The Feilding Star. THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 12,1885 The Premier

Feilding Star, Volume VI, Issue 102, 12 February 1885, Page 2

The Feilding Star. THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 12, 1885 The Premier

Our contemporary the New Zealand Times is nothing unless disengenious. In an article published on Tuesday last, the Times says :— "Mr Stout is most unfortunate in his capacity of peripatetic champion of the Ministry. He has recently made several intolerably bad speeches. He has undertaken the censorship of the Press on more than one platform, has lectured the people on their morals, and has brought himself into contempt by his silly utterances with regard to reform. No Minister who has ever gone about the country with the intention of strengthening his political standing has failed so egregiously, or done half as much to create a hostile public feeling. If Sir Jraius Yogel is wise he will give the Premier a hint that he had better desist from his labours. Perfect rest is what that astute political physician should prescribe for the patient. The further Mr Stout goes afield the worse he becomes." Apart from the bad taste for which this extract is distinguished, it is altogether contrary to fact, and is only leavened with that grain of truth which makes such mis-statements so dangerous. We admit that Mr Stout has made errors in his speeches, and the one which, we doubt not, he regrets the most, is that committed in his Dunedin address, when he made special allusion to the Times, and mentioned one of the proprietors by name. He thereby laid himself open to the retort uneourteous, and the Times promptly took advantage of the offered opportunity to exercise its skill at vituperation. While we condemn, we cannot help admiring the skill with which our contemporary plants " the barbed shaft" in the "rankling wound" which Mr Stout's armour of (supposed) unbounded self esteem is unable to cover. "If Sir Julius Yogel is wise he will give the Premier a hint that he had better desist from his labours." The implication of actual subordination to one who is Mr Stout's nominal official inferior, is very well put,- if it were not so cruel.