OUR “ REAL GOVERNOR.”

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 5515, 29 November 1878, Page 3

OUR “ REAL GOVERNOR.”

(From the Timaru Herald, November 23.) It is very evident, we fear, that, in spite of the severe lesson which their unpreparedness must have taught them last session, Ministers have no likelihood of doing any more work during this recess than they did during the last. As for the Premier, he appears to have deliberately abandoned the idea of undertaking any of the actual duties of his office. Ho has retired to Kawau for rest, and, from all that we can learn, has made no arrangements whatever for tho conduct of tho public business until he chooses once more to emerge from his retreat. It must not for a moment bo supposed, however, that the public business is in such applepio order that it does not need the immediate and personal attention of the Prime Minister. On the contrary, there probably never was a time in the history of tho colony when its affairs were in such a muddle as they are in now. A great many questions of the first importance have been awaiting consideration by the Cabinet for months, and the arrears of work which urgently demand to be gone into by Ministers are alarming to contemplate. The fact is that there has not for a long time past been any government in New Zealand, in the constitutional sense of the word. Each Minister has in a desultory kind of way disposed of such matters as his subordinates have pressed with great importunity upon his notice ; but of joint deliberation by the Cabinet on public questions as they arose there has been practically none whatever. The Premier appears to have the greatest aversion from consultation with his colleagues, most of whom he regards as vexatious impediments to the advancement of his own political objects, whatever they may be. It is only with the utmost difficulty, indeed, that a Cabinet meeting catriba got together at all, and when it is got together, wo arc told that business is conducted iu the most marvellous fashion. The Premier eyes everyone of his colleagues who has any opinion of his own, with suspicion and jealousy. Ho will neither impart his own views to them nor listen with any seriousness to theirs. He talks about all sorts of irrelevant subjects, avoids any decision on any matter, and presently fiuds some excuse for making his escape. Then another long interval elapses, only to be followed by a similar proceeding, and the papers which have been prepared for Cabinet meanwhile accumulate and stand over. There is a capital story told of the Premier, and a gentleman holding a prominent position, which illustrates, perhaps, as well as anything could, the way iu which public business is subordinated to private idiosyncrasies, under tho present regime. The gentleman in question had long suffered from the neglect by the Ministry of a matter of the first moment to himself and those ho represented. The matter was simple enough, and only needed the Premier to give his decision upon it one way or the other. The rest of the Ministers knew all about it, and were quite prepared to deal finally with it; but their chief had put off dealing with it again and again, and would never give anybody a chance to bring it before him. At length the patience of the member, —for the gentleman referred to represents a Northern constituency,— was fairly exhausted, and he determined to make a desperate effort to get his business out of the Premier's hands altogether. Ho accordingly found a means to obtain an interview with him alone, and, after detailing the case and describing the distress that he was in about it, begged the Premier as a favor to allow two of the other Ministers to look into it and settle it for the Government. Sir George Grey heard him patiently to the end, when he told him with an air of terrible weariness and distraction that ho had so many anxieties and cares that his head was well nigh bursting. Changing his manner then to one of great interest and pleasantness, which raised the hopes of the applicant to the highest pitch, he proceeded to narrate to him an anecdote of a little child who had seen a little mouse come out of a little hole and eat a little bit of cheese, and who had asked him whether he thought God taught the little mouse to eat the cheese. “ Now was not that a nice thing for the little creature t» say to me ? What I mran to say is, was it not really, though, a very interesting thing 1 Do you not think children are most interesting , &c., &c,, &c., &c. The member tore his hair and fled, and that business remains in statu quo to this day. This story is not only highly characteristic, but it has the further advantage of being strictly true in every particular. That is, in short, exactly the way in which the Premier comports himself towards all public affairs, except those in which he happens to take a personal interest. It has often been gravely asked whether he is quite in his right mind, whether ifc_ is possible for a man in the full possession of his mental faculties to make so light as he does of the weightest responsibilities, and to play ducks and drakes with matters which directly concern the welfare of thousands who never did him any harm. The fact that when he pleases he can despatch business with the greatest promptitude and the most unerring judgment effectually disposes, however, of that sypothesis. Whatever Sir (George Grey may be, he is certainly not a fool. We do not pretend to be able positively to account for that extraordinary eccentricity or perversity, or whatever it is, which has so grievously disappointed all those who really believed he would make an able Minister, if not a safe political leader. Wo have heard some who know him well and have had opportunities of watching him closely declare that he has no aptitude for administration, that he is not capable, in fact, of grasping the details of routine business, and that he°puts things off with twaddle, simply in order to conceal his ignorance. Others say that he is too indolent to do any wqrk, that it bores and vexes him to have to sit iu an office and fag at records and papers, and that he lets business stand over day after day from sheer disinclination to apply himself to it. At the same time he is far too jealous of those about him to hand over anything to them or to relinquish one iota of his authority. If ever his colleagues take anything upon themselves, they suffer for it afterwards. The Premier complains and whines about their disrespect to him, and about the impropriety of their taking important steps without his being consulted. At the same time, if the business which they have undertaken prospers, he assumes tho whole credit of it, and treats it as having been forced on his colleagues by himself. He must be a charming man to work with, certainly. Our own theory about him is that he is mainly governed by an all-pervading love of mischief, and that he dees not care a straw how far he indulges it. He is an utterly selfish man, and is void of consideration for others to a degree that is almost unparalleled in anyone we ever met with. He therefore gratifies his monkeyish passion for spoiling things, in a manner and to an extent which misleads those who gauge him only by the ordinary standard of human nature. In order to wreak a^ little grudge, or even to enjoy a little malicious joke, he does not care if he seriously injures numbers of people who are not concerned in it at all. Ulterior consequences are nothing to him, . provided his own immediate ends are served. II« looks upon even the Premiership of New Zealand merely as an incident in the pursuits of objects which only himself is cognisant of ; and he doss not consider himself at all called upon to fulfil the functions of that office any more than is necessary in order to gain those objects. One of his most intimate friends, if such a man can have a friend, said of him that he never forgave or forgot an injury in ins life, and that he would keep ou good terms with a man who had once offended him for twenty years, in order to get an opportunity of revenge. That judgment of him, which has been proved by a score of instances to be a precisely correct one, affords the key to much of his otherwise inexplicable conduct. He lives in a microcosm of his own, and has nothing really in common with the larger world in which; nevertheless, he moves as an important factor, and of which ha makes use for the furtherance of his own secret and selfish designs. There was a time in his career, no doubt, wbon bo bad lofty ainis and noble views; and we confess that when he voluntarily stepped forth from his gloomy and cynical retirement, to take a successful part in tho politics of tho country which ho once had ruled with despotic power, wo hoped that his old ago would rival his prime m active beneficence. It is not so. His heart has been steeped too long in tho bitter gall of disappointment, for a mind naturally defective in generosity ever to recover tho faculty of sympathy. His political life has been a grief and an astonishment to those who bad faith in him, and an interesting study of misanthropy to those who knew him well enough to penetrate his smooth surface of self restraint. We believe that the cursory analysis ; of the character of this remarkable person . which wo thus have made, if a candid, is not an uncharitable one. Wo are convinced that he is after all tho greatest suffer by his cold and solitary egoism, and wo pity him- , as much as it is possible to have such a : sentiment towards one who is bereft of all affection. Wo look upon him as a refined and 1 powerful intellect blasted by degrading passions, and we have no hope ol his ever re-

suming any useful connection with his fellow-creatures. Wo despair of his at any time realising the expectations of his admirers, and we fear he will go down to his grave a friendless, faithless man, with his once brilliant reputation left far behind him.