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Gisborne Standard and Cook County Gazette, Volume II, Issue 307, 4 June 1889, Page 2

To-night the Harbor Board finally decide the important question as tc whether further work on the pier is to be done by contract, or left to be carried out as it has hitherto bean done. It would be useless to again resort to argument when nearly all that canjbe said on either side has been said ten times over, but that stone contract business has a practical bearing on the question whioh ought to be of more effect than a great amount ot talk. We await with a curiosity that makes us chafe with impatience, to know what side (if any I) Mr Matthewson will take up to-night, Even if there were such a thing as consistent inconsistency, we should be at a loss to account for one who absolutely refuses to do anything, but we hope that the Chairman will take a note of the expressions of opinion that have been made on this subject, and allow no feeling of delicacy to soften a stern sense of duty. A correspondent, through our columns, the ether day, expressed an opinion that the system of having no sureties but the contractor’s bond was the cause of much of the trouble that has lately occurred over contracts. We think our correspondent’s views on that point are mistaken, but the easiest way of proving this is to call his attention to the fact that much the same thing occurred under the old system. It is impossible to say what the Board will decide to-night, but it is not improbable that what was at one time a majority in favor of contracting may now, in thi face of recent experience, have dwindled to a minority. The division list will at any rata he an interesting one, for if consistency is ft characteristic of the majority of the members, it will no doubt be decided that the ratepayers have least to gain by the letliug of the pier by contract.