of the Cross to run down those who went, neither can we see any reason why the Herald should endeavour to make the Thames and Waikato the causes of failure. That paper states-—"The only people who must feel a little ashamed of themselves must be the Thames and Waikato residents, not for the part they have taken, but for the part they have not taken in the affair. Had they exerted themselves to have sent a few good men, a different tale'ihight have been told. But they have deserted their province in her need out of a little paltry pique, which, in both cases, arose from mere idle rumours which they chose-to give credence to" With the Waikato we have nothing to do, but we can say most positively that no feeling of " paltry pique," or any other similar reason weighed with Thames football players in not going. How could it, when a Thames man was chosen as Captain of the team? We fully acknowledge that we have two players at ! least equal if not superior to any in Auckland, and had they gone what the Herald says is true,- " a different tale might have been told," but that they did not go though asked was entirely owing to private reasons with which neither we nor the Herald have any concern whatever. We can but repeat that no excuse is needed, and that it is worse than useless to try and manufacture one by endeavouring to make other people bear the blame where no blame attaches.