The Kumara Times. Published Every Evening. WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 15, 1882.

Kumara Times, Issue 1679, 15 February 1882, Page 2

The Kumara Times. Published Every Evening. WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 15, 1882.

The inhabitants of this portion of New Zealand do not Appear to take much interest in the International Exhibition which will shortly be held in Christchurch. In other places meetings have been held, committees appointed, and all the necessary steps taken to supply the first Exhibition which has ever been organised in the colony with specimens of the most important products of the. various districts, while here little or nothing has been done. The undertaking may be said to par-

take equally of the nature of a private speculation and of a public demonstration. The promoters, Messrs and Twopenny, who will have to stand tilt! chances of financial success or failure, will have to expeud very large sums before tile " colonial show" will be opened, the risk ou their part is therefore necessarily very great. However, these gentlemen have already given sufficient proof that they are equal to the dccasion, for they not long since carried out a similar undertaking in South Australia; which was an immense siiccesa so far as that colony's interests were concerned but the reverse with regard to their own private interests. It niusfc be borne in mind that although New Zealand does not as yet possess d very large population, still the means of transit are in many respects superior to that of many other colonies. More especially is this the case as regards Christchurch. Its communication by railway with all the well-populated portions of the Middle Island, in a southern direction, will bring about a large attendance at the Exhibition, while cheap fares on the overland route, will doubtless ensure the advent of a large number of visitors from the Wesf Coast to the City of the Plains. Thus the promoteis of the scheme may reasonably hope in their present undertaking to be recouped for their previous losses in Adelaide. Under any possible combination of circumstances, the holding of the International Exhibition in New Zealand cannot fail in being productive of great benefits to the colony. It must not for a moment be supposed that the building which is now in the course of erection is what our American cousins would call a " one-horse affair." We find that the total area of the building will be 183, 376 square feet, th*t the length will be 668 feet, and the breadth 282 feet. Of this area 77,400 will be devoted to manufactures, 77,200 to machinery in motion, and 9600 to works of art. The Exhibition would have been 02>ened at on earlier date but for the fact that there has been some delay in forwarding the European exhibits, which have to be collected from the south of Italy to the northern parts of Eussia. It must to some extent be admitted that it is a reproach to a colony like New Zealand that private enterprise should attempt what public spirit failed to essay; but still we must accept things as they present themselves to us, at least on this occasion, and it is our duty to the colony, and more especially to this district, not to allow the industries of Kumara to be unrepresented at the International Exhibition about to be held on the eastern side of the range.