THE Grey River Argus. PUBLISHED DAILY. MONDAY, APRIL 22, 1872.

Grey River Argus, Volume XII, Issue 1164, 22 April 1872, Page 2

THE Grey River Argus. PUBLISHED DAILY. MONDAY, APRIL 22, 1872.

It is scarcely two years since the Buller district expended its energies in seeking conceiving even then, "though'^ffiey^liadf: nothing like the prospects of prosperity which they now have, that they Were sufficiently settled and advanced as a community to claim some form of government for themselves, to be administered by themselves. The plot, or project, as we may more properly call it, came to a premature end, not in any respect upon its merits, but in consequence of its management in the preliminaries, chiefly concern iug the character of the , signatures which were attached to the petition presented to Parliament. Since then, and closely succeeding their efforts, what was known in Greymouth as annexation, and ■in Hokitika as disruption, was as warmly agitated, but, for the present, that project also remains in abeyance. Local efforts to get over the difficulties of our m«chxnixed. form of government hare not, however, altogether ceased. The scene is simply changed. It is not n«w in the Orey. Valley, or io the Bulier Valley, that the demand for separation, self-govern-ment, or annexation is made, hut in the remote and secluded district of the Amuri, another pendicle of the Province of Nelson. Numbering more occupants of the four-footed kind than representatives of "the human form divine," the Amuri has not hitherto possessed an organ of public opinion in the shape of a newspaper, and, having but one member in the Nelson Council, even his stentorian voice, so long as it was the solitary echo of Amuri sentiment, was notalwaysof much avail among the " multitude of counsel" assembled in the Council Hall. Recently, it is said, the district has been deprived of even this one solitary but sonorous voice, through the resignation of its representative and the insufficiency of time for the election of a successor. But, close to its borders, the Amuri possesses an organ or an oracle of small pretensions except in the boldness of its language, yclept the Kaikowa Herald, and through the medium of the columns of that Marlborough journal we are advised that in the Amuri there has been initiated a movement which aims at nothing less than separation from Nelson, and the elevation .of the district into a County or a region which shall have its affairs administered by a Board of Works. The project is undoubtedly a big and a bold one for such a thinly-populated piece of country as the Amuri, but anyone acquainted with the peculiar situation of j the district, or who may take the trouble to make that acquaintance by a slight glance at the map, will be ready to forgive the people there situated for any dissatisfaction which they may evince as to the management of their Jocal affairs. - By the creation of the Province of Marlborough, the Amuri was left as a mere wedge of country between the new Province and that of Canterbury, remaining { associated with Nelson only politically. Socially, as topographically, there was no alliance between the two places, and the wonder is that, at an earlier date, there has not been a disposition to seek political shelter in the arms of either Canterbury or. Marlborough. With railways advancing towards them from Christchurch, and haying been always more intimate with that city in their commercial relations, the residents probably now begin to feel that it is time they were undoing the ties which have hitherto bound them to Nelson, whatever these may have been, But they alao begin to feel some-

what self-important, and, in asking to be created a County, are asking that which, at the present moment, is not likely to be very promptly granted. Possibly .they^ may be more judicious than self-important — expecting some gain by oftering a tempting piece of territory to Canterbury, and by threatening a severance of their hitherto patient connection with Nelson. However this may be, it is satisfactory to find, on the part of th,e men of the Amuri, a disposition to : discuss affairs of local or public interest, for out of that discussion some good may come to themselves and others. Their district is ono wh'ch should prove an extensive and convenient source of supply to the West Coast — a consideration which is now of the greater interest when the demand is daily increasing. It is to be regretted, indeed, that greater exertions have not already been made to render the facilities of communication between the sources of supply and demand more available than they are at present. Had Ibis been done, there would probably be less complaint on the part of Amuri against the Nelso7i Government, and it is to be hoped that, while doing justice to all other interests, the new members for the Grey Valley will endeavor to promote this mutual interest of two Provincial districts by greater uTtft«imitv on the su'vject than that which distinguished their predecessors.