JOTTINGS from WELLINGTON.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume XV, Issue 4671, 16 March 1894, Page 2

JOTTINGS from WELLINGTON.

I•: (Prom Out 6wa ; Correspondent-^^^B

move.—Local Bodies object to. pay f#.S if Piper.—A musty iimmt %.-ZV Balkme Suggestion:.-Sunday An emtknt Easter [ excwsion.-lht"%M. Queen's "Navu":- ! '^'-;V' : -0~ : &Si?

■;\Nothihg else'ia. talked ofhere but the licensing elections, and nearly much interest appears to be taken ih ! them as in'the last' ffgltjtfHHHHfl for Parliament. Of nominations for the received up to the time of writing, at:|m least twelve oi the candidates are ; running on the moderate ticket, It is /\|Vi| generally, believed that this ticket will- ' ->» i carry the.day in' it is :^; reported that the cans. Have thrown.iij^ieir^ influence '" with the > " rediiotion;. of lioonses" ■■.•■ ?P, party "with the obpot of securing the •■- , : v: closing of the.lbwer-olasa,drinking "."A houses and thereby conserving: their : own. interests; by having fewer houses - and at the Bame thrin thro'win'g.a bob- ' .to' the temperance people'. At this is s\ a faoy.it is a;very knowing dodge, tor a .reduotion would, of course, mean > an increased trade to those hotels left ,opeq, bat ,iL does not' reflect very muoh .dredit upon the loyalty of. ; he , publioans 'towards one nnother as a body. ;";.''■'■:.;;•" : ;-.-. :

Only one lady; contrary to expeo talions, has had the courage tocome forward as a candidate for the Suburbs Licensing Committee. As there are several nominations, from the-same district; (Petone), I doubt vervimuoh lfsbe will have. a,.ohanoe of election,'' and will probably deoide to retire be. forepolli% day.. .The inembers of the Prohibition and. Bociai:Beform Leagues ars very actively oanvassing ' the oity and suburbs, but the antiprohibitionists and Publioanß'' l party generally appear'lo be "lyins verv low." The Rev. L. M. laitfc has chosen Wellington as his headquarters for the" licensing election oampaiga, and addresses meetings here on the five evenings preceding .the polling day. I notice it stated that Mr Jeitt has been "boycotted "here, for the reason that he has bam unable to seoure the skating-rink 1 whioh to addresa.meetings. Thie belief has probably arisen from the faot that the v letting of the riak is in the hands of ft firm of hotel brokers.

A great.deal of grumbling is going !on over the fact that theoost ofthe licensing elections has to be borne by the Local BodiA. Many of the poorer local bodies round Wellington state their expenditure is quite beyond their income at present without being earl* died with the extra cost of expensive eleotions. It is ,irobable that a movement will be made to have the Aot so amended next session as will ensure the cost of future elections being borne by the Government.

■ There weremany anxious enquiries at iv oertain hotel in Welltngtonj lasb week, regarding the whereabouts of a pushing young Masterton storekeeper, and when the dismal new? was told that he had departed by tlfo " Tata. wera" ; for other dimes'there were lamentations and reyilings loud and strong. I believe a good many Wellington .merohants will have oanse to regret that they placed their trust in such a dooidedly "badegg." Tub only hope is now thatlbe Ofioial Assignee may bs able to pull something out of tbo fire. In the meantime, I believe the long arm of tha law is being stretched out with the object of ascertaining the gentleman's whereabouts. In suoli good repute qb ;n enterprising and Bmart bueiness man was Mr A,, that only last week a gentleman who represents a-Mel-bourne house in New Zealand journeyed specially up to Masterton to appoint the .wanderer hia agent, but fortunately for him the bird had already flown, Ibelievethattbemanner in whioh he opened his accounts with the various banks was very,clever,bufc like moat too olever peopled over* reaohed himself through toomuob, ' confidence in his smartness whioh resulted in enquiries being made.

