GENERAL CAMERON.

Evening Post, Issue 275, 26 December 1865, Page 2

GENERAL CAMERON.

[ The Post doubts if in a war such as that waged in New Zealand, in which a colonial legislature decides on the use to be made of the imperial troops^ it is desirable that the officer in command should be a mere automaton. General Cameron distinctly charges' the colonial government with wantonly sacrificing Britsh troops for their own selfish ends, and with driving the natives into revolt for the mere sake of crushing them and confiscating their property. The colonial government profess now to be able to dispense with the assistance of the imperial troops, and if they will henceforth suppress Maori revolts with their own militia, we shall have no reasons for prying too closely into the nature of their dealings with the natives But as our troops hare not yet left the colony, and as it is too much to hope that their co-operation will not be again required, we certainly have a right to know whether the serious charges advanced by Sir Dunean Cameron are or are not without foundation, /"it must be, says the Army and Navy Gazette, most disgusting work, if what we hear be true, for any officer to be engaged in this land-robbers and land-jobber's war, and certainly if our troops are there only to give their "moral support" to the operations of the colonists, the sooner they come home the better for their Belf-respect, their reputation, and their morale as soldiers./ The New Zealand question is inexplicable to us 5 and although it 13 scarcely desirable in an officer to go into the ethical merits of every war in which he may be engaged, we must say that the result of General Cameron's operations in

the field gives us the idea that he had no stomach for his task. His old chief, Lord Clyde, used to say the most distressing and sickening duty he ever had to perform, was to command military parties to aid the civil power in distressing for tithes in Ireland long ago. " But," he added, " I did it— God help me !"