The Dunstan Times. FRIDAY, DECEMBER 10, 1875.

Dunstan Times, Issue 712, 10 December 1875, Page 2

The Dunstan Times.

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 10, 1875.

Beneath the rule of men entirely just the pen is mightier than the sword.

The Address of His Honor the Superintendent lias, by this time, been pretty generally read throughout the Province, and as far as our experience goes—especially in the country districts’—it do'/* not appear to have evoked any very seTlo is cause for reflection ; the equanimity of peoples* niinds being no more disturbed than it i Address had never been written. When v? first Silw tho effusion of His Honor, and kno - v ]"Z his patriotic! spirit for things H'ovincial, we did think we should have iT' ; pived something worth reading, which, vt > fc did not succeed in making us conVerf.* 1 1 thecauseof Provincialism would haveat ( least enlisted our respect, and probably some measure of sympathy for the fallen. But, what do we find 1 nothing but a bare recapitulation of facts ; that is, a record of. facts purposely pervert e 1 to suit the cause the Address is supposed to seiwe, and without the least attempt at argument to justify the illogical assumptions so hastily arrived at. His Honor makes no' attempt whatever to p’ead his cause ; probably because he knows that no other people except a sma'l Dunedin clique, with the Daily Times, at their head, will give ear any more to the pleadings of 1 1 ovincialism, and which they have wisely stamped as a rotten, worn out, and obsolete system of government, designed especially for the aggrandisement of Dunedin and the Taieri, at the expense of the interior country districts. His Honor commences his Address in a most fatherly manner, probably, under the impression that being so identified wi'h Provincialism, he possesses a prescriptive right for evermore to remain at ffs head ; for, while he lives, Provincialism must live ; but, when he dies, the absurdity dies with him. Were Mr Macandrew only pleading a good and honest cause, we could believe steadfastly in him, but his specious pleadings and pervertion of facts only tends to alienate us iuourbelieffrom one whose devotion to a cause and his friends amounts to an infatuation bordering on hallucination of mind. His Honor first proceeds to tell us ihat Otago has contributed two millions to the Onlonial chest, in respect to which it has not received one farthing in return, and we are to fanev what this sum would have accomplished towards developing the resources of the Province, it would require very little reflection to answer a very great deal, but how could we suppose to keep it Had it not have been for the gold discoveries the two millions could not have been raised, and only his Honor should bo sufficiently charitable to allow that the goldfields of New Zealand were not especially designed to benefit only one small section of the Colony. The gift, like all tho good things dispensed by a wise and all-seeing providence, was intended to lie wide spread and to benefit all mankind in general, and the colonists of New Zealand more immediately. Had the two millions wen remained in Otago, they would have been expended in and about Dunedin; the drivers in the soil, at whose expenditure of hone and muscle the gold was o'tai led, would not have been benefitted inS the least, and they actually gained more by the money being distributed by the General Government, cvi n if a larger than necessary proportion was expended in doing so. Wo are next informed that, out of the thirty-two colonies of Great Britain, twenty-eight of that number are inferior in amount of public revenue and commerce to tho Province of Otago. Puch an assertion is a long way from the truth, and is only calculated to mislead people. Worn such the case the British possessions in America, Australia, India, and A fries, would scarcely ho worth looking after, and there certainly would be no necessity for the large expenditure consequent upon the Pi incc of Wales’ visit to Her

Majesty's subjects in the minny East. Such an assertion may;- possibly be swallowed by old identities, who never lived in n larger world than tho Highlands of Scotland, or the Taieri, with an occasional visit, now and then) to Dnnedin; but people who have travelled can only treat it with tho ridiculo it deserves.. Mr Macandrew afterwards goes on to inform ua that in all probability the railways of this Province will prove remunerative, but that under the proposed new order of things, tho revenues of paying lines will be devoted to making good the deficiencies of others. This is exactly how things should be. We want New Zealand i ail ways, not Otago railways. It was that the whole of the Colony, from end to end, should be traversed by tho iron horse, that the Public Works Scheme was designed. Mr Macandrew's Address teems with narrow-mindedness, under the guise of localism, and the only conclusion we can draw from his Honor's work is that, finding the dawn of enlightenment which is beginning to set in upon the people of Otago, who, for all practical purposes, have rid themselves of a worn out, obsolete system of government, which, while' fattening" a few, was impoverishing and degrading the many, is especially designed to throw dust in our eyes, that we may revert to our old faith in an absurdity which, let us hope, is well nigh buried.