The Evening Star WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 20, 1871.

Evening Star, Volume IX, Issue 2759, 20 December 1871, Page 2

The Evening Star WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 20, 1871.

Unless people can see a little ahead, they are apt to allow their judgments to be warped by writers who for political objects, or through partial knowledge or misanthropy, take distorted

views of men find things. In some j journals periodicity is observable in these aberrations. Our morning con-! temporary is evidently affected thus.' The departure of the mail for England is sure to induce them in one shape or other. Sometimes they are developed in an attack upon a Minister: some-, times on a Government: sometimes on a department. This month the disease has broken forth in a howl of anticipation that all the world, excepting Victoria, is running rashly into bankruptcy by constructing railroads ; and Victoria has only been saved by pulling up, and doing a little of the nipcheese after an extravagant expenditure of nine or ten millions. Precisely so did our fathers talk about steam vessels. They were to prove merely expensive playthings—very well in still water, but utterly inapplicable to ocean traffic; and so expensive that every one who meddled with steam was sure to burn his fingers. Besides, even if they did answer, whore was the advantage 1 All the carrying trade of the world would be done by a quarter

the number of vessels j tbe existing shipping would be useless, and laid up to rot. Where was trade to come from I et cetera. Wo do not know that the world is more popolous now than it was then, but trade, instead of remaining stationary, lias continued to increase in proportion to the rapidity of communication between different countries ; and those modes of rapid transit which, it was predicted, could not be suppoited, because too expensive, have proved the cheapest and most effective means of developing it. Had we the happiness of personal friendship with the melancholic writer of the article which appeared in the Daily Times yesterday morning we should certainly recommend a visit to his physician, relaxation from study, and resort to the Christy’s every night for a month, lest it may be necessary to seclude him altogether from the world until he recovers. What a dismal picture he drew of this New Zealand of ours—really one of the richest spots of this fair earth. Surely some Ariel from spirit land must have held a seance with him, and cracked a joke at his expense, by parading before his eyes visions of troubles that do not nor ever will exist. Customs duties are to fall off: stampdutiesto yield no increase|; nobody will have our corn, and nobody in the shape of immigrants will come and help us to eat it; our best land is sold, and the Government have determined to make railways without counting noses. Such was the dismal morning song sung by our contemporary yesterday. But we had forgotten the blackest mark in the sketcli—the sting that is in its tail—some spirits at the seance prognosticated “ a final n struggle on the part of the Natives”— thank heaven it is to be the last! We hope it will be short, for, if they are to kick the bucket as a people, the sooner they are out of their misery the better. The “ odds ” these oracles tell us of that will be against us at the start, will be then so much in. our favor as to put us into straight running and enable us to pull up our lost ground by a burster. We think seriously of writing to the Government to advise them to throw aside the elaborate investigations of educated railway engineers, and to set some of the writers of the Daily Times to mark out tbe best lines with a divining rod. It is quite evident that they have means of acquiring information unknown to ordinary men, for they have found out that “ a million of money will be devoted “ to the construction of lines within u districts which, the Census tells us, “ possess no resources worth speaking “ of.” Most wonderful discovery this i

Dr Hector, thou art nowhere! Humble thyself before the prognosticators of the Daily Times. William Fox, Premier ; Julius VoaEL, Treasurer; Wjlj lam Gisborne, Minister of WtJrks—what are you about I You have staked your reputations upon evidence not worth the breath that uttered it. Confiding men are you to be so deceived, notwithstanding the means at your command to ascertain the truth. We recommend you to take note of the superior information of the Daily Times always provided, that you keep wide awake, and take means to find out whether those mysterious auguries are from a lying or a truth telling spirit — for spiritualists tell us that rappings are not always to be depended upon. But there is another caution we must give you—the fact that we have observed : the value of the monitions of the Daily Thaos depends much on periodicity. As a medium, the day of the month lias something to do with the state of our contemporary’s health. We always observe a very bilious tone some few days before the sailing of the English mail.