DANGEROUS CONDITION OF THE AUSTRALIAS AND NEW ZEALAND. To the Editor of the " Spectator."

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume VIII, Issue 754, 23 October 1852, Page 4

DANGEROUS CONDITION OF THE AUSTRALIAS AND NEW ZEALAND. To the Editor of the " Spectator."

Sir, — Two birds may be killed with one stone 'by so examining tbe suggested remedies of social disorganization in Australia as to exhibit pre- - cisely the objects with which they are proposed. These remedial suggestions are two : first, that British troops should be sent out in order to strengthen the authority of law and government; secondly, that abundance of labourers should be sent out in order to supply with hands the great - capital which is perishing for want of them. I. It is plain enough that a large military force i kept at the disposal of the Australian executives would enable the local legislature to control and regulate the business of gold-finding. With powers of control and regulation, the governments might put such checks and limits on the work of gold-finding as would preserve tbe or- - dinary labour of the colonies for ordinary pur- ' poses ; and if a large supply of labour were also continuously furnished from home, the goldfields might be continually supplied with more hands, so as gradually to develop their utmost -capacity of production without starving capital in any other employment. The government being strong, and the stieam of immigrant labour both large and continuous, laws migbt.be easily devised, and as readily enforced, which would preserve tbe due relations between capital and labor in all pursuits, and would therefore have tbe effects, not only of saving the old wealth of - these colonies, but of enabling them to convert 'their new production — gold — into the old sorts *of wealth. They would thus be elevated with '-unexampled rapidity to a height of greatness which it requires an effort of the imagination to conceive. But all depends on the maintenance of the physical force to be placed at the disposal of the governments. Such a force could be placed at iheir disposal, but could it be kept there ? I doubt it. May we not reasonably doubt whether in this country, where respect for the law is a national habit, or even in France, where mere authority is paramount and military discipline perfect, soldiers could he hindered from throwing down their muskets and running after gold, if gold could be picked up with but little effort in . a thousand -places ? What could hinder them, except other soldiers in greater numbers, themselves hindered by other soldiers in still greater numbers ? The extinguishers (see Tom Moore's Fables for the Holy Alliance) would take fire. But if that would probably happen in old countries accustomed to law and • order, full of supplies for troops, and possessing every means of locomotion for regiments, what 'Would be the case in the wilderness of Australia, where the gold has turned up in regions more expensive than all England, and as hot and dry as JNorth Africa ; where roads are few and bad ; toheie provisions have not been accumulated, still I

less accumulated in the great number of deserjt spots wide apart from ' each otber at which supplies for troops would be needed ; where neither law nor authority is much respected, because self-government is both novel and incomplete ; and where, above all, the populace would have enjoyed for more thfco twelve months an absolute liberty with regard to the picking up of gold ? The newly-imported soldiers would probably be quite unable to guard the gold-fields from the gold-hunters, and would more probably — certainly if they failed in a first endeavour to enforce new and restrictive laws — rush themselves to share in the intoxications of the gold field. The passions of greed of gold, of gambling, of love of license, of delight in a sudden change from the lavish lot of a common soldier to individual importance, and even to a kind of superiority, over fo,rmer superiors — all inflamed to the uttermost by extreme facility of gratification — would be too much for discipline. Setting soldiers to hunt gold-hunters in the wilds of Australia would be only setting them to hunt for gold. Considering what our soldiers are when their discipline breaks down, the transportation of some British regiments to Australia would resemble passing upon our worst criminals the sentence of a iree passage to the gold-diggings : it would be that species of doctoring which aggravates the malady. I am strengthened in this belief by finding that it is held by long-headed and expe ; rienced officers. We know that British troops in Canada are only prevented from deserting en masse to the States in pursuit of high wages, by keeping them away from the frontier, and rewarding settlers near the frontier for apprehending deserters. What is the temptation of American wages compared with that of the Australian gold fields ? The whole populace of Australia, hating the restraints which soldiers were intended to enforce, would stimulate and facilitate desertion. If the troops in New South Wales and Victoria have not yet deserted to the gold fields, it is to be observed that there has hardly been time for it ; that military discipline never breaks down quite suddenly, but only after longing and discontent have fermented into the spirit of rebellion ; and that swarms of Californian Yankees are.now finding their way to Australia, with ideas, habits,, and experience in devices, which are utterly hostile to the administration of the law "by means of soldiers. I wish you had seen Sam Slicks engaged at Quebec or Montreal in the regular business of seducing British soldiers to desert. No, Sir, if soldiers can be anyhow made available for the purpose in question, they must be men of a different stamp from ordinary British troops. I can imagine a force created, composed like the body guard of the old French monarchy, of cadets of the gentry class, and paid accordingly, which would do all that arms and discipline could accomplish in the circumstances. Such a force might at least be preserved, and there would be no difficulty in raising it ; but its cost would be enormous, and its efficiency small. I therefore dismiss the soldier plan as inapplicable. At best it would resemble the physic which empirics administer to remove symptoms, without ever thinking about the disease. 11. A like quackery is manifest in the proposal to send out British labourers in sufficient numbers. Sufficient for what? To work the gold fields more productively, no doub'., but not to work the old kinds of capital, still less to augment their quantity by converting the new wealth into permanent and productive wealth. Of course, the new labourers would go to the gold fields with even more haste than those long-accustomed and prosperous servants to whom the attractions of gold hunting have proved irresistible. It is proposed to let water run in at the spiggot without stopping the bunghole. The suggested remedy is a long way from the root of the evil. The root of the evil is this — that it is as easy to get gold as to take water from the rivers or to breathe the atmosphere. No human power can alter it. The American founders of California tried for a moment to keep the diggings under the control of the law as public property, but abandoned the attempt entirely as soon as they found it impracticable. Their practical common sense, nurtured to perfection in making war upon the wilderness, submitted without struggle or murmur to the force of laws more powerful than those of man. The Australian, like the Californian gold fields, are free ground to all comers : and you cannot alter it. Let us take it, then, as the basis of our calculations. It would be well, nay highly useful, to send out plenty of labourers from this country, provided we had hit upon some other means of working ordinary capital in the colonies ; but except on that condition, the measure would conduce to nothing but a more rapid and gigantic development of the gold-finding anarchy. That condition not attained, .the suggested remedy of a great labour emigration from this country seems as idie as that of sending out regiments to melt away in the gold fields. Having disposed of the two remedies in a manner which has laid bare the root of the evil to be cured, I proceed to my own suggestion. The basis of our calculations is, that we cannot binder any free man, not even disciplined soldiers, from turning into gold diggers. But we. could hinder slaves. The Australian and New Zealand want a population so far slaves as to be easily hindered from running to the gold fields. I use the odious word slaves, not inadvertently, nor in defiance of universal British feeling, but in order to stimulate thought. A labouring population which could be kept away from the gold fields, would serve every end in view, and yet would not be a slave population in any odious sense. China, and China only, offers us hordes of emigrant labourers, who would cordially engage before embarking to keep away from the gold fields, and whose deliberate contracts to that effect might be readily enforced, because they would be aliens marked by face and language, as labourers under contract to supply the demands of ordinary capital. Already this race is of in-calculable-value in California: the American colony could hardly exist without them as a civilized community. But far more of them will be wanted there ; aud as many as shall be wanted will be obtained, because the Californians are used to the management of 'their own affairs, to the process by which their public wants may -be Bupplied, to the art of inventing means »uitable to their objects. Whereas our Australian and New Zealand colonists are used to a total dependence upon their wretched Governments, and are therefore as helpless as children, or as the mean despotisms whose existence has forbidden them to even comprehend the uses of popular responsibility and self-reliance in public affairs. The