The "Cadet "business as applied to aheep stations and farms has re- ; ceived a decided " showing up " lately in Canada, whero the system was pur* seed to such an extent thJt, many people found it more profitable to lake - " cadets" at handsome premiums and •i farm "them instead of their lands. I came aorosß a oase here the .other day whioh leads me to suppose that ' cadettipg is not by any means the line thing for young fellowß, as one usually supposes it to be in this oolpny, Ayoung fellow came out from Home some three years ago, and very shortly after landing he obtained the position of "oadet" on a large sheep ~ station Bomewhere up oountry. The premium was £75 a year, and the|eu« gagement was for twoyears. In return for this ,£76 a year he was to leara all the details of sheep" farming and receive in addition his keep,-he was also to live in the manager's. house, and be treated in fact" like one of the family." Well the young « new chum "fresh from a pubMobooL . and coinforts of English country hooso.. up country.!'' He found the station well enough, but ;he did, not find else for his £75 a year. The Manager's H house" was a four roomed.shanty with a lean-to forakitphon. The "family" cqo,sipled of the mqneger himself a, drunken cpok and, a horde of p>gg, The manager wag a rough: illiterate bully, mora often than not the worse for liquor,. The accommodation and the cooking were vile, the dirt Shd the inßepts,were worse, and the society of the manager not being peculiarly fascinating, our friend betook himself to one of the men's tvhares where be Jived for over two years doing A 4 rouae-aboula work on the homestedMMjP and picking up whathe couldofsheep" *" farming in the intervals, wbioh wbb Dot yerymuch. Now of course in my friend's caße it would bare been far better for him bad he simply gone up country and woiked for bis" tucker'' instead of paying £75 a year for the privilege of. doin? dirty jobs about the homestead which the hardest ".dead-beat;! would have turned us nose up at. }\q would l hav<j learnt infinitely more ah.qi}t slje'ep Bnd,Bayed;hia£lqO into the bargain, The ''Cadet " ; bneiness was, ip faot, a delusion,and;a, enare Now, Jam perfectly, aware, that this is an ex. optional case, hut still I have shown , that iit- is possible for each a take-in tojtoppeh -and aWraWsimilar instapoeaWvillgivo this Colony almost *'•!s ifamVaseanada hasao'hieved. young strangers ' * /s B°^:|ib? ; Motiier;Country with capital / ' " < #?fWfMuaily take up land, but * --VE lllflipw themorT jf w^^l wtrntmuaM

The Ballanco Memorial people are ■ in 8: quandary where to pat their .monument now they; have decided to I ereotone. To the minds of moat people there is only one place where it would : -be moat appropriately plaoed, and that - is io the grounds of the Parliament 'Building's.. Permission 10 : erect the memorial there would, no doubt, be readily granted by the Parliamentary House Committee (they are the proper , people to apply to, no*, the Premier), ' : and,"indeed, no hcttcr sito could be •seleoted for the purpose. Future ■generations of legislators would then = always be reminded as they entered the grounds that whatever his mie« .takes may have been tho Liberal party was once led by a man good and . . tme. The memorial, though imposing enough on paper, will not, I am told, ornamental, although has been done for £SOO <w was ' possible, As a matter of fact I believe ' all the designs flero disappointing,

' Those same Parliament • House -gtoiudkby the way, present just ■rirjwßWry woe-begono appearance, as tibtbing but he.ips of clay and excavations., If the co operative : workmen do not blurry up it will be a tight squeeze to get thingß straight for the session, An act of vandalism has been committed in cutting down the pine trees which stood in front of the buildings, Even when levelleddown and swarded the grounds will present a very bare appearance without the trees, The fountain and the memorial will not even compensate for their loss. We have few—too few—tre s about Wellington to part with old Iriends iu this ruthless fashion.

