The Daily News. MONDAY, AUGUST 17, 1914. PRACTICAL PATRIOTISM.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVI, Issue 74, 17 August 1914, Page 4

The Daily News. MONDAY, AUGUST 17, 1914. PRACTICAL PATRIOTISM.

'New Zealand's t-hicf source of trade and commerce is agriculture Our animal export of ,t:iO,(iiilO,[)oo of agricultural products represents the greater portion of our national income. It lies within our power this season to lift our income liy millions more {says the Auckland Herald). We can do this by increasing our fields of wheat and oats, of maize and barley, by multiplying our flocks and conserving our herds. T3ie.ro is time enough in all parts of the Dominion to sow air the. grains, tFnie, to make provision for fodder crops and expansion of pastures so that our Hocks land herds can have abundance of food and thus increase and develop .is rapidly as possible. In the temporary disorganisation of commerce due to the war, a certain number of people in tho cities are being thrown out of employment. The number will be. relatively few if our peoples keep their head's cools and their hearts courageous, but even were the number large there need be no idlers, for profitable work can be found on tins farms of their country [ for more labor than can 'be obtained. All farmers cannot suddenly employ extra labor and make expensive improvements unless financial assistance is obtained, l»ut no one should bo blind to the fact that money expended judiciously on increased farm production is the safest and surest investment at this crisis, if financial institutions assist the farmer they strengthen themselves, for the farmer is the great creator of wealtli and he has nevor before had such an incentive to create it so rapidly. The State, as represented by the Government, can' do mucOi to uphold the credit of this country, and to asssit in its financial progress by making lands easily and rapidly available for every, one who will work them and make them productive. It can, where necessary, allow improvements to count as rents or payments; it can set its trained officials to the task of helping settlers ana farmers to improve their lands. If the nation at this critical time devotes its energies in the right direction, Xew Zealand, instead of suffering by this worldwide war, may even transform it to a benefit. Peace and prosperity liave not stimulated agriculture to any great extent. Let us hope that whatever else war does, it will stir our people to such energy that the farming industry of this country will expand during the next twelve months more than it has expanded during the past twelve years. It "ill 'be said (continues our Auckland contemporary): "What of the cities? What of fjhe married men with families, mid the single men with dependent homes, who cannot take to fawning? Hut the cities live by tins country; the cities exist because the country produces and flhe energetic application of all possible labor to fanning operations will lift dead-weight from the shoulders of the cities. For the rest, those public works which have for this object the assistance of production and facilitation of the export trade should be proceeded with more strenuously than ever—not delayed for a single unnecessary day. "Courage and confidence" should be «m----national note. Courage and confidence in the lighting line; courage and confidence in the backblocks/courage and confidence where ministers meet and where the captains of industry gather together, for us to care for and to ! maintain those who are left in our j charge by the men who go to tight our battles and to risk their lives, in our defence is a sacred trust; for us to help in organised fashion those who sutler unduly from the temporary dislocation of industry is a duty; for us to maintain by charily, honest and industrious workers wUio are able to work while the Dominion is clamouring for necessary public, works and while unused land Waits to yield to labor would be. as foolish as it would be criminal. Tho war will waste enough of our wealth and take away enough of our industrial energy without our wasting needlessly the labor that can create wcaltfh aud the industrial energy of which we have not too much, but too little. The Government has an unprecedented difficulty to cope with, but it Bias the unprecedented advantage of acting f or a united people which has forgotten party and abjured class and will loyally follow where it j K a ], 1,,, ] ed . We Unn]y b( ,. beve that Mr .Jlassoy. will prove equal to this great emergency and that Kir i •loseph Ward will think only of his cc-untry in considering any national plan for increasing production and employhi-' ••surplus" labor upon national development. \