ANTHONY TROLLOPE ON PROTECTION.

Tuapeka Times, Volume VI, Issue 1294, 18 September 1873, Page 6

ANTHONY TROLLOPE ON PROTECTION.

The following is an extract from Mr Trollope's recent work: — " I always take delight in reminding" a Victorian wh j is a jam loving creature, — that he is obliged to eat pumpkin jam, a filthy mixture just flavoured with fruit, because of the tariff by which he protects the fruit grower of Victoria, — who, after all, can't grow fruit. I know that this will bring down wrath on my head, because fruit is grown in Victoria, very fine fruit, which I have seen and eaten. And ho-v shall I be believed when with the same breath I warm my fingers and cool them ; when in the same paragraph I declare that the fruit is grown and is not grown ? Money and care no doubt will produce fruit in Victoria; but even Victorian shearers andminers cannot afford to eat jam made from costly fruits. Over in Tasmania fruit is rotting, fruit as fine as any that the world can produce, because it is thought expedient to protect the Victorian raspberry. Oh, my Victorian friend, deluging your unfortunate inwards with pumpkin trash, it grieves me that the madness of this protection will not make itself apparent to you till your taste will have been polluted and your digestion gone ! Y"ou will, I fear, never live to learn what comforts, what luxuries, what ample bounties the rich world will give to him who will go out freely and buy what he wants in the cheap markets ; or, how great, how fiendish, how unnatural is the injury done by him who won't let others go out and, buy ! "

The Auckland " Evening Star " says — We are glad io learn that Mr. Dargaville has withdrawn his threatened action of libel against our contemporary the " Herald." We are opposed to the practice, already too common, of attempting to stifle the voice of the press by law suits. Every facility for publicly refuting statements made in the press is afforded the person against whom the charges are made, and to fly to the law generally proves that the strictures are of a character that cannot be refuted with arguments appealing solely to men's judgment and sense of justice. This can scarcely be said of Mr. Dargaville's case, for he has shown himself to be quite capable of answering bis critics with interest. Libel actions by public men also indicate a peevishness and irritability under a wholesome criticism. — for criticism has a salutary effect (evea when its premises are not strictly ac* curate), by inducing caution, watch"* fulness and vigorous action.