CAMBRIDGE TOWN BOARD.

Waikato Times, Volume XVII, Issue 1475, 15 December 1881, Page 3

CAMBRIDGE TOWN BOARD.

The usual monthly meeting of this board was held in the Office, Cambridge on Tuesday evening labfc. There were present Messrs T. Wells, (Chairman) Johnaon, Hewitt, and Nixon. After tho minutes and correspondence had been disposed of, Mr Wells said he it Lia duty to draw^heir attention to a letter which they ml doubtless had seen published in a local print over the name of Mr Johnson, a member of the Board. In this letter Mr Johnson had taken a most unusual course of criticising the action of the majority of his colleagues without ever bringing the matter Before the boatd, or far as he could gather trying to make himself acquainted with the subject which he had undertaken to write' about. He hoped that in the remarks he was about to make they would dissociate everything personal on his account, as he brought the matter forward only in his I capacity* as chairman. Hin own acts and position amongst them he would leave to th« public, bat he thought it imperative that it should be understood that they as a puWio bpdy were not going to carry out their business through the columns of a newspaper "when they had a room— which was the "proper plaoe — to sit in and carry on their business. The courno which Mf{ Johnson had adopted' could' be productive of no possible good, and only serve to bi ing about a lot of ill-feeling and M}aai>blin£-amorig'his^olleagues, instead of expediting and facilitating 1 the ! public businecs, and doing their duty to those who had placed them in office He could quite understand such a course if he (Mr Johnson) had considered the majority had been' acting wrong, and that ; he had tried to have the wrong righted, but" failed ; then an appeal to tho public would not have been bo ridiculously out of place ' as the ond which appeared in print Home few days Track.'' He believd Mr Johnson had written the letter on the ' spar of the moment, for no wine man who had given the mutter, .the least possible consideration •woild ' hare adopted such a course of procedure; What ' would ' have beefc' , the' , outcoino ; \i hajfl replied "in the same spirit in which tbt latter bud b, ecu written., . Ife gould iq.

