THE AGONY OF RETRENCHMENT
. " Meroo'io '' writes as follows Id the 11 Auckland Weekly News ": — I mast fifty that during the holidays my eympatKieH And feelln^a of compassion hay« been moo keenly aroused oq beha'f of Mmie'ers, and when I have seen them amongst a crowd who were enjoying themselves, I have felt somewhat tbankfal that I w»b not ft Minister ot the Grown. Mr MitchftlaOQ, for instance, has been taking * few d»ys of reoreatloo before faoiDg the work that lies before him and his colleagnoß m Wellington — the work of remo/Beleu retreuchment. Bat that work mast be done If the colony la to be saved. The Minister's bowels of compassion must be shut np completely. A Minister who onoe did a j bof " catting down " told me that it was most agonising work. " I was not," he Bald, •' the men that wer* the rrorat. la many oases they took the stroke m silence. But the women were too maoh for my fortl adp. They Invnded me everywhere. I coald not get peace to take my meals In my own bouse ; and If I went out to a friend I wai Bare to find amongst the ladles present ono whose object was to persmde me to keep some« one In the office whose Barvioos I made op raj mind oou'd ba dispensed with. Wives, mothers, Bisters, all pleaded fot their male relatives — upon whom probably they depended — with tears In their eyas. First, they wonld Bay that It was an Injustice ; that Me So-snd-SJo couli not be done without ; that ha was the bey man m the department ; surely I would not send him away, while— ——and— — — were kept. Th sa men who wre kept mast have some way of li.fi lencing me whiob these pn»r husbands did not kntw of i Then, whaa beaten on theaa and half •••d< b^o ntber j;r -nods, thpy oame do»ntosimpleenrost!esaud plifal team. Th^v said, were they to be cast on the world after so many yearn m the poblio BerviOß, when their poor husband ould do nothing o'se but what he h«d bean aoCmtomed to ? were they to lose »hp ■ p eitinn they bad held 1 wer» their children to be little elae than beggars m the place where they had moved among the beatsocie y ? ' My informant declared that this kind of thins oontlaued day after day, almoat unnerved him, and made him inclined to think that it wonld be better to simply assome the pleasant position takan by Sir Julius V'pel, and go m for borrowing more and taxing more, bo as to make things pleasant whlie their term of tffioe lasted.
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Ashburton Guardian, Volume VII, Issue 1759, 6 February 1888, Page 4
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440THE AGONY OF RETRENCHMENT Ashburton Guardian, Volume VII, Issue 1759, 6 February 1888, Page 4
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