The Westport Times. THURSDAY, AUGUST 19, 1869.

Westport Times, Volume III, Issue 544, 19 August 1869, Page 2

The Westport Times. THURSDAY, AUGUST 19, 1869.

The lucubrations of our Charleston contemporary often afford us matter for a quiet laugh. To a certain extent, therefore, we are indebted to our contemporary ; for in this practical ago, and with so few mirth provoking subjects at command we should be wanting in appreciation did wo not acknowledge even the most trilling contribution to so desirable a state of mind. To catalogue the various topics which, from time to time, have called into unwonted play our cachinnatory muscles, would be a work too stupendous for our columns, and too severe upon our limited powers of application. We must rest content with the recollection of the fun they have eliminated in our mind, and if our readers would enjoy the sensation for themselves, we must perforce refer them to the files of the Charleston Herald for the past few months. The leading article, however, in our contemporary's issue of Saturday last demands a little serious notice at our hands. We are not ourselves particularly thin - skinned, in truth we sometimes question whether we ought not to be classed amongst the species scientifically designated pachydermatous. And if this definiton applies to ourselves we have no hesitation in saying it may fairly be applied to the bulk ©f the residents in and about Westport. Sydney Smith once said that it was impossible to get a joke into a Scotchman's head, unless through tho medium of a surgical operation. And we feel certain that some such proceeding is necessary to drive through the thick hide of indifference which encompasses our citizens, any sense of ths neglect and injustice we of the coast suffer at the hands of our rulers in Nelson. Still despite this unenviable characteristic, we find many in common with ourselves, unwilling to allow our profound contemporary to indulge in strictures at once unjust and unmeritted. We have read and re-read the article in question with a view to resolve it into sense, and to see if by possibility any design could be attributed to the writer. We confess candidly that we failed. All the rules of common sense, and all the canons of construction which we find in the books, and by which we have been accustomed to

govern ourselves, have utterly failed us, and we feel constrained to abandon the attempt we had made to reduce our contemporary to anything like sense or coherency. But while we admit our inability to discern either reason or eongruity in the production we allude to, we are able to fix upon one point which is capable of being understood, and at the same time is equally susceptible of a complete and incontrovertible answer. Our contemporary bas ventured to reflect upon the Westport Separation Committee in reference to the failure of the Separation petition. The elegance of the diction employed is quite equal to the grammatical excellence of the rest of the article. But at this we are not disposed to be captious. What we desire to deal with is the simple fact. It is said " the Separation movement has been, to use a common phrase, knocked on the head, and for this we may thank the "Westport Committee, who considered they were doing a clever thing in employing men to canvass for signatures on a system which was on the face of it extremely rotten." How the writer of this quotation derived his information, we are at a loss to know. Had he been a member of the Nelson Provincial Council, —one who basked in the smiles of the Superintendent, and was warmly appreciated by the Provincial Secretary, we might have fancied that he drew his inspiration from that quarter, because from that quarter first came the unworthy hint that our petition had not been fairly signed. But we do not think any individual so highly favored by the Nelson Executive is to be found on the West Coast, much less on the staff" of our contemporary, and we must attribute the sentence quoted to some one who knows less of the facts than even the Nelson oracles themselves.

In reply to the imputation, we assert that the Westport Separation Committee have earnestly and faith, fully performed the duty—neither easy nor pleasing,—which devolved upon them. "With a singleness of purpose, and an amount of application which deserved better fate, that Committee, despite personal considerations, and private inconvenience, worked hard and wisely to effect an object which their reason taught them was inseparable from the true interests of the district. That object has been defeated not by any laches on their part. The mode of obtaining the signatures has in nowise contributed to the temporary shelving of a question which must inevitably, sooner or later, be deliberately dealt with. No one knows better than our contemporary that declarations verifying the authenticity of the signatures, or the authority to attach them, were despatched to Wellington; and no one knows better also that the present inactivity on the part of the Separation Committee is to be attributed to the known hostility of the present ministry, and to no other cause. It is very much to be deplored that such groundless and unworthy allusions should be indulged in by those whose duty, aye, and interest it is to cement those friendly relations which ought to exist between communities situate as we are. For our own part we have ever been ready to acknowledge the public spirit and energy exhibited by our southern neighbors ; and wo firmly believe our feelings are cordially reciprocated by the people of Charleston. It is very much against our nature to assume the position of lecturers. We do not arrogate to ourselves any infallibility our fellow mortals ; nor do we aspire of right to any place amongst the swan-like quire, of whom Dryden, translating Virgil, once wrote. But if ever we have to sermonize our contemporary upon any article equal to that we have now noticed, we shall certainly take for our text that same old Virgil's line:— " inter strepit anser olores " " He gabbles like a goose, Amid the swan-like quire."

Private enterprise in Westport generally supersedes Government undertakings. Several residents on the North Beach rather than await the circumlocutory replies of the Superintendent to his Deputy, his Deputy to the Provincial Secretary, the Secretary to the Provincial Engineer and thence to the District Engineer, have determined, after repeated fruitless appeals to the Government, to erect a sea embankment on the North Beach for the protection of properties in that direction. Mr Dobson has kindly furnished the undertakers of this work with a specification of the labor and materials required. The work is intended to be commenced a little

way south of the end of Molesworth Street. The bant is first to be prepared by sloping off the perpendicular face, throwing the stuff upwards, posts will thenbe sunk in the ground, and filled up with fascines, which will be placed end on to the surf, the rails tobenailed to the posts and the rails to be then hove down hard on the fascines, and the other end nailed. The work is intended to be commenced to-morrow and will, it is hoped, be completed in a week. This is a plan which was recommended by Mr Lowe, the late District Engineer in his last report, to be undertaken by the Government, but, the public in this case, as in that of the river embankment, are more likely to see their houses performing somersaults among the breakers than to see any steps being taken for their protection by our, promising but never fulfilling. Nelson authorities. Bachelder*s Diorama was visited by a large number of persons last evening. Wo are obliged to withhold a lengthened notice of this entertainment until orar next issue. A very heavy thunder storm passed over the town on Tuesday night, and quite a deluge of rain came down for a few hours. There was a considerable fresh in the river all day on Wednesday; and we regret to loam that many of the claims at the Shamrock Lead have been flooded out, in consequence of the past few day's rain. Madame Carandini, her daughter, and Mr Sherwin met with a somewhat serious accident by the upsetting of the mail coach between Gympie Creek and Maryborough in Queensland. The claim at the Thames in which the Duke of Edinburgh is interested (the Long Drive), hasbeen turning'out some rich quartz. On July 6th 550 lbs of specimens yielded 2082 ounces of retorted gold; and on July 20th, 460 lbs from the same claim gave 2036 ounces 13 dwts., or 4 ozs. 9 dwts. 13 grs to the pound. OurWanganur contemporaries are having a " shy" at each other. The Times in observing a quotation made from the Evening Herald by the Welington Post, says "If the Post and other respectable journals will not cease to quote from the canards of the Wanganui Evening Herald they must stand the consequences." The Herald, on the other hand, has an article on its contemporary the Times, headed •' The Last Kick but One," with the following concluding sentence : —" We now promise, that when the last final kick is delivered, we shall write the funeral dirge and perform the last sad obsequies of our contemporary."