The Westport Times. TUESDAY, JUDY 27, 1869.

Westport Times, Volume III, Issue 535, 27 July 1869, Page 2

The Westport Times. TUESDAY, JUDY 27, 1869.

In Charleston and Westport public spirit seems to be suffering from some serious disease. Accomplished students in psychology and in social science would probably be able to diagnose it, and to describe it by some name which would be at once expressive of its origin and its effects. For lack of this accomplishment, ordinary observers of outward and visible signs must content themselves with using humble popular phraseology, and, in the exercise of this enforced condition of coutentment, we Bhall suggest that the disease complained of is a simple case of "dry rot." As exhibited in pumpkins and potatoes, decay of this description, we are told, is usually fatal to the subject attacked, the proportion of " recoveries " being exceedingly insignificant. Reasoning by analogy, some people might be uukiud enough to suggest that the heads and hearts of the people of Charleston and Westport, similarly influenced, are

fated to undergo, figuratively, an identical process of atrophy and ultimate dissolution. But,withoutbeing so hopeless or soi-disant satirical as these people, we believe that there is really some cause for anxiety, and it is in tho hope of some curative agent being administered that we direct attention to the present condition of these once spirited communities. It is scarcely necessary to refer to the originally healthy condition of the patients. In the case of Westport, reference need only be made to its recent and earnest agitation for Separation, to convince even the incredulous that, as a community, it was capable of a considerable effort of its nervous, muscular, and vascular systems. To render these expressions somewhat comprehensible, we may say that we refer specifically to tho facility with which speeches were made, and to the readiness and ability with which some people put their hands into their own purses or into other people's " courierbags." In the case of Charleston, reference need only be made to the indications which that community recently gave of its intelligent appreciation of the uses of water, and of a determination to apply it as a stimulant, not so much to the human race as to those other " races " upon which the prosperity of a mining population often depends. In explanation of what some persons may be weak enough to mistake for a joke, we may state that we refer to the recent institution of that hopeful enterprise, the Charleston Water-Race Company. Tho subjects with regard to which both Westport and Charleston exhibit a meutal or moral defectiveness are those of Steam and Eire. Unfortunately, and contrary to the habit of thoroughly healthy communities, they fail to recognise the one as an element of good, or the other as omnipotent for evil. To descend from parable to the plainest form of stating facts, we may say that we refer, on the one hand, to the miserable conclusion to which a recent public meeting and a still existent Provisional Committee must have come, in attempting to achieve the object of establishing a local Steamboat Company. And on. the other hand we refer to the rather humble effort which, in Westport, has been made to initiate a Fire Brigade, and the even humiliating effort which, in Charleston, has beeu made to do the same thing. Considering the circumstances which exist to urge the propriety of the on'e object, and the circumstances which have recently arisen to illustrate the absolute necessity of the second object, it must occur to anyone that, if public spirit exist in either of the two places, it must for the present be in a weakly state, if it has not altogether reached the stage of " dry rot" and decay which farseeing or fanciful physicians may be disposed to attribute to it. On the subject of Fire, our contemporaries on the West Coast have lately been " piling the agony " with an earnestness which may excuse any more being said in these columns than has been said. On the subject of Steam a great deal may or might be said, but, in rescuscitating the subject, isitnecessary to refer to more than what it has done to Greymouth as a port, not to speak of the Greymouth shareholders and their pockets? Is it necessary to remind the Provisional Com- 1

mittes of its own existence, or of the promise of the puhlic to give that Committee the opportunity for a second conference ? Is it necessary to remind anybody that there were £GOO voted by the Nelson Council as a subsidy for a steamboat stationed at Westport ? Or is it necessary to refer to the probability of the development of diggings in the district of West Wanganui, and of the intimate connection which, with locally owned or stationed steamboats, might exist between its trade and the trade of the Buller? Is there anything necessary for all purposes, prevalent or problematical, but a coalition between Charleston and Westport, and the renewal of the project of a public and local steamboat company ? Must the new Steamboat Company so soon suffer from the bane of public spirit and old steamboats—" dry rot ?"