THE SUPERINTENDENT'S RETURN FROM AUCKLAND.

Southland Times, Volume I, Issue 20, 16 July 1864, Page 2

THE SUPERINTENDENT'S RETURN FROM AUCKLAND.

(From the Sout land TniE3, June 21.) Hts Honor the Superintendent has returned from Auckland, having obtained for us all we anticipated ; all which, under the circumstances, we could well have expected the General Government would do. We understand this amounts to instructions to the SubTreasurer to pay over to the Provincial Government £15,000 per month for three months, to complete the railway works. By this, we presume, is meant the opening of the Northern Eailway, as far as the Makarewa, at onee — possibly further ; and continuing the works on the Bluff and Invercargill Line, so far as to prevent their destruction from weather and other causes, pending the time when Aye shall have sufficient funds to complete it. This accommodation is accompanied with the instruction, which we have previously stated would be the case, viz., to impress our Land Eevenue. We never indulged in any high-flown i expectations ; but looking at the circumj stances as consistent with strict justice, I and a due sense of what it owed to the i Colony at large as custodian of its I interests, we assumed that if the General Government assisted us at all, it would, as security for the prevention of further mal-administration, impress our revenues. Our views have turned out to be strictly correct. As to assenting to any such absurd loans as the " one hundred and twenty thousand pound one," any hopes based on so fallacious an anticipation are doomed to disappointment. In referring to this loan in a previous isnue, we ex- : posed the mistake of believing that it would ever be granted, or that the granting of it was an act of justice due to ourselves ; that the principle of spending money first, and going tb^ the General Government afterwards for assistance, was a vicious one, and. not likely to be tolerated. It would appear that that Government has taken a similar view of the case, and declines sanctioning a system which would soon plunge the whole Colony in ruin. We are not to be got out of our difficulties so easily ; and before we are, we shall have plenty of time to chew the bitter cud of experience. j The assistance now tendered is. on the express condition that the money is to be

devoted for Eailway purposes solely.. The past has not given us much confidence in the Government appropriating to- its legitimate purposes the money it obtains ; but after the' lesson wo have ~had in the stoppage of our railway works, and the embarrassments in every department of business which have resulted therefrom, we would imagine that His Honor will have received such a lesson a ; s .will male.; him more careful for the future. If this last assistance is misapplied, tKe"Provincial Council has the punishing by fine any siich breach^^a'power "we hope they will not hesitate in exercising. Had the Superintendent, when in ;A.uckland before, askedthe General Government, i on the disallowance of the Appropriation Ordinance, 1863, what it would" do for us, probably it might have granted a loan for a moderate amount 'at '''a; short date ; the misappropriation of the Eailway. Loans' Avould, perhaps, have not taken place, ,and thus, our, credit withJHe , General Grovernme'nt have not been! des- ! troyed; the Eailway works t would not have been stopped, and r much evil pre 7 vented. Driven at ■last to do what it was his duty to have done months ago, His Honor has obtained more than his deserts, at the expense of the impressment of our Land Eevenue, and the : refusal of any accomodation in the shape of loans. • We presume the Provincial Council will be at once summoned to pass a new Appropriation Act, when ; the events of the past will, it is to be hoped, obtain a careful scrutiny.