The Waikato Times.

Waikato Times, Volume XI, Issue 892, 12 March 1878, Page 2

The Waikato Times.

Equal and exact justice to all men, Of whatever state or persuasion, religious or political. * * * * * Here shall the Press the People's right maintain, Unawed by influence and unbribed by gain. TUESDAY, MARCH 11, 1878. * T was a pleasing duty which fell, ast night, to the lot of the young men of Waikato — the sons of old colonists — to entertain one of the"r number — the first European born in the colony who has attained the high position of a Minister > 'of the Crown in New Zealand, and it is a hopeiul and cheering sign for us alll who have sons growing up to man's estate. We often hear it remarked that the young men of New Zealand are the inferiors to their fathers — that they lack their ability and vigour, and show no signs of being able to leave their mark upoD the history of the colony, as their fathers have done. If this has been the case in many instances, it was only to have been looked for in a young colony where, till of laat y ears — even to the comparatively wealthy— the opportunity of providing a first-class education for their children has been wanting. That it need necessarily be so, is amply contradicted in the person of the guest of last night's banquet When quite a yoxith, Mr Sheehan — who I now holds the really most important portfolio in the Ministry, and whose business capacity, intellectual ability, and ready eloquence, are the backbone of the Ministry alike in the Executive Council and the Legislative Assembly — graduated in the schools of Provincial politics, and from his first advent in the House of Assembly, but a few years ago, his friends predicted his present successful career. Sons of old colonists and young colonists, too, may well be proud of one of their number who ha9 raised himself by sheer ability to so high and honourable a position. Nor the first of his class to rise to such a height will Mr Shhehan be the last to do so. The colony has made rapid strides of late years in the matter of education, and the time we trust is not far off when other professions beside that of the law and politics will be open to the colonial student, and all credit to them that our colonial born youths havo been able to hold their own as well as they have done. They are heavily handicapped in the race of life, for they have to compete with the imported talent of Europe in every profession and intellectual pursuit, with competitors tiained in the highest schools of a highly cultivated nation, and though now for the first time, the fact that one of them has reached the position of a Cabinet Jalimbw bas been made teb

subjeet of public congtatu'.ition and festivity, we could point ;o .scores in a less exalted sphere who.™ extjrrions show that the old stock uues no:., in any rsspeot deteriorate in the colony. The pluck and perseverance smd indomitable energy show out as favorably here as at home.

Yestebday J. R. Vialou, Esq., Mayor ! of Hamilton, was sworn in a Justice of I the Peace for New Zealand. A select quadrille party will be held in the Victoria Hall, Hamilton, to-morrow evening. The Concebt at Taotiri, in aid of the building fund of the Catholic Church, takes place on Thursday. Cambeedge Paesonage. — Tenders for additions to the Parsonage at Cambridge will be received by Mr D. Richardson, architect, up to Friday next. The Ohatjpo Cattle Sales take place to-day, when a large number of dairy, store, horse, and other stock will be offered by Mr J. S. Buckland. % Mr T. V. Fitzpatrick, of Ngaruawahia, is offering for sale a good W.aikato business for a carter, with pair of horses, drays, &c, complete. Cambeidge and Piako Road. — Tendebs for the construction of section No. 2 on the Cambridge and Piako road will be received by the Chairman of the Cambridge Highway district on or before Friday, the 29th insfc. School Committee Elections. — A notice appears elsewhere, from the Board of Education, appointing the day and hour of the meeting of the ratepayers for the election of school committees, in the districts of Hamilton East, Ngaruawahia, and Pukerimu. lendees for the construction of a bridge over the Waikato at the Narrows, some four miles above Hamilton, have been called for by the Narrows Bridge Committee, and will be received on or before the 6th of next month. Plans and specifications may be seen both at Hamilton and Auckland. Union Bank of Atjstbalia. — The allotment of new shares in the company of the Union Bank of Australia, to which we alluded in a late issue, is announced in our advertising columns. The shares will be allotted to proprietors in the proportion of one new to every five old shares, and will be paid for in four monthly instalments. Me G-eobge Smith, late Chemist and Druggist of Hamilton, who has returned from Nelson to "Waikato, and who has given some considerable care and attention to the study of dentistry, has commenced practise 'as a surgical and mechanical dentist in Hamilton. Mr Smith will pay periodical visits to other settlements, and purposes visiting Cambridge professionally on to-morrow and Thursday, where he may be consulted at Dr Waddington's cottage. Monsteb Cabbots. — That Whatawhata land can produce excellent crops is manifest from the fine samples of carrots which may be seen at our office, grown by Mr Martin Fitzgerald .of Whatawhata. They are not picked, but taken as a fair average of the crop, and weigh 2% pounds each, and being thickly planted on the ground, will yield a very large crop. The mangolds on an adjoining piece are also a splendid sample of roots. Both crops are field grown, and the land was manured with muck from the stockyard. The previous crop was potatoes. At the meeting 1 of the Education Board held in Auckland on Friday, tho following business, in. reference to Waikato schools, took place : — Times and places for the election of school committees, &c, were approved in lieu of those advertised: Hamilton East, Ngaruawahia, Pukerimu. — It was agreed to invite tenders for improvements and additions to the school and teacher's house, at Hamilton West, as recommended by the committee. — It was, also, agreed to inform the Kihikihi School Committee that the step taken by them, in closing the school against the teacher, was highly irregular, and could not receive the sanction of the Board. It was' ordered that the matter be inquired into. — It was resolved to grant an extension of time for the completion of the erection of the teacher's residence, at Te Awamutu. A similar request regarding Whatawhata was also complied with. Sib Gabnet Wolsley, writing in the 'Nineteenth Century,' says of English army organisation, that the one great tactical superiority which our army possesses over all others at present, and which most undoubtedly will go far towards helping us to victory, should we ever be engaged in a death struggle with any continental- nation, is, that whilst our enemy's battalion of one thousand men will be divided into four unwieldly companies commanded by four captains, assisted by only a small number of oificers, our battalions of a similar strength will have eight captains leading eight handy companies, assisted by several subalterns. It is the firm belief of those who have themselves commanded British infantry in action, and who are therefore the best judges on this point, that the foreigner, with his four clumsy companies, and without a proper proportion of officers, would be nowhere in such a contest. She had invited him to stop to supper, and he was trying to appear easy and unconcerned, while she was on her prettiest behaviour. "Have you used the sugar, John? " inquired the mother, in a winning manner. " John don't want no sugar," ejaculated the youug heir abruptly. "Why not?" inquired the father curiously ; while John, in his surprise, swallowed a bit of toasted crust and nurt his throat. " Cos he don't," explained the heir, in an artful manner ; " I heard him tell Mary, last night "You keep still," inter upted Mary, in an hysterical manner, while the young man caught his breath in dismay. "I heard him say," persisted the heir, with dreadful eagernesss, " that she was so sweet he shouldn't use no sugar any more— an' then he kissed her, an' I said I'd tell, an' " Here the young heir was lifted out of the room by his ear, and the supper was finished in moody silence. Railway Station Approaches Hamilton. — The attention of the railway authorities needs to be drawn to the state of the road leading to the railway station at Hamilton, which is far too narrow for the purposes of traffic even now, and will be the source of considerable inconvenience to the public when once the wet season sets in, if not previously remedied. The Hamilton Highway Board have formed their portion of the road and gravelled it to a width of 30 feet, from the town boundary to where the twenty chains or so of road belonging to the railway authorities and leading into the station commences. This latter piece of road is only gravelled to the width of 18 feet, a width utterly inadequate to the requirements of the trafic even at present. Traps and drays passing one another are forced into the water table on either side, and though little damage to the road is done in the dry weather, it will soon cut up and become dangerous and almost impassible in the winter. What might have ended in a fatal j accident occured on Friday night last to a j gentlemen driving through the main i street of East Hamilton. The party in question was returning home after nightfall through Hamilton East, the night ! bflfog very dark; aod> whea opposite

