FARMERS AND PROTECTION

Ashburton Guardian, Volume VII, Issue 1721, 28 November 1887, Page 3

FARMERS AND PROTECTION

("Victorian Farmers' Gszatte ")

We clearly reo gnlse that the interests of town and country are identioal. Manu factories present the best at,d surest markets for the products of agricnlture. They diffuse wealth amoo^ all obsaes, and cause money to circulate freely. To give • manufacturer and farmer good prices, and the artisan and the laborer good wages, Is to give them the power to buy, and to give, not only the manufacturer, bnt all claesep, a market for their goods-

The more a nation products, 'ha richer h becomes. Any Increase of domertio production Is an addition of ao much wealth ; any diminution of flomestic produotion la • ■abstraction of so mnch wealth. Proteoilon secures such Increase of production Freetrade In England hat thrown onefourth of her wheat area ont of cultivation. It has extinguished her dairy farming, her frolt and vegetable, and all other minor Industries, It has enabled foreigners to flood her markets with cheap and nasty goods. Protected manufacturer* add •nother population to the agricultural, and theie give rise to oommetoe and shipping with their kindred m dmtrles, and thus euperadd another population. These several classes re-aofc favorably upon and tupport other clauses, professional men, bankers, literary men, miners, brokers, clerks, and so forth. We do not grudge the manufacturers and artUani of Melbourne their present prosfierlty. On the contrary we rejoice In t. All we advocate la that the advantages of the cty and irural population should re playedf on an equitable basis as Regards Protection. No one will deny that Che Interests of town and country sire' Independent. A Q y causa that unduly presses on the one must injure the ptber. An inequitable tariff does this JPrbtectFop In'' America,' Canada, and rails har been the foster-mother of agricultural progress and procperity. It yai oply by experiment that we found that pould'grW cereals" m Victoria, that t\)Q sheep, the o^, and the horee would thrive here. Moet of the cultivated plants In England were originally German ft w»i by a polioy of Protection that they flourished Id Britian. It is only by Protection m this yoqng colony that the produott of the field and f«p ory have become what they are; The iofant may become a giant if protected lv it helpleasoeas

PTba Scotch honey-barvgßt iff the heaviest Cot' many s eats past, as the blossom oi the betihe? has'l&en exceptionally r|j)b; and the , jidnVyisol^lfendid'^nkiity: prices, hoWfiwr.'are bo low that althoagb the harvest is cue oi tta begt 00 record, it is pot lively to be jilJWPltlyciujtiyfl,