Correspondence.

Lyttelton Times, Volume VIII, Issue 493, 25 July 1857, Page 3

Correspondence.

To the Editor of the lyttelton Times,

g IB> : It is curious to observe the pertinacious spirit of perversion with which the resolutions of the Provincial Council on the subject of immigration are still discussed by your correspondents It really might be inferred from the letter signed " H," which appeared in your paper hist Saturday, that some resolutions had been passed by the "Council hostile to the policy of promoting immigration. As, apart from that strange misconception of what.djd take place, " H's letter contains much that is valuable, I

desire, with your permission, to make a few re- I marks upon it, with a view to separate the poison from the honey it contains. In the first place, then, "H" observes thus : —" At a distance of 16,000 miles from England, with passages costing what they now do, to suppose tli at an expenditure of £20,000 can overpeople this province seems preposterous." Now, sir, in the name of all the conjurors in Canterbury, who does suppose that £20,000 can overpeople this province ? Or where can anything be found to warrant the supposition that such a madman exists in the place who thinks so ? Again, "H" says :—" For my part, as an Englishman, I hold that population, so long as each can find honest employment, a climate temperate, and a soil not ungrateful, is the true source of wealth." Well, I suppose most persons think so too. It surely needs "no ghost to come from the grave "to tell us that. "So long as each can find honest employment," says ; he. Exactly so. There lies the gist of the whole controversy, and to it I will presently return. But in the meantime let me ask-—What right has "H" or anyone else to imply that there is any section of politicians here who would not " introduce population into the province so long as each could find honest employment?" I have never heard of one, nor do I believe such a person can be found. Such assertions as those made by " H " are mere truisms which'cannot be disputed. And, sir, will you pardon me for saying that this really appears to be the tactics of yourself and your supporters ( in this controversy. You and they ensconce yourselves behind a pack of truisms and keep flinging them at your adversaries' heads with the hope I suppose of stunning or stupifying, if you cannot convince them. As thus—" lam for immigration," ergo, "you are not." "I am for introducing Englishmen here as long as they can find honest employment," therefore, " you would keep them away," and so on. Now, sir, we might take up these truisms and fling them back again, for they will hit you just as hard as they hit us. But I forbear doing so. It is, I think, an unworthy style of controversy, and beneath the occasion. To use the word introduced by "H " into his letter, it looks like " clap-trap."

Now, sir, let us come to close questions. We admit, once and for all, that £20,000 and twenty times that sum will not " overpeople" this province. You and "H" are perfectly welcome to the most that can be made of that admission. We admit also that it is perfectly sound doctrine to affirm " that population, so long as each can find honest employment, a climate temperate, and soil not ungrateful, is the true source of wealth." I will go further and admit that that sentence is very prettily framed and comprises all that need be said thereanent. So let that pass. What then is the point at issue ? Simply this. Shall our assisted immigration of labourers be regulated, and (so far as regulations must of necessity be restrictions) be resstricted, or is it to be carried on without restrictions, and shall labourers be sent here just as fast as they can be induced to come ? Now, I, for one, am of opinion that it should be regulated, and that it is a mistake to assume that j £20,000 cannot introduce too many labourers ( into this small settlement ■at once, and thatsuch a doctrine, if acted on, will prove a very mischievous one. I know, Sir, that it will be said that those who think thus are timid, and that the history of colonization does not furnish an instance of population having been poured too fast into a new settlement. Ifc is, I think, a good answer to this(if it be true) to say that we are by no means well informed as to the minute and early history of new settlements. Almost all that has yet been written on colonization is theoretical, and we are in great ignorance of the minute practical details of the science, or art as Mr. Wakefield would term it. All that we do know of practical utility has been derived from i the accounts of the colonization of America, | the Canadas, and recently of Australia. _ But, j supposing the history of" the colonization of those countries to bear out the policy of unrestricted immigration, even then, it may be fairly maintained that there is no such similarity of circumstances between them and us as to justify the assertion that their experience furnishes the example which so small a settlement as ours should closely and in all particulars imitate. One remarkable distinction at once occurs. The facility, Inamely, of obtaining land. In the early history of those colonies jand was all but given away, and the settler became at once a possessor. In the almost boundless territories of those vast countries, this doctrine of populating as fast as you can may be politically wise, whatever may be the personal bearings of the policy, and atthe end of fifty years the resultmay be referred to in proof of success. But we know not how much individual suffering accompanied the experiment. And the imagination of every settler here, though he emigrated under the rnost_ favourable circumstances, can very readily suggest a very large amount. But- there really is no parallel in the cases. Ours is a country of very limited extent. Land with us is not given away. It is fixed (colonially speaking) at a very high price. Not an acre can be squatted on 'if the immigrant cannot immediately find work. The analogy therefore breaks down at the very threshokTof the argument. We have then to reason on this matter to a great extent a priori and with reference to the peculiar circumstance, of our own position. . . _ . . Now, your correspondent "H " argues, because 3000 people were introduced here in ISSI under the Canterbury Association " with results so advantageous," that "full and profitable '-employment could be lound for 3000' men during the next two years." No person, I pre r

