TO THE EDITOR OF THE "WEST COAST TIMES."

West Coast Times, Issue 62, 26 October 1865, Page 3

TO THE EDITOR OF THE "WEST COAST TIMES."

Sir, — It having come to my knowledge that 'the sham presentation of a watch and chain to Mr Thatcher has gone the round of tho New Zealand and Victorian journals, and being one *of the parties to the presentation, and fearing that such a hoax may prove detrimental to Mr Thatcher's, professional reputation, I now take the opportunity of publicly stating through the medium of your valuable journal that of all the •gentlemen present on tho occasion referred to •only two were cognisant that such a •hoax was to be perpetrated. And it was the intention of Mr Thatcher's friends and : admirers, if he had not left Hokitika so hastily, to have presented him with a substantial token <of their fespeot; and even at tho present moment they regret that they should have been •made parties to such a disreputable transaction. Trusting you will give this iv comer in your next issue, and that it will bo the means of setting Mr Thatcher right with the public, I am, Sir, &c> H. W. Bracken. Hokitika, 25th Oct., SSGS.

Gossip.— The bnne of social life ; always indicating a small mind, having affinity with Jpctty concerns ; often a malicious mind, •delighting in traducing others 5 irreverence for truth risking tho violation of it for the pleasure •of telling stories, which may be false, often are "known to be so ; great lack of honour — a sneaking disposition, saying behind the back of ■another what would not be said before his face ; presumptive want X)f power to converse on nobler subjects ; at least lack of interest in them. Generally supposed to belong exclusively to woman but supposed very incorrectly. Male gosiips are very numerous and are worse than female. Their spheres are different. Women gossip chiefly about domestic life, love, marriago, flirtation, servants, entertainments, — and a ■world of mischief they do there — of heart* burnings, heart sinkings, and heart breakings — 'of broken ties and aliented affections. But men gossip too. Authors, professors, commercial men — oh I what keen, biting, withering •gossip they have I half untrue, wholly needless. Literary gossip, political gossip !— why the world is half ruled by gossip — half its miseries are mado by gßssip. 'ffitte Press. — The press penetrates every nook and corner of society ; it searches out and apprehends the most reoluso and tho most unsocial — in the city and in the fields, in the palace ■and in the cotlago it steals unawares upon the guilty and rebukes the 'conscience ; it is an officer of justice who does wot need to seek out the criminal, for the criminal himself seeks out the officer, and takes him to his homo as a >f riend and companion . Unlike the pulpit, the press preaches at home and iw secret ; the reader need not dress and walk one mile or five to church, in ordor to bo addressed by the preacher of the press, for tho preacher comes to him, and goes to bed with him in the garden, or by tne livevside, and pours into the intellectual ears of his vision the words which he has the commission to ulter. Thk Power 0* Hunger. — It is hunger which "brings stalwart navvies together in orderly gangs to cut paths through mountains, to throw bridges across rivets, to intersect tho land with the great Iron "ways "which bring city into daily communication with city. Hunger is tho overseer of tliose tacn 'erecting palaces, prison-houses, barracks, and villas. Hunger sits at the loom, "whicn, with stealthy power, is weaving the vonrdrotis fabrics of cotton and silk. Hunger labours at the furnace and the plough, coercing the native indolence of man into strenuous and incessant activify. Let food be abundant and ■easy of access, and civilisation becomes impossible, for our higher c fforts are dependent on our lower impulses in an indissoluble mannor. Nothing but the necessities of food will forco man to labour, which ho hates, and will always avoid when possible, — Bluckwood HowReOHUITS ARfc OBTAtNRD At DA»ABOUB.— When soldiers are wanted, 'said our informant) and recruits aro scarce, a roview is given. A number of ingenuous manoeuvres aro executed by the troops, which result, first, in the spectators finding themselves enclosed in a square, and next, in the ablo.bodied ones being marohed off as 'conscripts to the Padishah's army. When this device gets 'stale, another measure is adopted, not calculated, one would think, to prsmote the better observance of tho Sabbath in Damascus ; soldiers are sent to the doors of tho mosques to catch all who may be insido* When this in turn begins to fail, and tho Damascenes will neither attend reviews nor go to church, tho authorities, fall back on a plan of mmplo effiacy, and send soldiers to kidnap peoplo in their houses at night. Horse-dealing in Syria, 1854, in Hlankwoirlc Magazine,