THE SORROWS OF A TUFTITE.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume XIII, Issue 1019, 27 April 1869, Page 2

THE SORROWS OF A TUFTITE.

Is there not a nursery rhyme—late events have somewhat disarranged a memory never particularly strong —expressive of a desire to be a butterfly? Something of the kind has of late been often recurring to me. My present —and, for that matter, past —feelings have been of such a mixed character that I have frequently wished myself anything but what I happened to be ; —a middle aged gentleman afflicted by a nervous disorder, and blessed —as my friends inform me —with a wife, slightly my elder in years, who is the very pearl among women and who has a mind just masculine enough, it is said, to take charge of an invalid like myself. 1 take pride to myself of being the possessor of an hereditory attachment to the English Throne. Consequently, lam at all times a loyal subject, though, from my peculiar temperament, I am somewhat unassuming as well as poor. Yet, T could not forego the opportunity of paying homage to a representative of royalty, especially as he was coming, at some danger to himself by reason of the disturbed state of New Zealand, to assure the unfortunate colonists that her Majesty’s interest in her children was unabated, however much appearances might favour the contrary. , So it was that [ managed, out of a limited income, to transport Mrs. I and myself to the capital of the colony. I found the place very much as its worst traducers had described it. To add to the general annoyance of high winds and frequent rains, we heard that the hotel accommodation had become rather scarce through the unusual influx of visitors at this particular time and consequently it was said to be rather expensive. Our first care, therefore, was to call on a young couple who had as yet abundance of spai’e accommodation and whom we had at one time been assured were for ever indebted to us, in the hope of receiving an invitation to make a stay with them, but after a protracted call and after my wife had managed to drop several hints of our being in a position to accept such an invitation, we were forced to take our departue disappointed. I was consequently compelled to take apartments at a family hotel.

The first few days passed quietly enough, for which I was profoundly thankful, and being left very much alone by my wife, was beginning to congratulate myself on a quiet visit, when, on the fourth day, and when a false alarm had thrown the city into confusion, my worst fears were aroused by the continuous arrivaljof spruce boys with brown paper parcels, which, I learned with some trepidation from the messengers themselves, to be a number of purchases by Mrs. I from various drapers’ establishments, and and that the young men had received positive instructions not to return without the money. One bill came to eight guineas. I had learned enough from experience not to take any notice of these purchase!, but consoled myself by looking on tbem in the light of necessary developments of loyalty ; mentally resolving, at the same time, that I should so gratify the immemorial feelings of allegiance of my familly on this occasion, so as to preclude the necessity of a second visit of the kind.

To add to my other and now multiplying sources of irritation, a number of men suddenly appeared very early one morning outside my chamber window, and, in spite of my remonstrances, removed it and proceeded, with the utmost deliberation, to substitute what they called a transparency. It was anything but this however, as I afterwards found ; I having to shave by candlelight at 2 p.m. the same day. 1 was inclined to be reconciled to the change although 1 felt my health slowly giving way by the draughts thus caused ; but my wife was les3 reasonable, as she took the first opportunity of taxing the landlord with want of attention to his patrons. It grieved and injured me more than words can tell, to hear the expressions that were freely used on both sides. The end of it was that she received notice that we were at liberty to find another abode ; —several eligible lodgers being anxious to secure our indifferent accomodation, and were then waiting without. Knowing to our regret that private hospitality was not to be calculated upon, and fully aware that the insolence of our landlord was indicative of there not being another bed to be bad in town, I was fain to step in and assure the vexatious man that my deep feelings of loyalty to the British Throne never rendered it more a pleasure than to have my bedroom window darkened by tlie picture of a bucolic youth of dissipated appearance who flourished a toasting fork in his left hand and had his right foot balanced on the foretopmast of a meanly rigged ship. To my inexpressible relief the following day was Sunday, and I trusted to the wellknown sanctity of royal families that if the young prince should happen to be outside he would remain there till after breakfast next morning. With feelings thus attuned to the occasion, I, in company with my wife, left the hotel where a crowd of enthusiastic citizens were speculating on the chances of the Galatea’s appearance, and wended our way through the pictorial streets where public celebrities were wandering in strictly morning costume looking as if having been deprived of the refreshedness oi sleep for several nights, and took our seats in a place of worship. Towards what must have been the beginning of a long sermon I was abruptly awakened by the sound of cannon. The effect was positively electrical. Half the church was silently emptied, andl had the consternation of beholding my wife leave with the others. On being shortly afterwards released I had the intense satisfaction of feasting my eyes upon the form of a vessel, which, from its generally impressive and grimy appearance, I recognised as the royal frigate, and having paid my adorations to it, was on the point of starting with a light heart in quest of my wife, when a general shout directed my attention, from what I was afterwards assured was a coal hulk, to a large steamer slowly coming into sight. However much I may have regretted having bestowed my homage on a wrong quarter I could not now recall° it, but reserved my personal fealty, and determined thus to make amends, against the time when I should have the pleasure of meeting the Prince in person. The remainder of the day was spent in confusion. In the hotel there was not a meal but was half cooked, to which cause, and the indigestion that followed, I have to ascrihe all my subsequent troubles. On Monday morning I proceeded to the Colonial Secretary, by direction of Mrs 1 , to renew an acquaintance with that gentleman of some previous years’ standing, and