sume, will doubt this if the same systom b& observed. On that occasion, the 3000 consisted of capitalists and labourers together, the numerical proportion of the one to the other having been adjusted after ve)-y nice and accurate calculations, by the Association. It is not dealing fairly with the subject to compare the immigration now proposed with that. Let land be sold contemporaneously, and capital be invested simultaneously with the introduction of your labourers, and "H" may make his three thousand thirty thousand, and if he could add another cipher so much the better. But then, " II" may say, the capital is already here, and therefore it is not necessary that it should accompany the labour. Precisely so. And it is just for that reason that the £20,000_has been voted. There would have been "but little need of it else. It is exactly that which constitutes the difference in. the two cases, and suggests a different course of action. Under that system every labourer came with his employer, or nearly so, and of course found instant employment. But now, seeing that every fresh labourer has to seek his employer after his arrival, and seeing that employers are not now as then to be found, even at the place of landing, or even within a dozen miles of it, but are to be sought for over the entire province, it becomes important that our immigration should be reguj lated and conducted at a rate which shall I allow one set to be disposed of before the next comes, so that,tto quote your correspondent once more, " each one introduced shall find honest employment." Sir, I cannot but fear that very loose opinions prevail as to the facility with which labourers, and especially such as have families, may settle down into their places after their arrival here. Though many doubtless will find ready employment in the towns, yet the bulk must find their resting places in the interior, which is not so easily reached by a man without money, and, it may be, not only without money but with a family. But it may be of advantage for us to endeavour to ascertain, how this important subject is regarded in the neighbouring colonies. And if, sir., as I have no doubt is the case, you are familiar with the way in which it is being discussed in Victoria, you must know that the ill regulated stream of immigration which has been going on in that country has bpen productive of an immense amount of pers nal suffering there. So much so, that the matter is now not only under the consideration of the government, but it constitutes a very fertile theme for the conductors of papers and their correspondents. In one Melbourne Argus alone, of so late a date as Jane last, there may be found three letters on this subject from recent immigrants well worthy of perusal. There, sir, as here, the Editor advocates immigration without limitation ; —theorizes with great ability on " labour which is capital"—and' talks of the folly of supposing that too many labourers can be introduced into a country with such boundless resources. Nevertheless, pressed by the arguments, and. above all, by the recital of the painful experience of the immigrants themselves, the theorist is driven to the admission that the government ought to have public works always on hand to which all new comers may be sent to be employed below the average rate of wages, till other work can be obtained. How far that may be sound policy for Victoria, I will not hazard an opinion. But sir, are you ov is your correspondent " H " prepared to adv cate such a system here ? Are the theories of Louis Blanc, the desperate contrivances of Louis Napoleon, to be the examples which upon a small scale we are to imitate? Are we to have national workshops, or what may be equivalent to them? And are we to borrow money to carry on a system of immigration requiring such a safety valve ? Will it not rather be better, even at the risk of being thought " Slowboys,"so to regulate our operations that no such evils need arise, still less be provided for? This, sir, I believe, is all for which the majority of the Provincial Council contended. There are some other other points, in connection with this subject, to which, when I began this letter, I intended to refer; but I fear I have already occupied too much of your paper. I must therefore pass them by on this occasion. I cannot, however, conclude without observing that I think it is unfortunate that this discussion should have been raised at this moment, and especially that the subject should have been treated as it has been. If, however, inconvenience should arise from it, the Wame rests with those who commenced it. I am, Sir, Your obedient servant, J. B.

