SCRAPS FROM OUR NOTE BOOK.

Tuapeka Times, Volume I, Issue 49, 16 January 1869, Page 6

SCRAPS FROM OUR NOTE BOOK.

No. XVHI.-^-"QNLY A DiaG-EB." We are beginning to bow down and worship before the shrine of kid gloves md Macassar oil. The exquisite, or haw-haw, is the coming man, and all heads are to groan Tinder thp of the chjmney-pot. This may be aj sign of prpsperity ; may be a proof of advancing civilisation, but it is as mtist disagreeable one, and I, Augustus Muggins, feel called upon to-eater my protest. Are we calmly to submit to see a pack of miserable upstarts, whose minds cannot rise above the merits of a spotless shirt, or the beauties of a dapper boot, pooh-pooh and patronise a class of men to whose energy and skill the colony owes its existence? Yes, I say existence! for the vegetable kind of life of the Old Identity times can hardly bo considered in the question. Are we to pass over "without censure the petty insolence which leads many a giddy-pated minx, hardly released from black-boards and bread and butter, to glory in insulting the bone and sinew of the community; "tocock her impertinent little nose and simper out, " I don't talk to diggers.! " Well, it may be answered, all this is very trifling, is utterly unworthy of notice from so important a class as the mining interest; but it is annoying, and, to say the least of it, a dangerous omen of future casto distinctions. Only a digger ! Ay, only one of that noble army of peace who, armed with pick and shovel, have torn from the unwilling earth her long-concealed treasures ; who have founded great empires, aud raised to wealth and 6036 thousands who otherwise had remained sunk in a slough of poverty; Only, a digger! only one of a body of men whose ranks can boast more intellect and education than any other class of manual labourers, whom solitary and continual communion with nature have refined and liberalised. We are asked to elevate above such men a lot of paltry tape-measurers and flunkeys, ; because forso^fch they flaunt in cheap finery, and, Narcissus-like, are enamoured of their own loveliness ; a class, in sodtb, narrow-minded and ignorant, at once faithless and credulous, contrasting as night does with day with the .wise liberality, the indifference to creed or country which characterises the social intercourse of our mining community. If we are to have an aristocracy, let us have one with some good qualities of head and heart; let the miner enjoy otium cum dignitate while the haw-haw draws water in his chimney-pot and scrubs floors with his kid gloves. In our hive there is no room for drones, a lesson much requiring to be taught in some forcible and convincing manner. The upper seat is at present seized by a class with not one tithe of the intelligence, education, or breeding of the class they sneer at so contemptuously. We are called on to regulate our conduct by the pjsttcrn of upstarts whose breeding has come up the area steps, whose claim to the title of gentleman is founded on credit with a tailor and the possession of a perfumed handkerchief. With what superb hauteur do tlij^y puff their three-ifor-sixpence cigars; Jic% authoritative is their decision on Bfey question of ton. In jewellery of He Mosaic kind they are magnificent, HLI spare no expense in the amount of round their hats. Albeit HK'e a seedy lot, ' who are < nejrer Hk respondjto the call of charity ; pur.spa eternally "left atL ready in^fl^H conyJM^^^H