to endeavour to secure the favour of a pn- i vate introduction to the royal visitor for | my wife. I had been unable, from the reasons stated, to take anything to eat that morning, and I was conscious of presenting anything but an impressive appearance to the public at large. It so happened that when I sent in my card to the Hon. the Colonial Secretary a message was returned that he knew nothing about me. To add to the critical state of nervousness into which I was thus unexpectedly plunged, the messenger ordered me off the premises with a hint, not conveyed in the most delicate way possible to a nervous gentleman, that he had received instructions to prosecute me for a vagrant. I could not return with this unsatisfactory reply to the hotel, so I purchased a double ticket for the ball on Wednesday, and in this way sought to appease my wife’s obtrusiveness. Later in the day I was forced to take part in a public procession, and, in the absence of all order, found myself insinuated into the Judge’s carriage, from which I was roughly expelled by a policeman dressed in a footman’s body-clothes and followed to a neighbouring hotel bar by the enquiries of the crowd as to whether my mother knew I was out. You may be sure I did not fail, even when suffering accutely from nervous affli ction and sundry other pains which lam assured was the result of indigestion, to attend the levee at the Government House. I was duly ushered in, and when about to deliver jga short and elegantly composed speech, expressive of my own and my wife’s unaltered loyalty to the throne and constitution, at the same time offering the Prince my hand, I was politely bowed away and requested to move on. In the midst of all my troubles, it is my unfailing consolation that my attachment to the reigning family is unimpaired. Tn the evening I was suffering so much from general debility and prostration that I sent for a doctor, but was told that the whole of the faculty were engaged with influential patients seeking relief from biliousness brought on by a universal state of confusion and a loss of dignity suffered throughout the day. Towards 1 o’clock a.in., a gentleman who seemed to have borrowed the stable-boy’s coat and the barman’s voice came and ordered me a dose of mercury. As lie had nothing on him but a bottle of brandy, and the druggists’ shops being all closed, I was forced to pay him his fee—and loath I was to do this, my funds being now at their lowest ebb —but was, even with this sacrifice, thankful to be left in peace ; and as by this time the the landlord’s assistants had ceased to rush into the bedroom every ten minutes to him the candles that illuminated the transparency, I began to think that I was to be left alone. But not long. This transparency soon after went on fire, which necessitated the Fire Brigade taking their engine into the adjoining passage, and there working it most energetically, besides passing the hose (oozing all over) across my bed to extinguish the flames. To add to the annoyance, the Insurance Agent felt it incumbent on him to arrive and deliver a lecture on the exemptions from fire policies, from which, as far as I could judge, insurances could under no possible circumstances be recovered at all. During all this trying time I was mercifully delivered from the attention of my wife, who, in an adjoining apartment, was from half-past seven that night, with but odd intervals of abstraction, till consciousness left me, engaged on that difficult and interesting operation of “doing” her hair. Tuesday passed in a dull' stupor. True, there must have been rare doings going on outside, for the imprecations bore equal intensity with the expressions of loyalty indulged in by the crowd that seemed determined never to leave off talking under my window. Moreover it was raining heavily all day, and the wind blew in what remained of the transparency. After this my nerves must have failed me completely. About half-past six on Wednesday evening, on coming to again, I was, in my first lucid moments, requested, in a whisper that I durst not disobey, to arise and accompany my wife, who by this time was dressed in a most fearful and wonderful manner, to the subscription ball. In spite of a debilitated frame and a nervous system all unstrung I attempted to perform my toilet as correctly as possible, all the time taking such observations of Mrs I ’s dress as 1 might recognise her by afterwards ; for which precaution I was repeatedly twitted as being in a conspiracy to render her late for the ball. The result of this hurried dressing was that I unfortunately made an incision with my boot in a part of my trousers where it was wholly uncalled for, besides neglecting several little necessary duties, of which, in my younger days, I had been fastidiously particular, and the neglect of which I was afterwards painfully reminded of by several solicitous strangers who drew my attention and the attention of the company to their omission, —acts of kindness that seemed to amuse the others as much as they brought shame on myself. Presently, 1 was supported by the assistant barman and boots (both the worse of liquor), my wife at the same time fixing my new hat on the back of my drooping wearied head, to the door, where I found a species of cabriolet, which I afterwards ascertained my wife had hired at an enormous premium, and into this, accompanied by the grumbling of the driver, we went. We arrived at the Government House at least an hour before any other ticket-holders, and so surprised the men in attendance lighting the lamps, a few others giving the last finishing touch to the tinsel and painted calico, and two others using depreciatory remarks when hanging the shields of one or two dignitaries who must have had direct succession from Babel—such a number of fine and outlandish words being attached to each. I had besides the satisfaction of meeting my old friends the Fire men who were, thus early, lined along the passages, looking very serious in tin helmets and leather buckets. A number of men in red shirts with guns and cold steel in their hands were-arriving from the kitchen and abuisng everybody. Mrs I advanced into the middle of the House of Representatives and practiced the last edition of the quadrille, and then seated herself in a cushioned chair, on a small elevation, draped with a rather greasy banner. I was too weak to remonstrate. She remained there till expelled by a file of soldiers.