form them chat the premises , upon, which ,theHtetite£l«^B b&ilfc Ivi&re utterly gtobntijless, and that there was not a tittle of 'foundation for wEaTnad"Tseeh aatd,— nor had there been much etiquette displayed jin saying it — the- whole affair being merely a matter of imagination more than reality, 4ad Mr Johnson, taken bis time 'until | the board met and than brought forward his grievance the whole affair 'could have been decided to the satisfaction of everybody in five minute*. However, assuming it only said, he would ■thon take upon himself to reply to it. The' firfit matter in dispute was with referenoe to their letting a contract on the other side of the Kirapiro Bridge. In doing this they were not spending the ratepayers' money,' but were merely the agenta of the county council in spending theirs for the exclusive benefit of their own district. It had been ! declared a county work, and the council j consequently had voted the money (£450) to do it, and instructed the board to carry it out, and the council would pay the cheques for the contracts as soon as the work was done, out of the county funds. 'The next matter in dispute was with reference to their letting the tender without consulting the engineer. In reply to that he would say that the matter was brought forward by a ratepayer of the town who was about to fence across the road and thus prevent a large number ot up-country settlers from getting into town. Acting in his double capacity as member of the council and chairman of the board, he had taken upon himself to call for tenders for the woik, so as to have the main outlets of the town kept open. For Mr Johnson's information lie would say there was such a clauge in the old Highways Act which said that for contracts over £20 it was necessary to get an engineer's certificate. But the Public Works Acfc ot 1876 overrides the old Highways Act, and it was under this they had charge of the roads. The authority which he had just quoted was to be found in the 81st and 82nd clauses of the Act. With reference to their dealing with the subject at a special meeting, ho would refer them to the same Act, and they would see by it that they had ample powers to deal with what they liked there. Mr Johnson, in replying to Mr Wells, said he thought his letter required no apology and very little comment. He contended that the board had no right to interfere with the road if it were a county work, and he did not think it was the business of Mr Wells or any other member of the board to take the work out of the council's hands. He maintained that it was unconstitutional to bring the matter forward at a special meeting and call for tenders ; and he thought the chairman should know his duty as well as any other member of the body then sitting. Such things he thought it only right should be brought before the public, who he thought should always be made aware of what business was transacted at all meetings. Mr Wells deemed it unnecessary to reply at any further length to Mr Johnson's argument, as the board was already convinced of where the misunderstanding lay. A communication was received from Mr Tole, secretary of the Waste Lands Board, Auckland, relative to the reserves and endowments of the township j but as it appeared to have been sent to the wrong body, no member of the board knowing what it referred to, it was put aside. A letter was read from Mr S. Bright claiming compensation for the lowering of the footpath in front, of his dwelling in Duke street, and declining to enteitain the collector's application for three years' rates until the decision of the board had been given. The Board resolved not to entertain the application. The following accounts were passed for payment : — Government storekeeper, £2 10s 9d ; Waikato Steam Na\ ig.it ion Company, £2 7s; Bond, £1 17s Gd ;,Dwan Bios., £3 15s 9d. The chairman announced that after re ceiving the Government sub-ody they had £25 to their credit at the Bank. He further lernaiked that as the Town Districts Act oa me into force on the Ist of Jiinuaiy, it was nocess.iry that a public meeting should be called, and in the case of the act being adopted to have a petition ready for signature, the act requiring a petition signed by three-fourths of the inhabitants and witnessed. The chairman was instructed to call a public meeting for this purpose eaily in January. The chairman asked that if he were requested by a number of the property holders on the other side of the river to be permitted to bring that place under the act was he to entertain their application. — Agreed to. Attention was drawn to an obstruction in Kirkwood street, where Mr Wright had allowed a lot of his wares and lumber to accumulate. The Seeietery was requested to ask Mr Wrignt to remove same. The Boaid then entered into a leng'hy consultation with the Engineer in reference to work on some of the (streets at present under repair, and afterwards retired.

The pi- to] with with which Lefroy murdered Gold in a fhst-chi'.s railway carnage has been found in Bradcombe tunnel. The natural son of Leotaid, the celebrated gymnast, has recently, through the death of his father, come into the possession of an income of £4000. The father of Leotard has thus fulfilled the dying wi&h of his son, who could not, according to the law of France, bequeath his fortune to the boy owing 1 to the ban under which he was bom. Tho young 1 man has already at the age of nineteen taken a wife and lives in magnificent style in a chateau at Toulouse. Cckhan, with all his wife, once found his match in the well-known leather O'Leary. "Reverend father," said Curran, "I wish you were St. Peter." " And why, counsellor, do you wish I were St. Peter f "Because, reverend father, in that case you would have the kevs of heaven, and you could let me in." "By my honour and conscience, counsellor," said O'Leary, "it would be better for you that I had the keys of the other place, for then I could let you out." Need of - Variety ijt ( Rest. — The Golden Mule asks : After the Sunday dinner, what? Well, it allcjepends. A person whose brain is wearied with intellectual . work during the week, or whose nervous system is exposed to the strain of business or professional life, ought to sleep within an hour or t.vo after his Sunday dinner, if he can. It is surprising how much like a seven-day clock the brain will work, if the habit of a " Sunday nap" be once formed. Nature will take advantage of it as'regularly and gratefully as she does of the nightly sleep, and do her bpst to make up lost time. People on the other hand, whose week of toil is chiefly physical, may well give their minds activity while the body is resting. Two sermons and three or four hours of solid reading are a real rest to some on Sunday, while to others such a course amounts to positive Sabbathbreak'ing. Sunday is a day of rest, not work, religious or otherwise. It is a day of repose, nojb for exhaustion. But what the dogmatists on one side and the illiberal liberals on the other are apt to overlook is the fact that all men do not rest alike any more than Jihey labour Alike, and whit may help one may kill an.otjjer. -. >J tt