The n"« Railway Commissioners should take a bint from the Directors of the Wellington and Manawatu Railway Company and tun Sunday trains into the country on their line, to say. Featberston. The Sunday trains od the Manawatu line are always crowded and people greatly appreciate being able to obtain ut ttip into the country at cheap fares, The same arrangement on the WellingtonMastertoa section would also find favour. As trains do run on Sunday as far as the Upper Huttit would entail very little extra expense to extend the trip over the Rimutakas.

Town sportsmen are growling a good deal about the date fixed for the opening of the shooting season for native 01 imported game. "They say the date should have been the 21st of (bis month in order that advantage might have been taken of the Easter holidays to slaughter the game. They further state that oountry "pot hunters" will get all the fun, and there will be nothing left later on, I am loth to believe this latter statement, however, for my experience is that the true "pothunter" is your town sportsman, who bangs away at the sight of any feathers or fur within reasonable distance of him, irrespective of size, sex, or condition, with the object of getting as large a bag as possible, One thing is quite certain, and thai is there is ut large amount of poaohing going on around Wellington, for feathered game is exceedingly scarce, and the hares are almost exterminated, " The pretty little rab* bits so engagin' in their habits," like the poor, we have always with us, even in the immediate vicinty of town,- ■ 9\|J ■ ■ '

la£a not as a rule au enthusiastic concert goer, tbat is I mean to amateur concerts, but I was tempted on Moods; night to go to the Wellington Liedertafel's" Ham ahend " (men's evening),. Contrary to expectations I enjoyed myself immensely, and listened with great pleasure to the admirable selection of. music, which the Society entertained its guests with. Nearly all the items on the programme consisted of part songs entirely unaccompanied and the effect, was extremely pleasing. The Liedertafel is composed entirely of male 'singers, and they hare been most carefully, and efficiently trained by their conductor, Mr Robert Parker, who is a great enthusiast in the art of male part singing, as, indeed, he is in all the other branches of music The light .and shade 1 of the various partitsongs were given with great effefciahd admirable- precision, the manly voices of the singers convey inga pleasurable impression whioh is eeldom felt when listening to mixed chorees most of whom are generally imperfectly trained in their parts and very unevenly balanced. The concerts too are of the free and easy order, whioh the soul of man lovetb, for the fragrant weed can be puffed and the cheering cup can be quaffed without let or hindrance. It muet not,'however,-be supposed tbat the . members of the Liedertafel are so ungallant as to altogether exolude the fair sex from their concerts, for on certain occasions it throws open its concert room to the ladies, when of course the delights of the pipe and the glass are banished from the festive scene. .

A great eland was made by a very e iplarge firm of grocers in town some "time ago to abolish altogether the credit system. They sold the very ■ best of goods at the very lowest market prices, bat for cash down. For a time tlie experiment succeeded fairly well, but alas for the frailty of human nature, times became hard, gnrlEadycasli was not BO plentiful .: regular oustomere' \pts became lees frequent. Reluctantly the firm was forced to the conclusion that something was wrong. They made enquiries,' and foubd the trouble was the no credit system. 'ihey then notified their former ouatpmers that monthly bills would be allowed,- la a week the trade doubled, and for thirst mouth the bills Were paid promptly,' but by degrees they ran into three months, and some into six even. The oash system had to be dropped, it would not work in Wellington. That firm has to do what . every other grocer of standing in Wellington does, it has to give long credit or lose its custom, The reason for this is not far to eeek, In ftpfWelliagton there are a very large people who belong to the salaried class, they either draw their salaries monthly or quartorly. They have an objection to pay _ cash, because they can't make their incomes go so far.' They pay their butcher one quarter, their grocer the next, their baker the next and bo on till they have got to the erJpV of' their list of" obliging tradespeople and then they commence again </« mp with theirbu'fpber'arid 89 on. '-They are in fact nov'er, out of debt, and every tradesman, no matter bow nwob be may want his money, must wait bis turn, A leading grocer told me the other day that a certain high official owed him for a | .whole year's groceries, -Whenasked ; for a obeque on .account-as boas urgentjy in,'neei of: money, the grocer was told he might send his bill jn at -tbe : end of tb6 mpath, whefa