To the Editor of the Lyttelton Times. Sir, —Notwithstanding the remarks of your Subscriber of this day's ' Times,' I must still remind him that he has not a practical or correct idea aboiit him as to the working of general average. That he has quoted McCulloch correctly I admit, but he has evidently never had a case of general average to arrange; if he had, he would know the working of such claims; at present he is "at sea "on the subject with compass and chart, but does not know how to use them. The tact is, Mr. Editor, that if a case of general average should arise, it wonld (in nine cases out of ten) work for the benefit of those parties who are agreeingto insure the -steamers; for example, if the steamer is " cut from an anchor and cable, or if the masts are cut away," the cargo would have to contribute towards the expense incurred repairing the damage; if the owners of the cargo had insured the goods, the underwriters of the cargo would pay, not the underwriters qf the steamer, as your subscriber

thinks and is endeavouring to make other people believe- as I said in my last letter,-if the cargo was uninsured, the loss (or proportion of loss contributed by the cargo) would fall on the owner of the cargo, and not on the steamer, l^have, Mr. Editor, had the practical working of average statements, and, as your Subscriber does nob understand Hhern, it is one proof that such cases seldom occur here. I cannot ascertain thifc more than two or three average statements have ever been made out in Canterbury ; considering the amount of trade carried on, this is remarkably in favour of the place. Allow nt» then, sir, strongly to protest against the impolicy of your Subscriber's letter when he endeavours to "magnify molehills into mountains; he ought rather to be uniting with others, who are doing all in their power and exerting themselves to the utmost in order to improve the facilities for communicatino- with squatters on the coast. I believe that squatters will, see through the interested motives of your Subscriber, and be greatly displeased at such letters as Ins going before the public here and in England to-the great injury of the colony (in fact I have been told by squatters that they are noticing rt). I consider that the plan proposed is a very good one, and the only plan which will enable us to have steamers in the coasting trade; as colonists, we ought one and ail io assist forward the proposed plan: when weh subdivided, as is being done, the risk is nardly worth talking about. . . In answer to your Subscriber's question why the steamers are not insured in England or Australia, I should suppose, Mr. Editor that underwriters who do not know the merits of the case, will not take the risk; your Subscriber and others before him and like him have, as is well remarked, by a Colonist in this day's limes, "given this colony a bad name." I will do my best to remove this, and, if others will assist me instead of writing the colony down, I have no doubt that ere long this province will stand A 1 in the opin?on of underwriters all over the, world, as indeed it would do now if similar letters to your Subscriber s had never been written.

- «.' v t ? TEAM ' ST^AM, STEAM. Jjyfctelton, July 22, 1857.

To the Editor of the Lyttelton Times. Sik—A better steamer than the Alma presents her. compliments to the Editor of the • Lyttelton limes, and W to assure him that she cannot be frightened-by ghost stories founded on interested motives. She thinks'her sister „ ~. a, AT~ n 1S jealous, and does not like the sdea of having " a steamer " for a rivaL ——d & Co.'s Shipbuilding Yards, Greenock, Wednesday.