SPEECHES AT THE RAILWAY MEETING.

Thames Star, Volume VIII, Issue 2980, 3 September 1878, Page 4

SPEECHES AT THE RAILWAY MEETING.

(To the Editor of the Evening Stab.)

Sir,—-From the interest I take in all that relates to the well-being of the Thames, and the furtherance of its prosperity, I cannot but advert to the proceedingsiof the public meeting convened on Thursday night at the Theatre Eoyal. The object of the meeting was to urge on the i Government: the, desirability of con- ■ structing the Thames and Waikato Railway. From the advertisement one would infer that it met for that;; purpose only, yet we find some of the speakers by no means confining'themselves- to the topic on hand, but wandering into others utterly irrelevant. Mr Speight, the mover, aud Mrßrown, the seconder of the resolution of congratulation, kept the avowed object steadily in view, and spoke pithily to the point; but what reference Mr Mitchell's speech of condolence with Mr Mackay upon th,e loss of his jpro'perfcy' bad to do with the Thames and Waikato Railway, I am at' a loss t&» I ; iim fact, the meeting apparently was used by a few of Mr Mackay's satellites and. parasites as an occasion on which to bring him againprominently before, the public. The ties of friendship may be strong, and all due allowance. made for them, but when a conspiracy has been entered into by which a man to whose name an odour of merited unpopularity has been attached is brought to the front of a meeting where all .were unanimous in their purpose, that by a parade of his public services he might ingratiate himself once more with the Thames public, not only is a glaring falsehood perpetrated, but a deliberate insult offered to the public who responded to the advertisement. I might assign a higher motive than that of self-interest to the utterances of Mr Mitchell, and even venture panegyric on, the nobility of friendship, did I not feel inclined to inquire whether the liberal application of . praise and condolence— mixed with regret that the public bad not recognised his great services for the general good—had any connection with Mr Mitchell acquiring large blocks of land from the natives: From this point of view one good turn deserves another, and mayhap the brilliant eulogy upon Mr James Mackay actually proceeded from no higher motive than mutual agreement to play into each other's hands. Mr Mitchell has not emulated the example, of the boy lying under the cherry tree-r-to whom he likened the people of the Tbames-rbut he has scaled the branches and plucked the ripest and best of the fruit, whilst his coadjutor was conveniently blind, find remiss in his duty, to the public. Mr Mackay must have lately drunk deeply of the milk of human kindness when he came to' countenance a meeting specially convened to express congratulatory ■ resolritions to the premier, towards whom it is not to be expected he would cherish any friendly feelings. Mr Mackay, in opehing his speech, remarked that the information, desired 1 he could give disinterestedly, as he held no landed interest in' the proposed line of railway, and no mining interest at the Thames. Actuated, by'such a noble spirit, all the feeling he had was to see a place he had so 'long been personally' connected with take its proper, position. I congratulate Mr Mackay on his clever casuistry, but regret that it should have been practised so.patently so that the dullest comprehension coulqi detect the cloven foot. I' am strongly' of opinion that this public spirited man did not. accompany those engineers, but that they accompanied him. At that time he did actually possess land, and singularly enough he did contrive to make both of the lines converge in the centre of his \ firm, merely as a fresh proof of bis disintereste'driess, I presume. Facts speak for themselves, and we must elect to stand by them. He led the meeting right through the proposed main trunk lines as explored by himself, and those eminent engineers who accompanied him, so that he might gratify his own egotism, and sound his own trumpet; yet, what a change has come over the spirit of his dream relative to the proposed lines since his farm has passed from his hands. He has dis covered with his vaunted disinterestedness and public spiritedness that it would be much to the interest of the Thames if the surveys were changed and the line run six miles higher up through theTe Aroha block. What has caused this sudd en burst of zeal ? From his speech we discover a hidden animus towards the Inspector of the Bank of New Zealand, because that gentleman is now theowner, of what was Mr Mackay's property. To Mr Mitchell's condolence that the public had not recognised Mr Mackay's public services, in that they had not reimbursed to him Uie funds expended in their services; I reply far from them having so ■noble; a vent, they were expended upon his own pleasures. To what a pitch of disinterestedness has he attained ! : How near is the prosperity of the Thames to his heart, since there is no longer a Block 27, a Tokatea claim, a Hikutaia township, a Tairua claim* a Tairua-Native reserve, or miners' rights to be distributed for a new rush to Ohinemuri. —lam,.&c, Peo Bono Pubiico.