The Daily Telegraph SATURDAY, DECEMBER 23, 1882.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3575, 23 December 1882, Page 2

The Daily Telegraph SATURDAY, DECEMBER 23, 1882.

Christmas Dat falliDg on a Monday this year makes it necessary for us to state that this will be the last opportunity we shall have until Wednesday next of addressing our readers, t The enjoyments incidental to the season are, we are glad to state, enhanced by the knowledge that the colony is in a flourishing condition. A short time ago we recorded the fact that there bas been a marked diminution of crime throughout the country during the year, as shown by the number ot prisoners in the public gaols. Our own district has ebared in the good fortune that exhibits a state of affairs evidencing increasing prosperity and decreasing sin and misery. Tbere is a less number of persons in the prison at Napier than has been known for a long time past, and we are led to believe that this fact is not in the remotest degree due to the absence of detection of crime. We must then seek the cause of this ameliorated state of affairs in the improved social and moral condition of the people. Equally a matter for congratulation is the aspect of the markets for colonial produce. Wool, grain, and meat are maintaining satisfactory prices, and there is no prospect, so far as can be seen, of any marked decline occurring to darken the horizon of tbe coming year. In addition to this, the reports from the country districts of the state of tbe crops, the weight and quality of the wool clip, the condition of live stock, show, as nothing co well can, the general prosperity of the colony. The demand for labor is greater than the supply, and high wages are ruling. jWben for the working classes there is no lack of employment; when there is no want of money to pay for labor, to improve the wild pastures, to import the best stock for the improvement of flocks and herde, then we feel that we have indeed much to be thankful for in the Knowledge that the country is goiog-abead. Xn this connection it is noteworthy that the return to the nomination system of immigration has been largely availed of, with the result of a steady influx of an excellent class of people wbo can scarcely fail to become useful colonist?. /The attractions that New Zealand offers to steady and iudustrious persons iv the climate of the country, in its natural resources, in the abundance of work and the price of labor, in its free educational system, and above all in the almost certainty that all in health who choose can be better off at the end of the year than at its commencement, are shown clearly in the face of the increasing numbers of those who are sending for their friends to join them out here. There is more iv this one fact than anything else that can be advanced to prove that what has been written of tbe attractions of this colony is true. 'Keviewing tbe prospects of the colony at large, and bearing in mind the many evidences of general prosperity and happiness around us, let us not forget that, at this season we are more than usually called upon to remember tbe poor in our midst. During the year our readers have often been called upon to relieve distress, to provide for the widow and orphan, and the appeals to charity have been at all times most liberally responded to. We need not then remind a community like this of Napier that, in wishing one and all a Mehby 'Christmas and a Happt New Yeak there are to be found those who, without assistance, can only accept the greeting as a mockery.