A Wheen Thochts.

Southern Cross, Volume 2, Issue 16, 21 July 1894, Page 7

A Wheen Thochts.

(By Scotch Thistle.)

Our “grand young man,” as “Vox” dubs him, when he goes in for anything goes in big licks. But yesterday, as it were,, he, along with the smaller Liberal fry, swept the elections almost before them, the main feature in their programme being no further increase of the public debt. To-day, by one fell swoop, he gives our name for another two millions, and, almost unanimously, we cry—- “ Well done! Sound finance!” Such is government by the people, but if it is sound finance for the people’s treasurer to take a struggling private institution into his hands, and to back it with two millions of the people’s money, then sound it will be ; yet in my ignorance I am doubtful, and through my inexperience lam suspicious. I have a lively recollection how a few years ago a bank, along with other institutions of the same kidney, sold out the little all of many a struggling tradesman and settler; and now when this ring of moneylenders are being pressed the burden is adroitly lifted and placed so that it will roll upon the back of the taxpayer should anything go wrong. I am a believer in the motto of *3Oll help the other when it can be done without iujury to others ; but in this case the whole object appears to be to keep up the appearance of commercial soundness. But if it is the duty of the Government to unite with or back a ring of money-lenders whose main object has ever been to extract the uttermost farthing from its clients, then it is its duty to back every commercial concern in the colony. After wading through the papers read at the Teachers’ Conference I am inclined to think that the said Conference will yet become a power in the land. From McNab, on the promotion of teachers, to Gammell on the promotion of newspapers and frozen mutton; all were interesting and practical, and doubtless good will result. But there was one grievance whose champion failed to toe the mark, namely, the grievance of female teachers in being paid less than the male, while performing the same duties. Surely when woman does the same work as man she should be paid the same, else we punish her for the crime of being a woman. If there are to be two prices for doing the same work, classify them—married against single. Mr Ferguson has departed and left us groping upwards and downwards in the mire of iniquity. When men like Mr Ferguson leave the district it is needless to say what all feel—that his departure is a loss. Mr Ferguson, as far as I knew him, was a plain man and a straight man ; and his departue to pastures better is dear evidence that he was a hard-headed Scotchman ; a*nd when members of his church proclaim that it was a call from God to higher duties that took him from us, I am doubtful. I do not know the Sydney people, but I know the Invercargillites, and some of the First Church people, and from that knowledge it was unnecessary to go abroad to find heathen. It would be well for us in matters of this sort to put aside all cant and recognise that the motto of the workers in the church is the motto of practical workers elsewhere — “Have us who will; our labour’s to be sold.”

News from Paraguay lias been a bit scarce lately, from which we may infer that there are none but the real stickers left. I see the man commercial and the man divine have been round calling on them, and both have returned, shaking their heads, which, being interpreted, means that there was not enough thirst for gain in, the system for one nor enough room for sin and misery for the well-being of the other. A few centuries ago the Pilgrim Fathers first sought on the shores of America freedom to worship God in their own way. To-day the principle is recognised throughout civilisation, and the handful of pilgrims has become one of the leading nations of the world, deficient alone (like all other nations) in what is the

chief aim of the Paraguayans-—indus-trial organisation. hTow, whether the Paraguay settlement continues to grow until in covers South America, or whether it collapses, one thing is sure —that communities and nations will yet be founded and worked upon the principle of “ share and share—each help the other.”