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-MUNICIPAL.- -1

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MUNICIPAL. -1 To near approach of the first of November will perhaps make a review of the. last muni- cipal year a not unacceptable exercitation to our readers. They are far and wide aware that the burgesses of Wrexham for some cause or other are divided into parties of red and white, as the ancient Florentines were divided into the (Bianca) White, and the (Nera) Black. The origin of our distinction is almost inappre- ciable. Certain persons gained 31 majority in the Town Council at the first, and elected a given gentleman for Town Clerk. Everlasting- warfare was proclaimed by one who imagined himself injured by that choice, and the insignia of hostility was an address to the burgesses by reputation, red, consequ ntly, became a colour one of his creature, pr nted upon red paper. The candidates of this school being of a shabby in great disrepute, and a trimming expedient was resorted to, that of red ink on a white ground, and somttimes black ink on blue paper, and last of all blue upon white, which last, the people say, looks "very blue" and means red. The Whites were those who rallied round the first Mayor of the town, and were for pursuing a course of enlightened and gradual ameliora- tion the Reds were those who, dissatisfied with the first work of the council, the election of a rown Clerk, accepted the Great Disappoint- ed One as their Mephistopheles, and laboured by many dirty contrivances to avenge them- selves by bringing the new corporation into unpopularity. For this purpose every move- ment was misrepresented and every step calum- nated by some discontented persons, and then it was said that the town howled" its dis- pleasure. Till, hey, presto," by some sleight of hand, the Great Disappointed One bounds into the chair at a jump, and then the corpor- ation must be respected, and every insubor- dinate person whipped into deference. The Reds are those who own the present Mayor as their champion. The Whites are those who disgusted with the unscrupulous use of the meanest of all party weapons-vituperation I and personal spite-signify their contempt for the whole thing by promising to stand aloof and letting the town make itself ridiculous by its pursuit of a faction without a policy. The Reds have had a majority in the council for the last few years, and let us see what use they have made of it. In 1860 they elected Mr John Clark for mayor, and the present Mayor said he was the best mayor the town ever had! The most we can say of him is that he did not make himself ridiculous, and as things have gone s i nce, that is sa ?3 have gone since, that is saying a deal. In 1861 they elected Mr. Dickenson to that office. It is no libel on him to say that he knows more of physic than he does of logic, and peo- pie hoped the Reds may do no more than make a harmless doctor a mayor. Last year they chose Mr. John Lewis, solicitor, to that office. The temper in which he set about his duties may be inferred from the fact that to qualify himself for election he gave up a situation as clerk to the borough magistrates of some floo a year's value. His first promise was that in a week from the day of his election he would clear the streets." In some six months after that he managed to persuade a majority of the town council that by a motion which was never put to them they had resolved that the veget- able market should be removed to the cattle I market; and this sort of reasoning finding its j enforcement in the presence of several police- men, who for many market days greatly exerted themselves' to keep the potatoe carts out of Queen-street and send them to the Beast-mar- ket, a scene of unutterable confusion followed in the latter place, which only righted itself by i the good sense of the people, who availed them. selves of the accommodation offered by the Market Hall Company, and thus saved the market of the town, if it was worth anything, from ruin. No matter,— Queen-street was cleared!-tbey are delicate footed people who tread that! and so row the first was performed. The next scheme was that the Feathers Field should be a Smithfield, and the fairs should be held on the green sward," the" gween thwawd," as Lord Dundreary would call it. This was so universally hooted, that it was abandoned, and the theatre is still a bad in- vestment. A proposal to purchase the Market Hall property, which confessedly should belong to the corporation, and which would be highly remunerative as an investment, was pooh- poohed because, forsooth, we were spending a good sum of money on the drainage:" when lo! in a month or two a proposal is on the cards to buy land for the deposit of manure and the erection of slaughter-houses, all on the same site, the meat and the muck to be piled up together, and all at the small charge of some E1200. The owner of this land is a young gentleman in the Guards. If any person will take the trouble to enquire whose client he is, some solution of this speculation may be come to, and, as the ostensible promoter of it is now a candidate for a renewal of his seat in the town council, if in the course of his canvass some curious burgess would put him through a sort of competitive examination, and ask him to dictate on the instant such another resolu- tion as the one he had on the notice paper in the summer anent the slaughter-houses and the manure depot, it would pretty soon be dis- covered who didn't dictate that resolution. Have we forgotten to mention that a sum of 2500 was given for an acre of land for the outfall of the sewerage, when a piece equally eligible might have been had for half the money ? But the latter piece belonged to Mr. Bury, and he began his last year's duties by proposing Mr. Overton mayor, and committing a breach of privilege" —high-sounding words, but inexpiable offences both. We believe that some members of the council complain that the present Mayor has done in the brief year of his office what none of his four predecessors ever did at all, and that is, altered the council days no fewer than three times to suit his own con- venience. That, we suppose, is no concern of ours, and to- those who complain" sic: j ulJeo" we apprehend will be the courteous and suffi- cient answer. And now about the urinals! Pity the am- bition of the man who hopes to go down to posterity as the Mayor of the urinals!" The discussion upon this subject is fresh in the minds of our readers, and we need not repeat it. We are spending a deal of money on the drainage;" so we are, and is that any reason why we should legalise six public nuisances of the fouldst character, and of worse ? One is to be placed near the old barn in Hope-street, on a piece of private property belonging to Mr. T. T. Griffith, and for which Mr. Griffith gave an enormous price. What does. Mr. Griffith say to that ? Another is to be put on a public footpath near the Nag's Head, right under a lady's window, where no recess invites secresy, and a valuable property must be ruined and public decency outraged Verily it is no won- I dei that persons at a distance deelare that our corporation has gone mad The Mayor at the last council meeting blamed a member of liberal politics for his inconsistency that he opposed these improvements. If there was anything in such a childish argument might not that member with equal justice have twited the accuser that he lately writing himself in his own newspaper the recognised head of the conservative party," had become a revolutionist ? These are the performances of the year just about to close! Paltry results, extravagant and wild as compared with the promises of twelve months ago. Heaven save us from a renewal of such an infliction.

THE AMERICAN QUESTION-" OBSERVER'S"…

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