BUTTER IH SaOKS. A correspondent of an American paper describes the method used on the Pacific coast for preserving butter as follows : “ 1 think the dairymen here have an art in the management of butter that might be turned to good account at the east, but wliich I never saw practised till I came to this coast —I allude to the manner of putting up butter for market. Perhaps necessity was the mother of inventions none the-less valuable. Here snch a think as a butter firkin or a stone jar to pack butter in is unknown ; but all butter is packed in muslin sacks, made in such a form that the package, when complete, is a cylinder three or four inches in diameter, and from six inches to a foot in length. The butter goes from the churn, as soon as worked over, into the cylindrical bags made of fine bleached muslin. The packages are then put into large casks containing strong brine with a slight admixture of saltpetre, and by means of weights kept always below the surface. The cloth integument always protects the butter from any impurities that chance to come in contact with the package, and being always buried in brine, it is protected from the action of the air; and tt has been ascertained by trial that butter put up in this manner will keep sweet longer than in any other way. Besides, it is found easier and cheaper for the manufacturer than to pack either in firkins or jars. And for the retailer there is no telling the advantage oil the score of safety and convenience. These rolls of butter can lie upon his counter as safe from injury, from dust or other contact, as bars of lead—can be rolled up for his customers in a sheet of paper with as much propriety as a bundle of matches. If the consumer, when he gets home discovers specks of dust upon the outside of the sack, he can throw it into a pail of pure cold water, and take it out clean and white. As he uses the butter from day to day, with a sharp knife he cuts off from the end of the roll, in slices, the thickness to suit his wants, peels off the cloth from the end of the slice, leaving it in tidy form to place upon the table. This improved manner of packing butter first caught my eye in the market of San Francisco, where I saw cords of it piled up like pigs of lead. The simplicity and great value of the improvement so impressed me that 1 wondered the Yankees had not long ago found it out.”