seat in the Provincial Council, from which to voice his opposition, and was returned for Akaroa on May 16. As an old journalist, he realised the necessity of newspaper support, and finding that the “Lyttelton Times,” of which he had been the first editor, was enthusiastic in its advocacy of the Tunnel, he set himself to establish a rival newspaper, and the appearance of the “Press,” on May 25, 1860, was due to his enterprise. The first number of the new journal contained a long leading article opposing the proposed Tunnel, accompanied by the threat “we shall return to this matter probably again and again.”
In a former chapter it has been stated that in the early provincial days, there were no party politics as we know them. Possibly it is not too much to suggest that the old order changed with the advent of the “Press.” Party politics, in any case, were bound to come sooner or later, and it was manifestly desirable that each side should be adequately represented in journalism. The “Press” has since enjoyed a long and honourable career, and is to-day one of the foremost papers in New Zealand.
The election of Mr. Moorhouse, as Superintendent, on November 4, 1857, had not turned on any particular policy measure, and the Lyttelton Tunnel, with which his name subsequently became so closely associated, was not referred to in the addresses of either of the candidates. It was later on that the demand for railway communication between Christchurch and its port became insistent, fanned by a series of articles in the “Lyttelton Times.” The Superintendent placed him self at the head of the movement, and never rested till he had carried it to a triumphant conclusion. The project was first seriously mooted in the Provincial Council in November, 1858, when a committee, under the chairman ship of Mr. E. Dobson, Provincial Engineer, was set up to collect local information, and this was followed by