it would be paid, and after that time] bis man need not call for orders again. And so it is with most of the trades-! people, thej either have to gua long I oreilit or get no custom. Nothing but ii comminution amongst therewith an agreement to atop credit say oyer a month or two, will check ihwiort of l thing, The working olassei are the beet payers,' they pay" onsh but] patronise the Ohinuaien, and are, of course, ooment with a lower quality of goods at much lower prices.

Tho Union SieanishipOoropanyan'd perhaps the Huddart'Parker Company propose to run excursions to Eioton at Easter, in order that Wellington people may attend the chainpiauslnp regatta which is to be held in thai place. The fares are to be six shil« lings per head return, and one shiling of this amount for every ticket issued is to be given by the Company, to the Regatta Funds. It. behoves therefore the proplo of Wellington to turn out in large numbers, for not only will they derive tho benefit of a sea trip across tho breezy straits, and witness a regatta at which crews from all parts of the Colony will compete for ohampion.events on a course per* liaps not to be excelled in New Zealand, but they will also bo lostetioj! what should be a national pasiiiuc in these seagirt islands. I mention these facts for no doubt there are many Wairampa residents who would like to avail themselves of the opportunity to ..take a oheapsea trip either on Thursday evening or Monday morniog. No more pleasant or healthful way of spending the Eas'er holidays could be devised, and ihe attraction of such a fine regatta in what is almost certain to be perfect w4er for rowing should induce many hundreds to cross the straits,

For sometime past there has been seen at the street cornere, in fine weather, a poor old man totally blind from parahsia of the optio nerves, qb the board round bis neck informed passers by. The old man played feebly, and plaintively on a battered flute, and pitying foot passengers, dropped small change and coppers into a money box which stood upon his knee. We had all got to like the poor old man, and to be moved to pity by the pathetic appeal of his sightless eyes and muto air ofi wretchedness. He was not a beggar by any oceans, He never asked for alms, people gave without solicitation and then gave cheerfully their mites. Children too, liked to drop their coppers into hia box, and to watoh hisßiuileof thanks. And now the hard-hearted BenevolentTruatees with o" benevolence" of their own which

is bom of dealing with many specimens of "bard cases "have deoided to request the police to remove him from the streets and they will endeavour to get him into the institution for the Blind at Auckland or failing that, into the Benevolent Home. Of course it is not a pleasant thing to tee tho blind, the halt and the maimed begging about the streets of & young Colonial town but the old man in question can no more be called a beggar than the German bands, the hurdy gurdy man, or the street singer, To put bini into a home may perhaps be a oruel kindness. He no doubt has & homo to his own and to part the poor old man from those he holds dear will be .cruel, At present he manages to eke out a living without being a burden to any one, place him in the Institution for the blind or the Benevolent Home and he immediately becomes a oliarge upon the state. The action .of the trustees in thiß, as in a good many other cases, has nothing much' to I recommend it.

Wellington will be quite gay in a dayortwi for no leas than three warships of the Australian squadron will be in port at the same time. The " Tauranga "is already here and the "Coraooa" and "Orlando" are expected to-day and Friday respectively. The squadron will not stay long here, they neter do in Wellington,it ia too windy for tbem, the; much prefer Auckland where they oan get comfortably ashore without wotting their ooats. Besides in the northern port there is very much more for visitors to do, Wellington iB k very slow place for visitors to stay at. Unfortunately for the ladies there will be no danoing during the slay of the squadron owing to the Lenten Season, but the Wellington' Olub and private people have arranged several picnics and exouraiorjß for the officers which ought to give the girls a very fair chance notwithstanding the time of year. Amongst the excursions arranged, will bo a trip to the Wairaropa,