ADDRESS TO HIS HONOUR.

Westport Times, Volume V, Issue 905, 26 December 1871, Page 2

ADDRESS TO HIS HONOUR.

Mr Pitt, in the absence of the Crown Prosecutor, then read and presented the following address to his Honour from the legal profession and the inhabitants of the district:— To His Honour Ciiables Robert Dudley Wakd, Esq., Judge of the District Court of Westland North. On the occasion of your Honour's last visit to Westport in the capacity of Judge of the District Court,.we desire, on behalf of the legal profession, who are too few in Westport to make the separate expression of their sentiments worthy of your consideration, and of the general public, to convey to your Honour our sense of the loss which this district must sustain when deprived of, the eminent qualities which have always been displayed by your Honour when acting in your judicial capacity amongst us. On behalf of the legal profession, we have to thank your Honour for your nniform kindness and courtesy towards ourselves, an'l for the consistent zeal with which you have at all times and in all places to endeavoured uphold the strict purity of the administration of the law upon the bench, and of its practice amongst the members of the profession. On behalf of the public we wish to express our appreciation ef your Honour's able and impartial discharge of your judicial functions, by which the forms of law have been made to promote and not to impede the administration of justice. And we trust that your Honour will enjoy a long career of prosperity and usefulness, and that the country may long have the benefit of your Honour's services in a higher and wider sphere of action. (Signed) Geo. W. Home, Crown Prosecutor.-; William Pitt, Barrister; T. Blackall - Shapter, , Barrister ; J. Bickerton Fisher, Barrister; Joseph Giles, Resident Magistrate, Warden, and Sheriff; C. H. W. Bowen, Clerk to the District Court; and thirty-two others. ; - ' Westport, December 23rd, 1871.

The address having been presented, his Honour replied as follows :-jGrENrLEiiEN,—I. beg to return you my sincere tbauks for your address. Conscious as I am of many short-com-ings, it certainly gives me pleasure to find that the discharge of my duties has been, rated so highly both by the Bar and by the public. No judge should court the applause of the community in which he administers the law : but unless he wins the confidence of the people, the utility of his Court will be much diminished. And, taking into consideration the peculiar circumstances of my appointment, the change that thereupon took place in the administration of commercial law, and the brevity of my tenure of office in Westland, I may be pardoned for expressing more than ordinary gratification at receiving the present assurance of public confidence. 1 am glad to have this opportunity of stating publicly to the members of the Bar my sense of the frank courtesy and support which I have invariably received from them, and which have conduced, in so great a degree, to the efficacy of the Court. 1 have now only to express my sincere regret that the present is, in all probability, my last visit to Westport, as District Judge. I came to the West Coast, I confess, with strong prejudices against it. lam leaving it, with great reluctance. I arrived here a stranger to all of you. I shall leave, I trust, some kind friends behind me. Of the magnificent resources of your District this is hardly the time to speak ; but I may say this at least, that no part of New Zealand has a more brilliant future before it, if those resources are fairly developed; nor do I believe that there is a single province in which the great financial programme of the present Government can be out carried more successfully than in Westland. I trust that, my present visit, though my.last as District Judge, will not be my last in reality; and that, at our next meeting, we may exchange congratulations on the realisation of some of the many bright prospects now opening before you. For the present, I have only to thank you once more for your address, and with all possible good wishes, to bid you heartily farewell.