QUESTIONABLE STRATEGY.

Dunstan Times, Issue 499, 10 November 1871, Page 1 (Supplement)

QUESTIONABLE STRATEGY.

Under the above heading, the European Mail publishes the following. A similar remedy has been suggested for the Maori difficulty ; —“ A new edition of Messrs. Parkman’s ‘ Conspiracy of Pontiac and the Indian War after the Conquest of Canada,’ has been published % Messrs. Little and Brown, of Boston, United States. In this work there is reported a proposal made by the Commander at the time, Sir J etfrey Ambers, to get rid of his Indian enemies by inoculating them with the small-pox. The exact words are these : ‘ Could it not be contrived to send the small-pox among the disaffected tribes of Indians 1 Wc must, on this occasion use every strategera in our power to reduce them.’ To this Bouquet replied : ‘ I will try to inoculate the • with some blankets that may fall into their hands, and take care not to get the disease myself. As it is a pity to expose good men against them, I wish we could make use of the Spanish method to hunt them with Euglish dogs, supported by rangers and some light horses, who would, I think, effectually extirpate or remove the vermin.’ ‘Amherst rejoined: ‘You will do well to try to inoculate the Indians by means of blankets, as well as to try every other method that can serve to extripate this execrable race ’ In another letter he says ; ‘ I need only add that I wish to hear of no prisoners, should any of the villains be met with in arms.”' A spirited girl says that, to her mind, the women who want female suffrage because it will cause division in families, must be a precious mock lot. A woman with any pluck can pick a quarrel with her husband without waiting to split on votes. At a Californian fair several bottles of strained honey were exhibited, when a man put a bottle of castor oil with the rest. Several old ladies sampled it, with the same result. The opinion of all who tried it was that the bee who laid it was a fraud. One old lady said that oven the bees had got to cheating now-a-days. Cliarles Dickens said The one serviceable, safe, certain, remunerative, attainable quality in every study and in every pursuit, is the quality of attention. My own invention or imagination would never have served me as it has but for the habit of com-mon-place, humble, patient, daily toiling, drudging attention.