The Oamaru Mail. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE NEW ZEALAND AGRICULTURIST. WEDNESDAY SEPTEMBER 10, 1879.

Oamaru Mail, Volume IV, Issue 1058, 10 September 1879, Page 2

The Oamaru Mail. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE NEW ZEALAND AGRICULTURIST. WEDNESDAY SEPTEMBER 10, 1879.

Mb. R. J- Ceeioiitojc, for many years one of the moat prominent journalists and politicians in this Colony, but who isj now resident in San Francisco, has written to Mr. Swanson, M.H.E., on the Chinese Question, a3 follows :—" I have simply to say th.it I examined it minutely and dispassionately, I saw it illustrated industriously, socially, morally, and intellectually, ami I conceive no greater curse to any Anglo-Saxon community than a swarm of 'Chineae coolies. It is worse than a dry rot. Yon cannot conceive of anything so utterly destructive of our civilisation methods and results. There arc more adult male Chinese in California than there arc American citizens on the great register of the State, and they arc coming at the rate of 1,299 to 2,000 a month, while white immigration has stopped. That means a rapid absorption of the Coast by 'the Chinese, who preserve their own ! customs, observe their own law 3, practice | their own idolatries, and have fifty per icent. more folotß in prison in proportion I to population than any other race. This is not a pleasant state of thing 3 to contemplate. Keep it out of Xc* Zealand. We have the greatest confidence in the ability of the writer to offer an opinion on this subject. He is in the midst of iwanns of Chinese, and ha 3 had an opportunity of watching the injurious effects occasioned to society and trade by what might be properly termed an invasion of these people. Those in favor of Chinese immigration may urgo that California 13 the victim of too much of a good thing. Bat, we have no doubt that not a few of the people of California thought the same at the commencement of the inllux of Celestials. Now they would fain rid themselves and their fair country of the unclean thing#. Chinese immigration t» California started in such a small wav that nobndv could have dreamt that it would grow to such alarming proportions- It was like the cloud no larger than a mans hand, which subsequently overshadowed the whole heavens. Thus it would be with this Colony unless the utmost restrictions were exercised. It would be wise to profit by the experience of California ; to throw all empty theories to the winds. \\ hat want we with theories when we have solid experience aa a basis upon which to act I What is to be avoided in regard to Chinese immigration is the swamping of European population, and the consequent injury to all institutions wc prise as the bulwarks of cur greatness—our happiness—and moral purity. Sir George Grey lias pointed to | this in bis manifesto on the Chinese | question. Notwithstanding any ireaty

that Great Britain may have entered into \rith China, wc are convinced that sho would not insist upon our submitting to a scourge so serious as that which has come upon California. The Mother Country has surely not made an agreement whereby we are compelled to open our ports to Chinese immigration, except under such restrictions that there wiil be 110 danger of our nationality, national institutions, and national purity being obliterated by a semi-barbaric and idolatrous race. It i 3 urged that they are industrious—that they are frugal—that they can live where a European would starve. These qualities, if unmixed with loathsomeness, immorality, and idolatary, "would make them welcome guests. It is not their industry we object to—in a new country that is just what is wanted to raise it into a great nation but we must protest against purchasing industry at so fearful a sacrifice. So long as the Chinese are confined to our goldficlds, even if they are there in equal numbers to Europeans, they are comparatively harmless; but if they happened to become so plentiful that they became dwellers in our towns, there would bo repeated here the Californian difficulty. It is foolish to talk of civilising these people. If they were to come here with the intention of becoming permanent colonists, there might be some chance of doing that. It has been found impracticable to infuse into them European manners and ideas, and they will not give us a chance of educating their children, for they bring neither wive 3 nor children with them.