THE NEW ZEALAND LOAN.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume V, Issue 206, 1 September 1870, Page 4

THE NEW ZEALAND LOAN.

I ne Saturday Review pmjs : — lt is often a subject for congtatuhition when a powerful Cabinet sets logic at defiance. A minister who lias committed himself to an unsound principle can very seldom he induced to confess and repudiate his blunder. Sometimes when parties aro very equally divided, this great hutniliation may perforce be accepted, but a Cabinet with a majority of more than a hundred must have developed an unusual amount of Christian meekness when it submits to an nnecumocnl acknowledgment of error. In such raises tlie utmost that reasonable men will expect or ••a-h. is, iliat the false step should at I lie smne tim.- \m justified and retraced, and i he true path regained by a sacrifice of luyic instead of by a sacrifice of fancied dignity. The modified tone of the colonial policy of Lord Giiinville affords a rpniarkabh- illustration of this well-known method of escaping from a false position. If ever aman committed himself to »mi\ tiling, Loi d Granvillii stood committed to ihe doctrine that the relations between Great Britain and her colonies were to bn governed l>y the sternest doctrines of political economy. The theory wa? perfect in its Inyk-, however alien to the feelings of the kindred people at' home and beyond sea t<> whom Lord Granville would have apj I ied it. Within a very short r inn- after the promulgation of Lord G'anville's doctrines in the matter of the New Z a I mid war, two occtisions have arisen t<i fest. the souuiiness of his unsympjithisincr policy. One was the Red River difficuliy in Canada, the other was the New Zealand project of a loan. In both of the-e emergencies we are happily able to congratulate the Governmeut on their judicious inconsistency. If it was right to reluse to the New Zealnnders the assistance of Government troops in their hard struggle with the savage tribes around tin m. it would, a fortiori, have been right to leave the Canadians to put down iheir rebellious half-breeds by their own strength; but in the brief interval since L<>nl Granville's unfortunate despatch to New Zealand, a flood of light had been thrown upon the whole subject, and the Government agreed without demur to share the burden, of the little expedition In which Hiel and his half-breeds were to be brought back to their allegiance and punished lor their crimes. This of course was frightfully illogical, but it was right, and it will go far to neutralise the mischief of any number of scornful despatch* s. Another evidence of the conversation of the Cabinet from their sceptical views on colonial matters has just been afforded by the resolution to assist the New Zealanriers by guaranteeing the loan which is necessary to enable them to fight their battb s without the direct support of English, troops . . . The colonies had asked for a regiment in their distress, and iust- ad of it they got a 6ermou, and uot. at tdl a pleasant sermon, on their duties and responsibilities. As some c insolation, after this unpalatable dose, it occurred 10 Lord Gianvilie that the Government might send out 50,000 emigrants in place of 1,000 troops. The project was clunky, and the precedent rather dangerous, and we do not regret that the Cabinet declined to back it. Emigration will go on quite as fast as it ought to do without official forcing, and a much greater effect will be produced liy making the colonies the most attractive places for English emigrants than by paying any number of passages. Lord Grinnville's newly developed sense of duty to the Colonies was not exhausted by this first failure, and he fell back npoa the plan guaranteeing n loan, which is perhaps ot' all things what, the colony most desires. But it was necessary tor the maintenance of Mini-terial consistency to 10 say that their preseut concession was wholly indefensible, and as the effect on the money market will not b^ diminished by the singular course which the Government have adopted in recommend ing; their policy, we may congratulate the colony on the arrangement, and the Ministers or. their tardy and not very intelligible recognition of principles which they still affect to condemn. The loan 13 not. a matter of very great moment, but, couph-d with the Red River arrangemejr, it may be accepted as a sure indication, that the Cabinet, have finally broken with the fatal theory of colonial independence which for a time exercised so si range a iasciuation over some at least of them."