The Taihape Daily Times AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE TUESDAY, APRIL 9, 1918. A POULTRY FARMER'S LAMENT

Taihape Daily Times, 9 April 1918, Page 4

The Taihape Daily Times AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE

TUESDAY, APRIL 9, 1918. A POULTRY FARMER'S LAMENT

(With which, is Incorporated The Taihape Post and Waiu»irino News). „

Men who have launched their little savings in the poultry industry are, if anything, of more than average business ability, although they may not be -students of the history of British social, political and commercial life. The evolution of the common people from feudal (slavery) times to the position the masses occupy to-day has been slow, but there are clearly marked eras of progress. At the present moment a transition stage obtains, and the future will largely depend upon the result of the war for freedom that is now being waged. Poultry-farmers have recently met in conference, in Wellington, to deliberate on matters benefically. as well as tlidkfe detrimentally., ail taring their industry. After reading published reports of their discussions no one could deny that poultry-farmers are the pioneers of an industry that is sooner or later to become of far greater importance than it is now. These men have still to face many discouragements, disadvantages and set-backs, and,. although time and opportunity is not yet befitting to go deeply into the question, poultrymen may be reminded that it is only a few years ago that the "Cocky" was the butt of the cynic; that his operations were necessarily so "Small and confined as to render' them the subject for levity by even the men the "Cocky" sometimes had occasion to employ. Tho "Cooky's" day has come, however, and now we see him greedily mopping up the possessions of his neighbours till he throws off all that put him in tho "Cocky" category, and he emerges from the Cocky chrysalis into all the glory of a fully developed rancher. Future legislation may modify the amount of land one man may aggregate, but tho poultry-farmer's future is assured despite the thorny path he •may have to tread for a little while longer. There was no 'sentence uttered at the poultry-farming conference that attracted our attention more than the lament made by one which indicated that the law did no regard the industry as seriously as it should do. It wafs! remarked that the law punished most-severely for sheep stoaling, while the robbing of poultry farms was treated somewhat a>s a joke. It must be confessed that convictions for poultry stealing, are notably few, and that punishment upon the few convicted is too inadequate that it amounts to less in most cases than it lia's cost the farmer to secure the convictions. The poultry-farmer is chagrined, and despairs of improvement, but it seems that he has made no enquiry into the past with respect to protection of life and property. If ho had he would have learned that not very long ago a death sentence was passed on the man who stole a sheep worth ten shillings, while poultry stealing was more a joke even than it is to-day. In Britain, and even in New Zealand, law courts are redolent of the extreme wickedness of 'shooting a pheasant which belongs to the poorest man in the community as much as it does to the richest, and the pheasant-killer has to pay a heavy fine or go to gaol, while the man who robs his neighbour's poultry farm is more often not prosecuted because evc n present, day justice for such a crime punishes the injured more than it does the thief. New Zealand laws were brought with our first settlers from Britain, and it is only natural that if tho people take no steps to have all traces of feudalism removed from them, the wealthy men they elect to parliament will retain as much as possible the laws which conserve the old-timo class privileges. Half a century ago if a poor man was seen look-' ing intently from a lane over a hedge iinto a great landowner's estate he was suspected of dishonost designs-, perhaps, of coveting a rabbit. It is boasted that there is no law in En°-- ■ and against shooting a rabbit, but Micro is a stringent law against tresspassing, also against using firearms on a public thoroughfare, and woe betide the unhapyy wight who is caught doing either in pursuit of a rabbit. The fuss made about stealing a neighbour's rooster would be as a molehill against a mountain. Wo would suggest to the poultry-farmer who found" occasion to lament that a one-eyed justice presses hard on poultry-farmers, that

ho will.find the cause of Ms trouble in the relicts of soaji-barbarisia that are still allowed to. pervade our laws. Until laws are purged of the remnaucs of feudalism there will be a great huo and cry against; the shoejp-steaier and' the shooter of a pheasant, while the robber of poultry farms will continue to be looked upon as a practical joker. So long as the masses of the people elect their lawmakers from the ranks of the very rich and those who represent the rich, there will be one law for the poor man's property and another for the rich man's property. There is this tendency ; the whole statute book an| there it is likely to remain. If jon owe a hundred pence and when.payday comes you fail, you commit a grave offence and deserve to go to gaol■; but ,}f you owe a hundred pounds and you,pay no};, what you owe, mercy in such case abounds, lawyers wash you white as snow. One-eyed justice can afford to uplift her partial sword o'er the head of a poor debtor dealing justice to the letter; but when knaves of high degree get in debt and can't get free, justice strikes with feeble stroke, loth to hurt such gentle-folk. The eame principle of consideration for the rich who make the laws, operates to cause poultry-farmers to pour out ; their laments in conference about the law not reaching the poultry tbief as it in all justice should do.