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Southland Times, Issue 688, 26 June 1867, Page 3

(TO THE EDITOB OF THE SOTJTHIAiaJ TIICBS.) Sib, — Every one who knowß me, knows that letter writing is not in my line, and as I have never during the five years of' my Southland experience, ■written or furnished a line for the newspapers, I would not now have broken the ice, hut to correct some (as I fear wilfully) false statements in the " leader " of your, contemporary of Saturday last. I don't know how you regard your own relationship to an organ sunk so low, and apparently without hope of redemption, as has that once truly respectable journal. For my own part I have but a feeing of profoundpity for the miserable literary hack so degraded as to be compelled to earn either daily bread or daily nobblers, by the writing and publication of deliberatefalsehoods to pander to the morbid taste of his own creating. To refer to the statements of the " Editor," (save the mark) of the Southland News, as to the meat question. He says, "At the time we wrote the average price for fat wethers was 15s. to 165., their average weight say 601 b., the retail price for mutton ranged from Bd. to 9d. per lb.; " with the exception of the price quoted for wethers. I unhesitatingly assert that the statement is wholly untrue. I challenge the whole of the stockowners in the province to show that, within the last twelve months, a single lot of sheep has been delivered in Invercargill, to either of the butchers, reaching an average of sixty pounds ; what is more, I am prepared to prove that the average of the whole of the sheep slaughtered in Invercargill during the last four months has not reached even fifty pounds. The assertion as to price is so palpably untrue, as to cany its own refutation; the retail price for mutton having been during the last eighteen months from sixpence to eight-pence per lb., instead of from eight-pence to nine-pence as asserted. The assertion as to beef is of equal value. The quoted price of live beef is nearly enough correct ; the average retailing price of the article to serve a purpose, and to bear out calculations, (certainly very intricate and clever, and requiring a cool brain, and great knowledge of arithmetic) being stated at fully threepence per pound in excess of the truth. There is a satisfaction in contending with a well informed writer, writing from principle, and upon principle j but in contending with men to whom truth is nothing except as it may serve present purposes, one feels a degree of mental degradation not easily to be overcome. The losses in bringing in cattle and sheep from many unavoidable accidents are so frequent as materially to add to original cost, while the necessary expenses of conducting a butcher's establishment are admitted to be far in excess of those to which other retail trades are liable. A fair calculation on basis which may be easily obtained by any one desirous of forming a conclusion, will show that butchers profits are not in excess of those obtained by other retail trades. If beef at 6d or 8d per pound, be thought too dear, what must be thought of the wretched rag which your contemporary retails or rather hawks. Price only sixpence. "Oh wad some power the giftie gie us, To see oursel's as ithers see us " In reference to the remarks of the " News " on the opposition with which the trade of the butchers is threatened, I merely say that whatever private reasons II Stockowner " may have had for his patriotism, a few weeks experience will teach him that a butchers bed is not exactly a bed ot roses, and that all is not gold that glitters in the shape of profit on a carcase of beef or mutton. lam GrEOKGKE SaTJNDEBS. [The above letter is inserted because Mr Saunders attaches his name to it. * "We cannot but think, however, that the writer indulges in a most unnecessary and unwarrantable strain of abuse in speaking of the character of the gentletoan alluded tp, and that too of a natu?e likely ta'Wfct W* W» oMfltr*