Parliamentary Gossip.

Thames Star, Volume XIV, Issue 4536, 19 July 1883, Page 3

Parliamentary Gossip.

TBOX OTJB GWS COBBEBPONDENT.) Wbimngton, This day. Native affairs will take op much attention from the legislature during the remainder of the session. The Cambridge Land Court having, as it were, worked out its own tenure in a large measure. The scandal became so huge, that it was only half covered by the Chief Judge's denunciation. It seems a veryeood thing that the goose which laid the golden: eggs at Cambridge was killed in | the interests of the surviving geese.' Judge McDonald's recommendations to the Government contain little that will effect any radical change in the procedure of the Court; being rather alterative than reconstructionary ; in fact, all he proposes is that the Crown shall resume the preemption of native lands. The temper of the House is the main factor to fix, in all speculation on the subject, and it appears to me to be such, that it j will make penal any attempt to deal with native lands, in n»y way, before they are through the Court. I believe all the Government energies will be needed to the full. In my opinion the northern land will be foand more difficult to deal with than the southern, and here it may be stated., that some seventeen millions nave been expended in the South Island, against some eight millions in the North, jn opening country or bringing it to the state it is now in ; if there is this difference in outlay, wiil the South Island vote to the North, the difference between the amounts already ex pended, besides the large amount paid for the purchase of native lands P Solleston's idea is to make roads over lands before idling them. The question is-» Will the South vote the expense for making roads in the North Island over private lands P Any idea of the Government resuming the right to purchase is, to my mind, out of the question.