The Southland Times. TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 1870.

Southland Times, Issue 1307, 13 September 1870, Page 2

The Southland Times. TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 1870.

Tn Saturday's weekly issue we briefly narrated the fact that a misunderstanding had arisen between the merchants and up-country carriers respecting an alteration of the freight tariff. Happily, it was of short duration, having been adjusted by mutual concession. The ground of dispute was simply this. "Winter rates to Kingston, including railway charges to "Wmton, or at least as far as the permanent line extended, were £10 per ton. "With the advent of spring, the merchants resolved that a reduction, of twenty-five or thirty per cent, should be made, which would still leave the draymen from six to seven pounds for the through journey. On the part of the draymen, the proposal was rejected, and, pending negotiations, a temporary suspension of the traffic took place. Disputes of this kind are of such a nature that outside interference rarely succeeds in effecting much good, either one way or another. Still, there are points involved which it is necessary both the carriers anj I tha-public^shQnld clearly, -tmtteratand," more especially that the question is bound to crop up again as the season progresses. On behalf of the draymen it was asserted that £15 was paid for carriage from Dunedin to Queenstown, and that £10 was nothing more than a fair proportion for the distance they had to travel. "We confess we have altogether failed to see the force of this argument. Either the draymen must be ignorant of what the journey from Dunedin involves, or they must presume upon the ignorance of their employers and the public at largo. The distance from Dunedin to Queenstown via Shag Valley is equal to three times the distance from Winton to Kingston, while - the contingent expenses of the one route bear no adequate proportion to those of the other^ We shall enumerate these for general information. ,• In the first place there are three tolls to be paid between Dunedin and Paitnerston, and id the second place there are the Morven and Nevis punts on the Kawarau above Cromwell. -We cannot state definitely the charge exacted as tollage, but we are safe in putting it down at ss~ for 'loaded drays, and half price for empty, ones. -With regard to pontage dues we can speak more definitely. They are Is a head for horses, 2s '6d for drays, arid 5s per ton for loading. Computed according to this scale, the up and down journey of a seven-horse team, carrying 3J tons of goods, amounts exactly to £4 15s 6d, allowing the dray to return empty. That makes an impost of £1 7s 3f d upon each ton of goods, which, deducted from the freight, leaves the carrier a net sum of £13 12s B|d. Now, if the Dunedin tariff is worth anything as a basis of computation, the Invercargill draymen have no right to expect more than £4 10s lid clear of railway charges, seeing they have got to travel not more than one-third the distance. But even that proportion is not a fair criterion when we take into consideration other circumstances connected with the roads. That from Dunedin is a succession of abrupt pinches, and despite the amount of money spent by the Otago Government in road-making, not more than half the distance to Queenstown can be designated better than ' a natural track. Take the Blueskin Bush close to Dunedin, the Kilmog Hill below Waikouaiti, or the Pigroot and Brothers at Mount Ida, and where is the country inside Southland to compare with them ? Why, a trip along the crown range of the Hokanuis would not be a bit more difficult than some of the pinches we have named. Admitting the Southland draymen have some nasty rivers to ford, they have not got one more than the Otago draymen, while high floods are of much rarer occurrence here than in the neighboring province. The truth is that the one road is a bowling-green compared to the other, and a day's journey by Southland is equal to the progress of a 'day and a half by Otago. These are the facts of the case, and it was upon their assumption we based the assertion made a few days ago, viz., that Southland held the leading-strings of locomotion in her hands. It is, as we have already tacitly acknowledged, a delicate matter to interfere as between employers and employees. The question at issue, however, impugned the commercial facilities of the province to a degree that any ambiguity on the ..point was bound to damage the prospects of the place. In other words, misapplied arguments regarding the relative position of Dunedin and Invercargill to the north-western goldfields were calculated to subvert the effprts that have been made to cement existing relations — a thing which nothing but false delicacy could tolerate.