The Evening Star TUESDAY, DECEMBER 6, 1870.

Evening Star, Volume VIII, Issue 2396, 6 December 1870, Page 2

The Evening Star TUESDAY, DECEMBER 6, 1870.

It is rather an odd thing that our keen-eyed morning contemporary manages to spy out and to reproduce every sera]) of news from the English papers telling us of the low estimate people at Home entertain of New Zea land, and the difficulties that beset every scheme for its advancement. In this he resembles a scavenger who scrapes all the dirt into a heap—but with this notable difference ; the scavenger follows his dirty trade with a view to the removal of that which, if allowed to remain, would poison the air ; while our contemporary allows the nuisance to be unremoved, to putrefy and spread, and sap the foundations of the commercial and industrial health of society. It might reasonably have been supposed that the extract published this morning from the Home News would have been accompanied by some editorial comments tending to place the mattci in a right light; so that on transmission of today's number of the journal to England the raiscenceptions of the anonymous writer might be removed. Whoever the “ recent writer” quoted by the Home News may be, he has evidently been but very partially informed

of the plans of the General Government. It seems very probable that he had drawn his information from the columns of the Daily Times ; in which case we are not surprised at the rigmarole that follows. We dare say by this time most people have read the extract referred to, as the llomt Nans is pretty generally accessible ; and we therefore need not quote it in order to make our remarks understood. It is very plain, from the style in which it is written, that the commentator on New Zealand matters knew very little of the subject on which he wrote- He indulges in painting a picture of evils that have never followed the construction of railways in any country, so far as the people themselves are concerned ; and condemns the plan of borrowing ten millions, without in the first place knowing the proposed loan had been reduced from ten millions to four ; in the second place, that the loans will not be asked for at once, but are intended to be spread over a series of years, and thrown upon the market as required : and, in the third place, that the sum really asked for has not been thought preposterous for Colonies with far less proportionate wealth to area than New Zealand. In order to render the imaginary parallels he draws applicable to New Zealand, he must first have similar conditions. The idea in the mind of the writer evidently is that the proposed railways are all to be commenced at once, and that they are mere speculative affairs, the utility of which is questionable. Wo have no doubt that there will be plenty of logrolling—plenty of pressure brought upon the Executive to induce them to construct lines of railway in directions that may favor a little land speculation, or even speculation in town lots. It always is so, and ever will be ; and the only true remedy is for the people to inform themselves on what is for the general good, in order that they may be able to check their representatives whenever they are inclined to sacrifice the public to individual gain. These are, however, surface matters. Half a dozen men, with clear heads and long pockets, grow rich—half a hundred get out without loss ; and two or three hundred are let in for it, and come out of such speculations reduced to poverty. But the land is there, with access to it by railway, and it falls at last into the hands of those who get it at its fair value, and know how to use it. There is really no less wealth in the country than before : it has only changed hands. Wc do not know a single Colony or dependency in Her Majesty’s dominions in which such impediments have been thrown into the way of railway construction as in New Zealand; These have arisen partly from circumstances over which the Colony has no control, partly from the jealousies arising from its double government, partly from personal antipathies, and mainly from the ignorance or want of tact, or interested motives, of its public men. The word “ loan ” in regard to public works should be changed to some expression less liable to be misunderstood. It has become so habitually associated with the idea of wasting money in war, that the notion of laying out capital in obtaining water supply to the goldfields or making one of the cheapest and best kind of roads, is looked upon as equally an evil. Propose in the Provincial Council to spend forty thousand pounds for the maintenance for one year of a badly-constructed metal road to the Clutha, and the vote is passed as a matter of course. The working of that line involves innumerable American waggons, drawn at two or three miles an hour by teams of six, seven, or eight horses. The cost of wear and tear of these vehicles, the loss of horses, the heavy hourly charge of feeding and driving, are all to be considered. Contrast these with a cheap line of railway, on which ten times tinweight can be drawn at ten times the speed, continued through three times the number of working hours at a fraction of the cost of labor of man and horse, and wear and tear of vehicles and road, and it must be evident to all but the grossly ignorant or wilfully blind that the best and cheapest road is the railroad. On purely personal and electioneering grounds our Provincial Councillors choose to postpone or refuse its construction, and the Executive seem inclined to enter into engagements to pay 8 per cent, interest annually for what the General Government proposes to do at G per cent. We fancy they have at last managed to cut their own political throats. It is evident that under the Consolidation of Loans Act, whether wc will or not, the loan for the construction of the Clutha Bailway, if obtained, must be on Colonial security ; and were it not so, we see no reason why the Pro-; vince should pay 2 per cent, annually on £400,000, for the purpose of placing the construction of a line of railway under a Provincial Executive that has for the last two years been shewing “ how not to do the work.” The people evidently think with ns, for, as we predicted, they are following the

example set by the Clutha settlers, and petitioning the Superintendent to ask the General Government to go on with their plans, notwithstanding the factious opposition of the Council —and they will succeed. Wo can see through the sinuosities of Mr Reid's “ tail ” wo should like to know who pays our contemporary for “ bearing ” the Home market for Colonial securities.