The Manawatu Standard (PUBLISHED DAILY.) The Oldest Daily Newspaper, on the West Coast. THURSDAY, APRIL 2, 1885. PRIZE ESSAYS.

Manawatu Standard, Volume IX, Issue 102, 2 April 1885, Page 2

Manawatu Standard (PUBLISHED DAILY.) The Oldest Daily N ewspaper, on the West Coast. THURSDAY, APRIL 2, 1885. PRIZE ESSAYS.

» It is officially notified m the Gazette that one gold medal and twenty guineas, one silver medal and ten guineas, and one bronze medal and five guineas will be awarded for essays on the present condition and future prospects of the industrial resources of New Zealand, and the best means for fostering their development. In judging of the merits of the essays preference will be given to those which are of a practical character, rather than to mere abstract or theoretical disquisitions. The essays must be sent m to the Secretary of the Exhibition, signed with a motto and accompanied by a sealed envelope containing the author's uamo and address, <on or before the Ist day of December, 1885. This late date is fixed to enable the essayists, if they denire to do so, to utilize the information which the Exhibition itself will supply. The essays will be submitted to a Board of three persons, to be hereafter appointed, on whose decision respecting the merits of the essays the above prizes will be awarded, provided the essays reach a suffi-ciently-deserving standard ot excellence. We shall look forward with considerable interest to the result of this experiment, and hope that there will be considerable competition for the prizes offered. It is said of several great preachers of the day, that they pursue the system of giving out to their class beforehand the subject on which it is their intention to discourse on a future occasioiiV and thus elicit from the members their var.ir ous ideas and strains of thought 1 on the subject m question. Many of them have admitted tljat to .-this- practice they attribute their most successful ecclesiastical eft'orts. Possibly Sir Julius Vogk-l may be.about <tp take a leaf out of their book, and try a similar experiment. No do.ulit much remains to be said and argugd on the and important question of the " present condition and future

prospects of the industrial resources of New Zealand, and. the be^t moans for fostering their developemeut." Whiit more useful, beuelicial, or attractive tiieme could engage the attention or enlist the literary ability of any essayist? The industrial iv sources of New Zealand are as yet m an undeveloped state, and on their development depends m a great measure the future progress and pros perity of the Colony. Let us hope, then, that as "m the multitude of councillors there lacketh not wisdom, so from the literary labours of the competitors may be gathered a mass of practical and material information which may prove serviceable to the Government and the colonists at large. We shall look forward for some original and well-digested ideas on the subject chosen as the result of the competitive essays which we trust will be creditable to the industry and intelligence of those competing.