Untitled

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume VI, Issue 101, 1 May 1871, Page 2

The Caledonian lodged 12690zs for the week ending 25th. April, and then 25cwt. of specimens were on band. A magnificent meteor was witnessed at' Napier at 10 o'clock on the night of the 27th April. \ Arrangements are making in Auckland for a grand reception lunch, at which the Governor is expected to be present, to the officers of the Nevada, whose arrival is looked for' on Friday next. We take the following significant paragraph from the.circular of the New Zealand Loan and Mercantile, Agency Company, Limited, dated Londou, February 21st : — " New Zealand securities do not stand so well as when we last wrote, the decline dating from the receipt of a telegram from New South Wales stating that the New Zealand Treasurer was on his way to this country to negotiate loaas for £4,000,000. The remains of Captain jst. George, buried 18 months; ago where he fell at Pototu, , were removed to Napier and buried in the cemetery on Thursday last with military honors. It. -was a great ,public funeral for, which the whole of the militia and volunteer companies turned out, and the places of business were closed the whole afternoon. The ceremony began at 1 o'clock and lasted till after dark. ? '• ' : ! f ' 1 .The; Grey, River Argus asks:—-" Who, what, and where are the Ministry that by a political fiction are supposed to govern New Zealand h If we were to turn to the ledger of the Paymaster-General we shpuld find that the . Government of. this jQolqlqy; jyas f;| a':tnagnj|ficent institution. There is first the Hon. William ( Fox-^whp'> in I the < 'census paper, would foubtless„pui down Ma occupation as k to 1 " ; iTordan, : ' Teetotal

Lecturer, and General Muddler,. Thett there is the Hon W. Gisborne —prj# fession : Head Clerk, Excellent Correfi poudent and Unprotected Politcal Female; Next we have the Hon. Julius Vogel — Clever Schemer aod Patent Patron of Political Panderers. Then we have the ornamental Bell —the Hou. Dillon —the mouther of meaningless elegancies, tho Deep Deplorer, the comfortable Commissioneer and Political Puzzle. We had the Great F , the Parent of Provincialism, the Wet Nurse of Wellington, and Comfortable Commissioner number two — but alas ! he hath departed this Colonial life for the blissful beatitudes of Court Suits and Public Dinners in Bishopsgatestreet Within. The Hon. Donald M'Lean, Wholesale Dealer in Flour aud Sugar, and Maori Medicine Man, comes next ; and finally we have the Hon. Henry Sewell, whose position should be described as, " Generally - useless, but Respectable middle-aged party, who ought to be provided for." These delightful persons nominally represent some £8,500 per annum out of the pockets of the Colony, but as their salaries are only based on the absurd assumption that the Ministry would stick to their duties in the Colony, it may be considered that at least double the sum would be about the real price. The quinquennial census of the United f^ States was lately completed, aud shows that the Union contains a population of 39,000,000, about one-fourth more than the United Kingdom. It has increased 22 per cent in the decade, and at the same rate will, io 1900, reach 75,000,000. Of these, about one-tenth will be negroes, as they increase, notwithstanding the war, nearly as fast as the whites. The largest State. New York, now numbers 4,370,000, or a million more than the six New England States, which collectively number only 3,482,000, or a fourth of the population of " the West," now above

...The .discovery of the art, of printing or still more; that of the manufacture of paper, havitig taken the key of knowledge o'ut.flf the'hands of a Sacerdotal class, loosed the flood gates of learning, and Las allowed; knowledge to flow at large through the earth. '"'- But as living water when dammed back in a confined space continually adds to its profundity, but when the impediment is removed', spreads abroad and may be •ultimately lost, so it has fared with knowledge; every body now knows a little of everything, nobody knows anything well ; for there is, even with the best intentioned student, no time to store up one commodity, while so many and various flowers are waiting to his hand to be gathered. Foremost among the branches of learning which have suffered in the manner alluded to is the science of Political Economy; and especially is this state of things true in a young country. The men who emigrate from an old and settled community are usually meu possessed of the pluck and adventure necessary to induce them to take the penal step of severing warm and early ties, and journeyiug in search of a home, sixteen thousand miles off, over that elenieut which, according to the ancients, required a heart clad with threefold brass, and an oak backing to face the embarkation. Such a heart and backing these men no doubt bring with them; but what with hardship, toil, aud schemes, the first years of colonization - add little hut experience to their stock of knowledge. Now experience is a good thing and it covers a multitude of sins, but experience in vaccination will not -stand a shoemaker in much stead, neither will a life spent in subduing the wilderness, or growing wool necessarily make a legislator. A man who pleads experience in lieu of abstract knowledge, must show that his experience has been gained in the line of business which he seeks to conduct. To both these counts, namely, ignorance ..of; abstract principles, and want of experience, it is to be feared that the great bulk of our Legislators whether in esse or in posse must plead guilty, and not only; they, but the whole adult, male population who make legislators 1 of them. True, they are gaining experience, and have before them a corpus vile on which to try their prentice hand, but let us not mince matters, let us call a spade a, spade, and not put ourselves forward as Master Legislators whilewe. are only journeymen tradesmen. It reduces itself to this then —we are governed by the rule "of thumb, we lead a hand-to-mouth political existence. The wisest ruler now-a-days is the man who plays a waiting game and jumps with the popular wish. Arise, then oye people and teach your Senators wisdom ; or,' at any rate tell them plainly what it is you want for they will obey you. It is hard no doubt to have to pay a staff of Legislators while we are left to do all but the mere mechanical part of the work ourselves, but this seems to be a necessity of our present institutions. The momentum of a long rolling, weighty Conservatism prevents a change on the one hand, while an indisposition to fix responsibility on, or to exact penalties from supine or ignorant' representatives, begets on the other hand our present " lasser faire" mode of conducting public affairs. To say nothing of the absence of the salt of the whole genius.