THE OPPOSITION.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 15, 6 May 1871, Page 3

THE OPPOSITION.

[Southeen Ceoss, April 24.] The perusal of our files of newspapers received from the South during the last few weeks reveals the absence of any cohesion or unnanimity in the small party directly opposed to the Government. There is no doubt of the existence of a bond of union among its members, created by their exclusion from the Treasury benches; but it seems as if there was no clear set of principles on which a rallying-cry might be founded to form any combination of the discontented sections. To judge from the tone of the few devoted organs of what is supposed to constitute the Opposition, the present Government has little to dread in the next session beyond the windy utterances of a few grievancemongers ; for of an actually organised Opposition there is not the least sign. We have turned over file after file in search of something tangible, or the enunciation of some views which could be construed in to the basis of a definite course of action, and our labor has been in vain We have wearily poured over column after column of small print, proving the total ignorance of persons on the spot of native matters within their ken, and demonstrating clearly, could the writer's conclusions be be taken for granted, that there is no surer sign of impending, calamity than a, state of unprecedented quiet. •" A voice from the North," in tones easily recognisable, has proclaimed to the South that numberless evils (directly traceable to the action of the present Ministry, but existing only in the imagination of its possessor and his colleagues) are now impending : " Master Humphrey " shrieks in despair over the inevitable collapse to which, in his opinion, poor New Zealand is doomed ; and leader after leader is devoted in the energy of despair to personal abuse-of the members of the Cabinet, and to favorable reviews of correspondence faulty in its information, and coarsely virulent in its language. A wearying sameness per- ! vades these organs, varied only by the different direction given to their pointless shafts. Seeing now Mr Fox branded for presiding at a social meeting, now Mr Gisborne for performing an act of courtesy, and now Mr Sewell for minding his department, we thought, from the paucity of subjects on which the fault was found, that the big gooseberry season was rapidly approaching, and we were forcibly reminded of Mr Nathaniel "Winklejs fancifal display of shooting where, with the best meaning on his part, the objects of his murderous intention were none the worse, and his own friends ran the greatest danger. ■ If the antagonists of the present Ministry trust to support of this kind, founded on personalties, we may expect to see them eventually, like Shakespeare's their own petard,". Severe as correspondents and leaders may be on other members of the Ministry, it is on the Colonial Treasurer and the Native Minister that the vials of their wrath are poured out, and we believe we can trace the reason. In both the departments presided over by these gentlemen there is the greatest scope for theory, and the practical man who succeeds in either raises himself up a host of theoretic enemies. Success is at the bottom of all envy. It happens that in his Mr Vogel has carried out a postal system, and, from the nature of his office, has had'the duty of expounding a comprehensive scheme of colonisation, — both endorsed by the country, and calculated to largely enhance the prosperity of the colony. Mr McLean was called upon by the country at large to under-

take the wearisome task of attending to native matters when rebellion and murder were rampant in the land, and has brought about the happy result that never were affairs connected with our Maori neighbours in a better state, and that at no time has there been less apprehension of danger. Success has attended their efforts ; hence the jealousy against them. It would be but honest if rival financiers and would-be native administrators would acknowledge the actual cause of their hostility, and not cry out against the Native Minister because he does his duty by visiting native tribes and by having his office en the spot where his services are most required ; or stop so slow as to invent and retail slanders concerning the Colonial Treasurer, We must object in the name of the fourth estate to the introduction in newspapers of objections to politicians based on their personal appearance. It is simply degrading to " the Press " that speeches made by public men, bearing upon such a subject should be favorab[y. eommented upon. We really feel for our contemporaries in seeing them reduced to such straits for topics on which to use their pens; for we know full well that it is only the weak and spiteful who fly to. invective as their strongest argument.