WANTED—POLICE!

Westport Times, Volume III, Issue 508, 25 May 1869, Page 2

WANTED—POLICE!

(To the Editor of the Westport Times.) Sib, —There is a practice now among a certain class of animals (men in dress) of going at unseasonable hours to private houses, and attempting to enter, or in some cases of actually entering them. On Sunday morning at 4 o'clock I was for the second time disturbed by loud knocks, and upon demanding who was there, was answered by the inquiry if money would purchase a bed. Our grandmotherly Government has partially disbanded our police force (by way of retrenchment,) and it becomes necessary for anyone fond of quiet, or of having his house to himself, to become his own policeman, and I wish, therefore, through the medium of your columns, to let these peace disturbers know that I, for .one, will act as a " special " for the future, and as getting out of my warm bed for the purpose of conveying a nightwalking vagabond to the Camp would injure my health, I intend to try whether my pistol-practice has failed me ; a broken arm might convey a salutary and lasting lesson to these sneaking house-entering vagabonds. I suspect that Judge Lynch will have to open his court here shortly; but be that as it may, as I cannot expect our weak police force here to do the work of double their number, and as I do not intend tamely to suffer myself to be disturbed, and my family alarmed by those sneaking " moreporks," I shall act for my own defence. —I am, Sir, your &c, Pjeabce Phillips. Westport, May 24. [We believe that Mr Phillips is not the only person who has reason to complain of similar nocturnal nuisances, and of deficient police protection.]

A MINING GRIEVANCE.

(To the Editor of the Westport Times.) Sir, —Of the many grievances under which the miner suffers, the present system of settling disputes is at once the most important and unfortunate for the mining community, and it has become highly necessary to devise some simpler method, if we consider the miner entitled to any reform. Of the numerous taxes imposed on him this is by far the heaviest, for he cannot, under existing circumstances, have the slightest dispute settled without raising a mountain of expenses to deliver a mouse.

Twelve years ago a Commissioner could ride out and settle a dozen disputes before dinner at a cost to the disputant of the trouble of walking to the camp to inform the Commissioner that his services were required. And it would be wise in us to return at once to this good old system of settling disputes "ou the ground," or we may soon find the district insolvent through our army of miners being compelled to bring their unavoidable disputes to a cumbrous tribunal, more adapted to try crimes like murder and treason than to settle disputes which, with a little assistance from Government, ought to be settled by the good sense of the disputants themselves. Sir, the ruled are more worthy of blame than the rulers, for the cumbrous and expensive proportions their court of equity has assumed. It is the apathy of the miner which has allowed this evil to increase to an extent that has made it one of the principal causes of grinding him down and keeping him poor. There is no denying the fact that if the miner wants good laws, well administered, he must put away his apathy, his immediate selfishness, and his narrow creed that " he will do nothing for reform because be will not be here long," and extend the range of his mental orbit by taking an active interest in the questions of the day, meeting and discussing them, and when he has found out where the shoe pinches agitating for a new one. The miner is more intelligent, industrious, and selfreliant than the "identity," yet the apathy of the miner allows them to be his task-master. " Hereditary bondsmen, know ye not, who would be free himself must strike the blow!" The pen is as powerful now as the sword was to our forefathers. Then weild it as freely as they did the sword; and once miners have made their laws perfect they can carry and adopt them in any clime, besides leaving traces of their ability as they ramble the world around.—Tours, Ac, Citizen.