ALL ABOUT A TURTLE.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume VII, Issue 1984, 7 May 1885, Page 2

ALL ABOUT A TURTLE.

A dreadful story about the banquet given at Christchurch on March 12 to Sir Julius Vogel has just leaked out. Probably (says the Timaru Herald), we should never have heard of it, if the chef engaged on that memorable occasion had not had a dispute with his employer on the subject of wages. Their differences led to an action in the Christchurch Resident Magistrate's Court, and then did the chef a talo unfold which lias harrowed up the souls of many leading citizens,, and in some cases has produced' internal convulsions of a less poetical, but more tangible, character. It will be remembered that a very prominent part was played in that banquet by a turtle. In tho minds of some people we are not sure that tho turtle did not take precedence of Sir Julius, but everybody was at.least ready to give the' turtle second place, His arrival in Christchurch, about a month before the banquet, was hailed as quite a masterpiece of good fortune. The papers were enthusiastic in the paragraphs with which they welcomed him, and theportly citizens went about beaming with delight at the prospect of calipash and calipee. The turtle, however, did not participate in the general hilarity. As the date of the banquetapproached he became sadder and sadder. Perhaps he was pining after the friends he had-left behind. ' Perhaps his politics were not of the Vogelian hue. Probably he came from Samoa and was adverse to annexation, at any rate as apapplied to turtles. His melancholy increased "to such ah extent that the plaintiff in the action being, it is said, a " turtle doctor," was called in to see what his art could do. The chef, had reached this period of the story when the Resident Magistrate suddenly turned palo. His Worship, it appeared, had been present at the banquet, and he anxiously expressed a hope that the witness was not going to say anymore unpleasant tilings about the turtle. The chef, however, looked stern and implacable, and tho worthy magistrate, with a gulp, said it was a long time ago, and in the interests of justice he would try to bear it.. The witness then gave a touching account of the sad state of the poor turtle, and the frantic efforts made to keep it alive until the all-important night, Nothing they could do seemed to have the slightest effect in cheering up the patient, whose aspect becamo daily more and more despondent. The cook urged him to make an effort, declaring that the'" calipash" would'nt be fit to look at if he died a natural death; but even this appeal failed to .move tho inconsiderate creature. On March 7th the Cook killed the turtle, just in time to save it from dying of its own accord, and five days later it was produced in triumph at the banquet. Whether the animal, having disagreed with the banqueters in life, acted consistently by disagreeing with them in death, wo cannot say, but judging from some of the speeches mado at the gathering, it seems highly probable.,