AT CHRISTCHURCH.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXV, Issue 10713, 10 November 1913, Page 5

AT CHRISTCHURCH.

EVERYTHING, QUIET

THE AUSTRALIAN CRICKET TEAM.

CHRISTCHURCH, Last Night.

At no time has the strike taken on any wildly exciting phases at Lyttelton.

On Saturday morning, under drizzling showers, there were disconsolate groups of men standing about, and the port generally looked exceedingly dismal. A fair number of strikers went up to town by the early trains to get some amusement on the first day of the carnival week, but the majority stayed at port, possibly for reasons not unconnected with tinance. The s.s. Maunganui, with a further consignment of racehorses, was awaited with considerable interest, but it was not anticipated that there would be any trouble. The boat was said to have left Wellington at 7.45 p.m., and she was expected at the wharf about 8 a.m., but she made a good, passage and tied up about 7.15 a.m., tlitis having done the distance in under I'2 houre and fringing fine weather with her. , !

The passage was smooth and uneventful and the official statement set forth that 615 excursionists had come down in the vessel for Cup week.

The horses brought down numbered about a couple of dozen. Outposts and stragglers of the waterside workers watched the landing of the horses, but there was no interference or disturbance of any kind, and tip racers t were taken through the town a,nd trucked without incident. j < The Maunganui did not make : [long cstay at Lyttelton, for she is urat Wellington. She took a few passengers on board and sailed again at 9.25 a.m. !t will not be long now ere the storage at Lyttelton for dairy produce will be lull up. Already some of the Peninsula factories are carting their cheese to Little River by jroad, and railing the produce to Lyttelton, as they cannot get it sent round by sea.

The Press Committee of the Lyttelton Waterside Workers' Union handed in the following manifesto to the newspapers 5 p.m.,"Everything On the waterfront is going On smoothly. A telegram has' been received from stating that tho Union Steamship Company's permanent men in Wellington have thrown in their lot with the strikers in Wellington. Several tradesmen in Wellington have intimated to the Strike Committee their intention of standing by the watersiders in their time of trouble, and the committee desires to thank those tradesmen on behalf of the union. All hands are very cheerful, and do nothing, andprovisions are coming to hand freely." A local labour leader to-day asked the manager of the N.Z. cricket team, on the telephone, if it was true that he Had taken a list of his staff and asked if they would volunteer to work on the wharves should need arise. He declined to affirm or deny the- statement, whereupon he was informed that the Unionists of Australia would be asked to boycott the team's i matches in Australia. Mr S. Orchard., the gentleman referred to above, admitted to a representative of the press that the facts were correct. "As far as lam concerned," ho said, "X don't see that the strike people have got any right to dictate to us what we must do. They liavo not got the power to run .the universe. 1 won't be dictated to by them, any* more than I expect to them to be dictated to by me. Things have surely come to a pretty pass when a man has to do what these 'labour leaders' tell him, and must not hold views contrary to theirs. They can try and do their worst.' It will only; be a good advertisement for the team. If they iefuse to take our baggage aboard and •ashore, well, we can do it ourselves." "What if tho seamen refuse to ■sail the ship?" queried the reporter. "Well, I suppose we can't swim across," replied Mr Orchard with a smile. In reply "to further questions. Mr Orchard said he had not heard of any attemnt being made to influence the New Zealand Cricket Council or nfembere of the N.Z. cricket team to block his going as manager.