The Ashburton Guardian. Magna est Veritas et Prevalebit. THURSDAY, JANUARY 11, 1883. As Others See Us.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume IV, Issue 839, 11 January 1883, Page 2

The Ashburton Guardian. Magna est Veritas et Prevalebit. THURSDAY, JANUARY 11, 1883. As Others See Us.

There is a certain class of men who spend their time in travelling about from country to country, never sojourning in any one place for long, and too indolent to look below the surface, while they are at the same time egotistical enough to fancy themselves fully qualified to pass an opinion on whatever may come under their notice. Meet such a person in society and you vote him a troublesome bore, and, to use a slangy but expressive phrase, you “ cut ” him forthwith. But this kind of man very often has that excessively common affliction known as caco'cthes scribendi, and he .occupies his idle hours, which are many, in putting down his impressions on paper. His lucubrations generally see the light in some obscure newspaper, that would never be heard of in the countries he has visited, were it not that some good natured friend ot the kind that irritated Sir Fretful Plagiary is sure to disseminate thearticleg. Thus it is that observations that are not worth the paper they are written on obtain a wide circulation and receive attention out of all propw.

:ion Ito their value. An instance ,61 ;his has occurred recently, in the §,hg|e of a letter concerning "New Zealand published in the Ceylon Advertiser, which several of ourcontemporaries have reproduced. Our visitor does not appear to have remained long in the colony, but that in no way prevents him putting forward his opinions with as much assurance as if he had lived here a quarter of a century. We are told that unless a man has a capital of at least he had better not think of settling in this colony, and he calls to witness the books of one farmer which were shown him, and states that a splendid farm that had cost £16,000 was only returning interest on the capital expended at the rate of per cent The natural conclusion that we would arrive at in this'instance is that the farmer knew very little about his business. This reminds one of the old fable of the man who carried about a brick as a specimen ot a whole building, and the particular brick our illustrious visitor exhibits seems to be of a very inferior character. He goes on to tell his friends in Ceylon that commerce in New Zealand is conducted on a system of dishonesty, and that ere long a tremendous reaction will take place. This prophecy would have more weight if the prophet who uttered it had shown that he had more than a superficial knowledge of the subject he treats of. but it must be remembered that these things are written for the amusement of people who know as much about this colony as we know of Ceylon. What, however, especially struck our superfine visitor was the absence of that humility which should always be observed in well - regulated countries by the lower classes towards their superiors in rank. It seems he found the “ lower classes of settlers ” to be “over-fed and insolent,” while he waxes very wrofh when he comes to speak of the larrikin. ■ This is what he sa y S The colonial-born people are in a deplorable state of morality. The lowest scum of the Home population was brought out by the Government, and the off-spring is what one might expect: the wits being sharpened by the prevailing low chicanery—liars, thieves, continually committing most brutal violent assaults. The ‘ larrikin ’ is the lowest type of humanity I have ever seen.” This is, in truth, dreadful, and we can only pity our illustrious visitor for being obliged to associate with such dreadful people for ever so short a time. The question, however; arises : Why did he go down into the lowest depths in search of types of “ colonial-born people ” ? He might just as well walk in the gutter, and then blame the local Borough Council because his boots were spattered with mud. It is, unfortunately, impossible to deny the existence of the larrikin; but to take him as a type of colonials is about as reasonable as to imagine that because many deeds of violence are reported from the United States the American citizen is a blustering blackguard, whose chief amusement is to shoot everybody he comes across. It is probable, however, that our late visitor was some young gentleman whose knowledge of the world is limited to the small island at the south of India and a few months’ sojourn in the Australasian Colonies, If this is so, let us hope that he will gain more wisdom in his future travels, and if he meets with no worse specimen of humanity than the New Zealand larrikin he may regard himself as lucky. The only result of his wonderful letter will be to deter any intending visitors from Ceylon from coming to New Zealand, and if he is a fair specimen of the inhabitants of that island the colony will not suffer from their absence.