A DISREPUTABLE WAY OF RAISING THE REVENUE.

New Zealander, Volume 9, Issue 785, 22 October 1853, Page 3

A DISREPUTABLE WAY OF RAISING THE REVENUE.

(From the " Australian and New Zealand Gazette,” April 30.)

We have a serious charge to make against her Majesty’s Ministers in general, and her Majesty’s Colonial Minister in particular ; viz., the charge of obtaining money under false pretences. So many given times in a session does her Majesty’s Government print large colonial Blue Books which the innocent members of the House of Commons are assured contain the very latest intelligence ; and so many times do simple-minded editors — like ourselves —imagine that a new light may possibly be dieted from the bulky folios, and are thus led to invest a given number of shillings in the said Blue Books as they appear, but only to be emphatically “ done.” We never yet saw a Blue Book which might not more appropriately be classed as one of the “ Records of Ancient History,” whether appertaining to the colonies or otherwise; but somehow or other, like the lottery dupes of former days, we never hear of a Colonial Blue Book but we are tempted to buy it, and are always “ sold,” as well as the Book itself.

So many years have elapsed since Government published anything relative to New Zealand that on the announcement of a fresh Blue Book we sent instanter for the huge volume, chuckling that it was out of the power of the Government to “dof us in this case; the intelligence must be novel, in spite of all the red tape in Downing Street. The very first article which met our eyes on opening the book was a leader from the New Zealand Spectator newspaper, dated 1847! which leader appeared in the old series of our journal just six pears ago I “Done again,” was our involuntary exclamation—“ We will never buy another Blue Book.” But surely it must contain something. What follows the antique leader just noticed? Why, that on the 26th August 1847, one Lynham, a carpenter, gave a hint to Lord Grey—who sent it to one Tattersall—that he thought he should like to emigrate to New Zealand ; whereupon Tattersall apprised Lord Grey of the reception of the hint thus given, and also of the additional fact that he had communicated with the said carpenter further on the subject. This information beats the last instance by half a year, it being only Jive years and a half old. The intelligence will be no doubt perused with as great interest by the emigrating public as it is by the House of Commons, for whose enlightenment the fact is Intended; editors of colonial newspapers being supposed to have no interest in the Blue Book, except by courtsey of the House —price seven shillings. The next object that strikes us in a narrative of the transaction between the New Zealand Company and a German gentleman named Beit, one of the early Nelson settlers, who, thanks to the good offices of Mr. Cowell and Earl Grey, stands in the unique position of being the only settler who compelled the New Zealand Company to act fairly. This, as far as it goes, Is a pleasing event in the Company’s history; but as Mr. Beit’s transactions with them commenced, to the best of our recollection, somewhat about 1842, it is rather hard on the buyers of Blue Books to have them published for the first time in 1853, eleven years afterwards. Nor is it at all more interesting to the searchers after colonial news, to know that in 1848 the New Zealand Company was so angry with Mr Cowell for making them for once do justice, as to manoeuvre him out of their house, as an impracticable person, who entertained improper notions of the relations bdtvveen companies and those 'who had been induced to rely upon them. Such intelligence may do very well for the House of Commons, but will not suit the editors of newspapers who are in the habit of searching out news under eleven years old. It is quite evident that if M’e were to devote one of our numbers to the publication of Mr. Beit’s narrative, the Inland Revenue Office could not charge us with the stamp duty on our paper, unless that narrative came un • der the denomination of “ news” from having been published for the first time, the tenth part of a century after the occurrences narrated took place. Like the gentleman who now and then remit their defalcations of income tax to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, we are too conscientious to take advantage of Government tardiness, but we submit to the said Chancellor of the Exchequer that he ought to remit to us seven shillings—the price of his antiquated Blue Book—for having deluded us into buying it under the idea that it contained news. If he do not, our seven shillings will lie quite as heavy on his conscience, when he settles accounts with the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the next world, as any defalcation of property tax can possibly do on the conscience of the miserable sinners who evades its payment in this world. As we were saying, there must be some infatuation in those editors who buy Blue Books In the hope of gleaning something novel and instructive from them. It is but a short time ago that we invested a similar sum in the purchase of an Australian Blue Book, but only to find that the existence of the gold of Australia was somewhat problematic though our own columns had given the fact that Victoria alone ba 1 sent upwards of a hundred tms of the precious metal to the Bank o£ England. Our ideas were, that we should at least find some of those admirable topographical and geological sketches long since given to the world by Sir Thos. Mitchell, the Rev Mr. Clarke, Mr. Stutcbbury, Mr. Hargraves, Commissioner Hardy, and others who have so indefatigably explored the gold regions ; many of whose explorations we have given months ago. But no—nothing of the kind was there, nor indeed anything which was not co-anti-quated with the gold disco very itself. In 1863 we shall no doubt get the documents alluded to, though in 1853 we shall in all probability have published the whole, if we can find room for them. Colonists need not be surprised at the tardiness of Parliament in acceding to colonial reforms when Parliament is so late in getting intelligence from the colonies. It is not many years since a nobleman asked Lord Brougham whether New Zealand was in Australia. For any geographical knowledge that has since appeared in Blue Books to the contrary, that noble man may have imbibed the opinion that Australia is in New Zealand, and that the Australian tallow imported to England is made by boiling down the “ cow trees” which when we were in New Zealand, grew in the valley of the Hutt, —the counterparts of Humboldt’s milk trees of South America.

Yet are these Blue Books marvels of cheap typography, if they only contained anything worth reading. The most expensive print on the most expensive paper—what marvels of geographical and historical instruction might they not become, if their compilers only belonged to the present age; if the ponderous volumes were devoted to the instruction of the people, instead of the convenience of the cheesemonger, pastry-cook, and trunkmaker, for whose purpose less expensive articles might serve. But Parliament has strange notions of book-makiflg, though not altogether deficient in the appreciation ot the art. It is not many years since they devoted some .£40,000 to the production of the writings ot the Venerable Bede, which would no doubt by this time have been hailed with rapture by antiquarians, if Mr. Bohn, without any paliamentary aid at all, had not forestalled Parliament by publishing the said work for three, and sixpence ! There are no doubt many worthy members of Pariiaiftent, who. from the perusal of Australian

Blue Books, are under the impression that some ten or twelve years back Governor Phillip sailed to Australia with the first batch of English convicts, and that therefore it is unreasonable on the part of the Australian colonists so soon to ask for the discontinuance of transportation. Why not tell them in a Blue Book that this is a mistake ; that since that period Australia has become a great colony, rich in wool, wine, tallow, gold, horns, hides, and all the other commodities in the London docks; that, in short, there is no limit to its progress, but the want of the newest information communicated by Blue Books to an intelligent and inquiring people. It will be of no use to parade this knowledge in the Blue Books of the next generation, for that will only be to tell the people of England what was the importance of the Australian colonies when they were in possession of the British Crown : a species of information which the people will learn from other sources than Blue Books, unless the editors of those astute publications show a greater determination to keep up with the inquiring spirit of the age. Fortunately for the New Zealand colonies, the Blue Books relative thereto cannot be very antiquated, seeing that the colonies are themselves only thirteen years old; but when we find a Blue Book raking up trifling events for eleven out of these thirteen years, we may admire the antiquarian research of its compiler, who is no doubt a distinguished member of the Archaslogical Society; but this will scarcely satisfy the inquiring mind of the public whose tastes are less antiquarian, and least of all ourselves, who are sufferers by this spirit of antiquarianism on the part of the Government, to the extent of seven shillings sterling, minus the value of the New Zealand Blue Book as waste paper.