Le Quesnes', Mb horse made a sudden start to the left, and tore off at full speed. At the same moment the driver felt his whip touch something above his head, and mechanically ducking his head on the moment he saved his life. The obstacle standing in the centre of the highway w;as % no other than Mr Le Quesne's store,»rin course of being . removed, across the v( q,d, and the obstacle against which the i nip struck, and gave timely warning, was the verandah roof, the building standing up on props. As it was the drivers' hat was smashed, and had he not ducked his head in time, the concussion, considering the speed with which the horse had started off, must have been fatal. There was no light burning at the time.

The Opera. Concert. — "We would draw the attention of our readers to the programme published in another column of to-days publication of the Waikato Times by the Royal Italian Opera Concert Company. Tfte first part consists of choice selections from various operas, many of which we recollect as having been specially noticed by the Auckland papers during the late opera season for the finish and brilliancy with which they were rendered by the several artists who essayed them. In the second part we notice a fovorite old English ballad " Bread and Cheese and Basses."

A "Good Templae" must learn. to.,b e temperate in all things, and not. " Indulg® the sin he has a mind to, by damning tha 1 he's not inclined to," is too often the case." His letter if more temperately written would have received insertion, but our Hamilton police are neither "ruffians" nor "dogs." A "Good Templar " will act wisely in being temperate in language as well aa in liquor. If the police exceeded their duty we should be the first to draw serious attention to the matter, but they have quite a sufficiently disagreeable and arduous duty to perform in the arrests of drunken and half drunken men (the latter is generally the more objectionable animal of , the two) without being subjected to the annoyance of undeserved newspaper strictures, and we feel quite certain that no such condition of things as that stated on the unsupported authority of our correspondent exists. A little less leniency in the Police Court would be perhaps etfectual m putting down the drunkeness which exists in the district, for the magistrates have the power to commit for a lengthened period of imprisonment, as an habitual drunkard, any person who has been three times convicted in the Police Court in the same year.

The Nabrows Beidge. — A meeting o* the committee was held at (j-wynne's Hamilton Hotel on Saturday afternoon. Present, Dr Waddington, Chairman, and Messrs Runciman, S. S. Graham, W. A. Graham, S. Steele, and J. Hunt. The minutes of the preceeding meeting were read and confirmed. The Secretary, Mr Runciman, stated that he had called on Mr All wright with reference to the plans and specifications. That gentleman conld not undertake the supervision of the or k The plans and specifications, he said j COl1 _ tained all that was necessary to enatyg committee to call for tenders, ufc a workingjplan would he required. M r -^r j^ Graham thought that as the "bridg e ■ was likely to he built largely from Government money, the Government, if appfoa to, would send an engineer to supe^e the work. He thought they shoul^ call for tenders, and then apply to the Public Works Office for supervision. it wa s resolved to can for tenders at once, and they appear in our advertising columns of to-da.y . On the motion of Mr w. A. Graham the names of Hakcrewhi jfourewa and TWhakarainu, of Tamah ere) were a dded to the committee. The n a ti V es generally in the district evince gre a t interest in the work. They have alr ea dy subscribed liberally towards it, and are still doing so