The Nelson Eveening Mail. THURSDAY, APRIL 30. 1874.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume IX, Issue 102, 30 April 1874, Page 2

The Nelson Eveening Mail. THURSDAY, APRIL 30. 1874.

Provincial Council. — The next session of the Council will be opened on Tuesday next. Harmonic Society, — The Society's quarterly concert, to tho preparation of which unusual care has been devoted, will bo given at the Provincial Hall this evening. The Kennedy Family. — The of tener Mr Kennedy and his family .perform before n Nelson audience, the more do tbe.y appear to be appreciated. Tbere was again a full house last night, and, if we may judge from the manner in which the son^s and anecdotes were received, there is every probability of a large audience assembling as often as often as Mr Kennedy likes to call them together. Coroner's Inquest. — An inques was held at Stoke to-day on the body of Walter Biggar, who met with a Serious accident about a month ago, whf-n the wheel of a dray passed over his head, from the effects of which he died yesterday. A verdict was returned accordingly. The year 1873 was the first in which the imports of foreign aod colonial merchandise into the United Kingdom exceeded the value of £1,000,000 a day. The t.iali. stated at £370,383,745. The exports of British and Irish produce and manufactures averaged nearly ±700,000 a day, tha total being £255,073,336. There is a curious legal complication likely to arise, unless dealt with by the General Assembly. The powerful Arawa tribe of nntives were enlisted by the Government as a protection for their particular districts. They were to serve for three years, and at theexpira* tion of their service to be each entitled to v certain quantity of land. They formed a part, nnd a very effective part, of. the '"Native Contingent." It appears that the t^rm of service has expired, aud the Arawas have not received their grants of land. The natives, however, have a " very native" way of getting over difficulties. A great number of them took piecea of land equivalent to what they were entitled to. They regarded their right as good, according to native logic. Having found their way to this solution of the question, they proceed to sell. Many Europeans h'uve bought some of these lands. Of course the Government will not ratify tbis proceeding upon the part of the Arawas, and unless some basis of equity may be found, the pakfhas will lose their money nnd land. This has happened before ; but we do think that tho proper settlement of such difficulties is not by sacr ficing ihe pakeha, but adjusting the matter according to wellknow;n principles of right and justice. Herald. " Who can do otherwise than sympathise with Mr Ho'.loway in his efforts to better the condition of his class? Who can read th_ following graphic account of their sufferings as given in a lecture at Dunedin, and not feel that Mr Arch and. Mr Holloway ara engaged in a work of true benevolence:— • I speak, says Mr Holloway, more "espetially now in regard to the farm laborers. Their position in the past has been most deplorable. Born in the

midst of poverty and distress, poverty's arms have embraced them, poverty's rigs . have covered them j poverty, Bhrunken, shivering, like a fiend has pursued them close through every step in life — stunting their growth, urnmmog their manhood, ond destroying with its yery breath all that has tended to make life sweet, and dear, and lovely. I have been brought up amongst this class of people? 1^ have mixed very freely with them; I have entered their homes, and, in many oases, I can assure you, they are the abodes of misery and privation. Their wages have been low; their food bas been insufficient; they have had to send their sons into the fields to toil whilst yet children It has been impossible to give them an education; it hns been impossible to avoid tho miseries of the day, or to lay aside anything whatever for sickness or old age. ' The result of all (his has been that, after years of toil, and after having largely to appeal to the sympathies aod to the charity of the publir, they have, in too many ens*?. 0 , had to end their days in a union wotkhouse, and finally rest in a pauper's grave.