Imperial Government, therefore, Tirhicb has .made these colonial governments and communities so weak, is bound to help them in this emergency. - It is an imperial emergency also ; for,' to say nothing of the loss of our fine-wool imports, if we don't mind what we are about, our colonies may be found some fine day within the fast-spr ; ead-' ing realm of Yarikedora. The principle of Ameiri-, can annexation, beiiig that of conquest without war by means of emigration and of decentralized but federated municipalities, is mightily agreeable to the ciicumstances of the inhabitants of new countries. But your limits of space and my own inclination equally forbid me to Jwell on this' point. The colonial emergency and the imperial obligation to the colonies are motive enough for the imperial effort proposed. Ido not propose that the mother country should do anything for the colonies which they could do for themselves, but something which is wholly out of their power to do. Being what England has made them, they have not self-managing strength enough for setting on foot a large and systematic Chinese -immigration. Neither have they lawful authority for the purpose. The revenue which their taxes yield is but partially at the disposal of their governments, and those governments are still in agreat measure agencies of Downing.street. The government of New Zealand is entirely so. Their waste lands, by far the most important of their sources of revenue, and the best security -they can give for immigration loans, are by law wholly under Downing-street management. Therefore it must not be said that I suggest any new Imperial "meddling" with colonial affairs. Nay, I am persuaded that the Chinese remedy which the colonists cannot yet themselves apply, would utterly fail if applied Ly our Parliament, unless at the same time every power of strictly colonial government now reserved to Downingstreet by Imperial acts were handed over to the colonies. Under the pressure of the colonial emergency, I suggest that before the reserved powers be given up, they shall be used by us to save the colonies. They would be so used, if for every colony money were raised on the security of its waste lands, and expended, to some extent perhaps in sending out British emigrants, but principally in setting on foot without delay an emigration of labourers from China to the colony. If J ttfe Chinese emigration were sufficient in amount, due precautions being taken with regard to contracts for labour in the colony, the emigration from this couutry would be at any rate unquestionable. But the grand point is an ample supply of labour from China for ordinary purposes. This would cause an immense emigration from England. A sagacious and spirited Prime Minister would do the thing without much talking about it — would raise the" money in a fortnight, and send two or three men of ability to several Chinese ports by the ensuing mail. Would not Put have done it, or Canning, though perhaps not the unoriginating Peel ? I think that Lord Durham might have done it. I think tbat Lcrd Palmerston would do it out of band if he were at the head. of the Government. Lord Derby is perhaps incapacitated by his unsettled position as Minister. But no Minister would attempt it spontaneously. Therefore we should resort to the application of pressure on the Government. Hence the proposal of an Australasiao Society or Association. If the colonies can be saved without oue, so much the better. But if not, as I for one cannot help fearing, the sole object and work of the Society would be to stir the question, to inform the ignorant public, to trouble the Houses of Parliament, to worry the careless Ministers — to do for this particular object what has been done at some time or other by every party and for every important public object, because in free countries it is only in the principle of association for getting things done, that parlies live, and public objects find their means of success. I remain, Sir, your obedient servant, E. G. Waxe3?ield. i Reigate, May 18, 1852.