AT THE CORNER.

Thames Star, Volume XV, Issue 4898, 20 September 1884, Page 2

AT THE CORNER.

[by nemo.]

Homo sum, liumani nihil a me aliemmi puto,

It is not often that I have a growl at our city Fathers, in fact I think they have —considering the means at their disposal and (he great drawbacks in the way. of floods they have had to contend with— done exceedingly well in the matter of forming roads and footpaths throughout the Borough, but there is one thing which requires attention without delay, and that is the rat-holes in the asphalt footpaths. These are particularly numerous in parts of Pollen street, and are really dangerous to those who are unaware of their existence. I was walking along Pollen street, near Mary street, the other evening when a youDg lady just in front of me inadvertently put her foot into one of these traps, and fell heavily against a building. It is a wonder that there have not been more serious accidents from this cause, and as the cost of filling up the holes would be but trifling I have no doubt this hint will be sufficient to cause the matter to be attended to.

As showing that genius is existent iv our midst, I am glad to get the opportunity of publishing the following composition, presented to Miss flaselden, head mistress of the Kauaeranga Girls' School, from the pen of one of her former pupils, Miss B. Watkin :—

Once again the passing seasons in their varying course have rolled, Ciolden summer, fruitful autumn, stormy winterwild and cold— Who, reluctantly departing, veils his gloomy face betimes, And—in ebon clouds enshrouded—wings his flight to other climes.

Gentle spring- her mild dominion over Nature's scenes maintains, Wakes the sleeping birds with sunbeams, bathes them with refreshing- rains; Tunes anew each feathered songster, that with winter's cold was mute; And with fresh and verdant garment clothes each branch and springing shoot.

On the year's returning pinion comes thy birthday with the spring, Once again our fondest wishes, and our loving gifts we bring For another year's instruction, patient work and tender care, We are met to-day to thank you, and our testimony bear.

But the months have brought their changes—some are gone who used to meet— And we miss familiar faces that would make our ranks complete; Still, though distance may divide us on this wellremembered day, They have loving thoughts and wishes, and with us uniting say:—

" May your future in the distance, free from sorrow and from care, Bring- you happiness and comfort, and as sunny spring be fair, And with kindest friends surrounded to accompany your way, May your life be spared to \vitnc3s many another glad birthday."

Recognition by long-established Home journals of colonial publications is quite flattering to those whose efforts are taken notice of. Therefore I give a brief concensus of an article appearing in the July number of Temple Bar. A publication on the Thames in days gone by is apparently the object of the remarks, which run to this effect:—"The least satisfactory use of Scriptural quotations that has come under our notice is, that of employing them as headings to trade advertisements. A few years ago there used to be published in New Zealand an eight-paged paper entitled 'Enoch, an occasional journal, devoted to the consideration of prophecy.' Seven pages of it were filled with balderdash, professing to be prophetic interpretations of the • signs of the times, I—-as1 —-as indications of the near approach of the millenium. But the eighth, page was filled with tradesmen's advertisements, each one of which was headed by a passage of Scripture: 'Eise Peter, kill and eat,' was the text of a family butcher. One shoemaker took, • Over Edom will I cast my shoe,* and a second, ' Thy shoe is not waxen old upon thy foot'; while a bookseller heralded his announcement with, • Understsndest thou what thou readest?' About these and others of the selected quotations there was a certain verbal appropriateness, but in some instances there was nob even that excuse. At any rate, for ©ur own part, we fail to see the connection in the following example : ' Owe no man anything, but to love one another'—a pair of trousers for a guinea."

Mr Selby has come, delivered his lecture on " Moses and Darwin," and has taken his departure from our midst. He showed Moses to be an " ignorant man ; because he lingered forty years in a " bit of a desert." Darwin would surely have done better than that, he left his hearara to infer. He did not candi«My admit the reason why Moses and the Israelites had had to wander about ! for forty years. Oh, no; nor did he explain how an "ignorant man" would be able to write so profoundly philosophic a book as the Pentateuch. "Ignorant" men do not much trouble themselves about the beginning of things, about systems of legislation, or matters of that kind; they are usually indifferent to such trifles. Their minds and desires take a lower range, and canaot well lift themselves to a consideration, much less a solution of the topics grappled with and dealt with by Moses. Yet Mr Selby put down Moses as an ignorant man. No one but an ignorant man will believe such a statement. Should any one believe him 00

n po ahe ught (i l).- •• writ!* n down au bss." xxx. On the chronology of the Bible, Mr Selby, was, as he imagined, awfully convincing—convincing of course as to the utter erroneousness of it. Archbishop Usher had made a table of dates on the margin of some version of the Bible ; and Mr Solbv incorporated this table with the Sacred Volume, and then condemned the Sacred Volume because of tlip errors of the table. Mr Taylor objected to this, but his objection was not driven home as it might have been. The disputants overlooked the obvious faci hat the Bible is not a book of dates, or was ever intended to be taken as such ; but a book pt crM or morality. This and nothing else. Those persons who are ever mouthing about the Bible, the whole Bible, and nothing but the Bible, for anything and everthing, from goldmining to calculating the distance of the stars, or the geological formation and antiquity of the earth ; misunderstanding the nature of the Bible in tote, go much farther than men of Mr Selby's type can go to bring it into disrepute in i the opinion of the superficial or even halfignorant.

The point that Mr Taylor should hare urged is somewhat like this:—The chronology of the Bible is not the chronology of the globe we inhabit; but only the chronogly of the human race itself; and consequently it imposes n% limits on the antiquity of the earth. Asv this is the fact, Mr Selby's arguments about the truths of geology as contradicted by the Bible, cannot be considered anything else than claptrap. Moses had no roncern for geology. It is a pity Mr Selby is so ignorant as not to know so much.

The following, from a recent issue of the Tuapeka Times, shows the nature of the reports of mining matters on the Thames which are found in some Southern journals :—" On the Prince Imperial claim, Thames, things are looking well. Some good bright mineral has beeu met with, but no gold has been seen for some time. The course has changed considerably lately, and the reef will bow run oat on the northern instead of the eastern boundary, about 30 feet ahead.—There is nothing fresh to report from the other claims in the Thames district." Of course, after this flattering account of our prospects, published in such a widely circulating journal as the Times, there is not much hope for the district's future, but still we mean to keep on pegging away, and perhaps, should the editor of the Times ever get a reliable account of our position, or open his purse-strings bo far as to appoint a correspondent here, his readers will open their eyes when they learn that the mine spoken of so disparagingly has produced no less than IGOOozs. within a fortnight, with a good prospect of further rich yields when new blocks are opened up.