The Oamaru Mail WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE NEW ZEALAND AGRICULTURIST. SATURDAY, JANUARY 31. 1880.

Oamaru Mail, Volume IV, Issue 1183, 31 January 1880, Page 2

The Oamaru Mail WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE NEW ZEALAND AGRICULTURIST. SATURDAY, JANUARY 31. 1880.

CoLTSEt. Scratch lev ilkl not visit Oamaru to report upon defences for that port. We suppose that he did not do so because he was not asked, and that he was not asked because the Government did not think it worth while to protect such a place as Oamaru, if they thought of Oamaru at all. The guns which have arrived from England to the order of the Government will be apportioned amongst the principal ports of the Colony, and Oamaru has not yet earned such distinction. We cannot, however, help thinking that Oamaru is one of the vulnerable points in the Colony's armor, and that it would be possible for an cne ny to do serious damage to it, and therefore some damage to the Colony, through the opening which is being left for them. Surely the hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of property in Oamaru are worth protecting, and surely we are entitled to have them protected when we are made to pay the expense of protecting property in other places. Oamaru is just as valuable and dear to its ocopte as Punedin is to the Dtinedinitcs, or the other cities that are to be favored with these big guns are to their inhabitants. We object to this monopolising of these munitions by a few centres of population because they happen to be larger than others. If they bad exclusively paid for them, the second rate tov.ns of the Colony could have ! said nothing. They would probably have provided themselves with these defensive weapons on the same terms. It does not say much for the wisdom of thoao who are responsible for the distribution of the guns that they have virtually plugged up the bring hole but left out the spile. The defence of the smaller ports of the Colony will surely form the subject of tliscc3sion in Parliament during the next session. It is scarcely likely that an enemj could bo landed in such numbers as to do us any damage worth mentioning. It is just as unlikely that auy foreign power would deem it worth while to pour into the Colony a force that would be capable of taking possession, even if it were able to do so. A foreign power would perhaps turn its attention hither if it were in antagonism with Great Britain, bat it would be more likely to conserve all its energies for concentration on the most powerful nation in Europe- We have little to fear from foreign invasion, but we think that we and the other smaller, though by no means unimportant, ports of the Colony, should share in those defences for which all ha\ c to pay- -