The Patea Mail. (Published Wednesdays and Saturdays.) SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 1, 1879.

Patea Mail, Volume V, Issue 472, 1 November 1879, Page 2

The Patea Mail. (Published Wednesdays and Saturdays.) SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 1, 1879.

The great Liberal Party, having cut off its own head, is conducting itself after the manner of most other decapitated things—it is beginning to smell high and to show signs of disintegration. All tbe blows of the enemy had been aimed at the Grey head, and therefore it was supposed by the body and the limbs that if the head were cut off the enemy would be completely sold, having nothing further to attack. The head was therefore removed as politely as possible, and it was then discovered, when it was somewhat too late, that a head is a useful contrivance, and that it is not easy to graft any block on in its place. In cutting off its natural head, the Opposition has done all that the Government could have wished to do, and the victory of the Government will after all resemble that of the Irishman at the battle of Waterloo, who walked boldy up to one of the enemy and cut off his foot. “ But,” said one who heard the story of the exploit, “ why didn’t you cut off his head ?” “ Och I” said Pat, “ that was off already.” Tbe great Liberal Party should have remembered that a band of humbugs would be most successfully led by the prince of humbugs, and should therefore have stood by the leader without whom they would have had no political existence. But it is too late to repent; the head is off, and the bones will soon be white and bare. Disaster follows disaster,

“ When sorrows come, they come not single spies, But in battalions !”

First the Auckland members are lost; for they belonged to the personal following of the Grey head, and when it was cut off were at liberty to follow whom they would. Then the boasted senior seat for Christchurch, so chivalrously won, was lost and given to an enemy, so that the Grey head was first cut off, and then kicked —cut off by its friends, and kicked by its enemies. And now disintegration sets in, and will proceed more and more rapidly as the effluvium increases.

A sure sign of the chagrin and imminent dissolution of the Opposition is that the political bogy, Separation, is being trotted out on every possible occasion. The first attitude of the Opposition was, “ Let ns have our way, or we’ll stop all business.” Now it is, “ Let ns rule the country, or by jingo we’ll split it in two.” Both of those threats argue very exalted patriotism. “We must do the business, or there shall be none done, we shall rule the country, or there shall be no country to rule,” is about the plain English of what the Opposition have to say. . Was ever selfishness more thoroughly carried out, or ever seen in a more contemptible shape ! Never,-since Satan preferred ruling Hell to serving in Heaven, has there been anything equal to this fiendish wish to divide a united country in the hope of ruling a part of it. The whole tendency ot modern enlightenment and common sense is to abolish the needless and insane divisions of nations, and to build up in place of them compact unity and strength. Russia, Italy, Germany, Great Britain and Ireland, Sweden and Norway, America, Canada, and even New Zealand, afford examples of strength and safety being sought in unity. Only the other day this colony abolished the provinces, in accordance with a far sighted policy, and will she now tamely submit to be threatened with a more preposterous division than the one she but lately healed with so great an effort? We trow not; nothing is more certain than that the common sense of the electors could be trusted, in this matter, to give an almost unanimous verdict in favor of unity. Now Zealand centralised itself in order to be able to offer good security to the European money-lender. On the strength of that centralisation she has borrowed a great many millions, at a rate considerably below what she could have borrowed at had she been divided. But what would our confiding creditors say if they discovered that they had been trapped, and that after we had borrowed a dozen or fifteen millions on the strength of our unity, we suddenly divided more widely than before ? What would our Gorman creditors say ? What would Bismark say ? Let those answer who remember how he interfered in Egypt on behalf of German bondholders.

But the difficulty with the public creditors is by no means the only one that Separation would bring upon ns. Innumerable inconveniences would arise from different -laws and tariffs being adopted iu what would practically be the two colonies of New' Zealand. One Island might adopt Protection, and the other Freatrade, and the result would be a repetition of the troubles between Victoria and New South Wales. Or again,

both Islands might adopt Protection, so that while the North excluded the wheat of the South, the South would exclude the timber, cattle, and horses of

the North. Rates for postage, telegrams, and exchange would probably bo raised. Quarrels about mail contracts and the like, would ensue, and prejudice and bitterness would arise and strengthen year by year. But above all, having regard to the remote future, one Island:'-might ultimately arm against the other, and both would spend their strength o'n mutual destruction, Some one has said that he cared not who made the laws of a people if only he its proverbs. There is much truth In this. Law can only stand on the common sentiments of the people, and we therefore deprecate any attempt to awaken feelings and thoughts opposed to those of mutual pride and brotherly love, which are at present the guarantee of peace and unity in this fair land. Let New Zealand know her enemies, and mark those who would sow the seeds of strife so that they might grow with her growth, and be strong to produce weakness by ,and by. Let our colonists make rapacious politions know that our country is not to bo a prey to them, nor to be “ leased out, like to a tenement, or a pelting farm” for the benefit of a clique. Let New Zealanders be proud of their united country, and hand it down to their children unbroken, so that they too may rejoice in This other Eden, demi-paradise ; This fortress built by nature for herself. Against infection, and tbe hand of war j This happy breed of men, this little world, This precious stone set in a silver sea, Which serves it in the office of a wall, Or as a mote defensive to a house. Against the envy of less happier lands.