THE Temuka Leader. TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 12, 1893. THE GERALDINE FARMERS’ CLUB.

Temuka Leader, Issue 2554, 12 September 1893, Page 2

THE Temuka Leader. TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 12, 1893. THE GERALDINE FARMERS’ CLUB.

The Geraldine Farmers’ Club has been opened very successfully. The evening was cold and wet, as if the elements had conspired to throw cold water on the affair, but notwithstanding this the attendance was large and representative, and a good deal of enthusiasm was manifested. The proceedings can scarcely be reckoned as within the scope of newspaper comment, and yet we think that a few words on the subject will be of interest. For one thing we are always prepared, and that is, that wherever two or more farmers are gathered together there are to be heard grumbling and growling, and complaining at the hard lot of the farmer. A stranger listening to these complaints would say to himself, “ These poor innocents are being victimised right and left by the rascals who compulse the balance of the community,” but those who are accustomed to hear this grumbling know full well that it is only a playful way farmers have of enjoying themselves, and that they do not mean what they say. They know that hard as the times are with them, and we admit that they are hard—theirs is the most independent, and the safest, and the soundest position in the country. Let us contrast their position with the storekeepers’. There are perhaps half-a-dozen or more storekeepers in Geraldine, cutting each other’s throat to see who can sell the cheapest and get the largest number of customers. Their profits are cut down as low as possible, but they struggle on, trembling for the 4th of the mouth, till just in the beginning of the season in comes a “ cheap sale man,” who has bought a lot of, rubbish at a bankrupt sale and advertises his goods at 25 per cent, under cost price. The hopes which had buoyed the local storekeepers on vanish, and the grinding struggle for existence grows more intense daily. The farmers whom they had frequently accommodated, and whose farm produce they had been consuming for years, pass them by, and enter with their ready money into the cheap sale store and leave it there. Let farmers think how they would like such a I life as this—a life hanging between hope and despair—when one does know the moment a creditor may step in and ruin one—for a storekeeper might be perfectly solvent and yet be ruined by a forced sale. Lpt farmers reflect on all this, and it will do then) good. Lot them think of the worries, the and the grinding straggle of business life, flud they will go to sleep thinking their stars that the grass in growing on their land and the wool on their sheep. There was a time when the storekeeper mado money, and when he was to be envied, but that time is gone. There is nothing m iw but terrible, fearful, awful, killing competition : the world Is gone mad on cheapness, and the farmer cannot hope to escape. It is useless for farmers to pect everything they sell to be dear, and everything they buy to be cheap. They must do as others are doing—take one thing with another. And now as regards the railways. We published a plan for cheapening them about nine or ten years ago. Wo suggested that protective duties should be put on, and that the increased revenue thus obtained should be devoted to compeusrting the people by running the railways at half the present rates. Did one farmer hack us up in it • Not a single one. Have any farmers Packed up Mr Yaile ! No. They grumble and growl, and yet when a suggestion is made they will vote against it. The question as regards the railways is; Are they going to be treated as roads are ? that is, free to all, or Are they to pay for their cost of construction ? If they are to pay the interest on the money invested in them 3 per cent, is certainly too low. Our railway freights are high because our population is small, and if farmers desire to make them cheaper the best way to do it is to insist on the land being more thickly populated. If the population on the land could be doubled the traffic on the railways would be doubled, and then freights could be reduced, but where is the farmer who will vote for the compulsory cutting up of large estates 1 Farmers very frequently complain that the whole country is living on them. This was not said at the Geraldine meeting, but we have heard it frequently said. Now that is true, but are not those dependent on them rendering them services 'I Can farmers do without blacksmiths, cirpenters, shoemakers, newspapers, bankers, cabinetmakers, storekeepers, auctioneers, and so on ? What is this but what is known in political economy as “ divisions of labor.” Towns people sell their commodies to farmer whether they be labor or goods, anda farmers sell to the towns people in the same way. Wo acknowledge unreservedly that the land is the source of all wealth, but this statement must bo tempered with some little bit of common sense. Every one who works for a farmer has a right to he paid for his labor, and it is an irrefutable fact that townspeople are simply working for farmers in some capacity or another. The land belongs to the people by right, but that right'they have sold to the ! farmers. They did not at the same time I sell themselves into slavery, and hence ' the reason that they demand payment i for their labor. It is just as well to j think over these things, and try to get:

correct ideas concerning them. We shul be the happier aud the better of knowing exactly the relationship iu which we stand to each other, and that is a state of inter-dependence. We are all dependent on each other; no one can afford to play a lone hand. Let a farmer erect a high fence around his farm and try to live within it, and before many days he will find that he is just as much dependent on' the outside world as the outside world is dependent on him. One of the most practical suggestion made at the meeting was Mr John MundelPs reference to entire horses, but what was this but the rage for cheapness. Farmers would rather get a horse worth £25 "for £2 than a horse worth £350 for £4. That is just it, and the result is the world is getting on to a level of mediocrity. We congratulate the Farmer's Club on their successful beginning, and more especially Mr H. B. Webster, to whom the honor of having brought the club into existence is due. Farmers ought not to forget this; and it ought to open their eyes to the fact that there is some good in townspeople after all. We wish the club success, and a long career of usefulness.