"SAVE ME FROM MY FRIENDS.!"

Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume VII, Issue 378, 9 June 1876, Page 3

"SAVE ME FROM MY FRIENDS.!"

(To the Editor of the Mount Ida Chronicle.)

Sir, —Your correspondent " Cosmos " is a rarity in this district, inasmuch as he sticks up for Macandrew and Reid, while the district has pretty generally dubbed them a pair'of the pleasantest humbugs living, and as such to be put down. If the action of these gentlemen in trying to sell pastoral lands was " careful and deliberate " then thera is cartainly less to be said in favor of them than previously—the only excuse they have hitherto had being that there action was hasty. I should think Mr. Shennan would be willing to make the Maniototo his home if he could get 23,000 acres at 17s. 6d. per acre—doubtless your correspondent would be willing to do the same on the same terms—but it is a pity nothing less than 23,000 acres would satisfy him. And " Cosmos " says Mr. Shennan's is only one case out of thousands! Then if his (" Cosmos'") idea is to be carried out abolition is indispensible, for I am afraid Otago would hardly be able, even were the two " champions of the people's rights" to do their very : best, to accommodate these willing and philanthropic-minded persons. It is a shame that Mr. Shennan and his brothers in injustice cannot have their liberal inclinations fostered, and I quite agree with "Cosmos ; " a repeal of the Land Laws and the substitution of more liberal ones is necessary —coupled with a bill for the reclamation of the Pacific Ocean. We must provide for small settlement —that's an established fact. But the small settler is one "who duns the Government to continue immigration ; " " he does his own work, and cannot give labor, and a country that cannot give labor is not prosperous." And yet " Cosmos" says, "every encouragement should be given to both large and small capitalists " —especially the large capitalists, he means, I suppose, for he surely cannot mean the small, seeing that they cannot " give labor, and a country that cannot give labor is not prosperous." Doubtless he is right, for any one can see -that unless labor is given the country will not prosper, and consequently must, prosper if labor is given. Look at the stations in the district as a case in point, where labor is given at the rate of about one shepherd for 20,000 acres. How infinitely superior for the interests of the country that this should be so than that the land should be peopled by 300 small settlers, who would "do their own work, and could not give* labor." Mr. Shennan should be allowed to make Maniototo his home, and " give abor," as he always has done. What Iwould become of his two bosses and boundary shepherd if that land on which he is willing to make his ,home were thrown open for small settlers, who would "do the work themselves." I fancy I hear a democrat say—" Why the shepherd would become a small settler himself, do the work himself, and dun the Government to continue immigration ! " The thought is too horrible. As your correspondent seems to have forgotten, until he came to .the conclusion of his letter, the' subject' with which his effusion is headed, I may be pardoned foil referring chiefly to what seems to be his real object—viz., to deprecate the action which prevented Mr. Shennan purchasing the amount of land necessary to making his home in Otago.—l am, &c.,. Settles.