MISRULE IX TONGA.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXVI, Issue 39, 15 February 1905, Page 10

MISRULE IX TONGA.

(To the Kditor.) Sir. —I would again cvrvp space in your valuable columns u> nrakf v rVw remarks upon ibe above subject. Nu onedenios that a treaty was concluded between Tonga And Great Britain. i'ut should not a treaty be binding upon Loth parties to tlto agreement? Ami in the event of one of the parties concerned continually failing to observe the conditions of that agreement, most its clauses Still be binding upon the other party? That there have hecn continual hrecichc.s of the treaty on the part of th? Tongan Government you cannot deny. Tarn not prepared to argue about the. inherent right of the Tongans to make their country too hot for any foreigners who have the temerity to land upon their shores, .any more than I am prepared 1o argue about tbp inherent right of thy Maori as original owner of the soil to dispos; sees the preterit colonists. But in view of the fact that the Tongan (.Government save fit to enter into a treaty with Great Britain, was it not bound to a rigid observance of the conditions stated therein? Again you do not, and cannot, deny that there was general and widespread discontent even amongst King* George's 18,000 subjects (the figures are yours) at the maladministration of their laws, and at the. various infringements of their rights as granted to them under tlieir own constitution. Now. bearing in mind that the laws were administered by the King's Ministers, who were responsible to tiie Kinpr alone, that the King had power to absolutely veto any measures that militated against the welfare of his 18,000 subjects, aud that by failing to exercise that power he. became personally responsible for the jnisprovernment and oppression tinder which his subjects groaned, what becomes of "Tubou's" pathetic speech' , of which you make such capital? Probably th? similarity in sound between the Tongan "b" and "p'' caused His Majesty to confuse pathos with bathos. —I am, etc., EX-TRADER.