Tuapeka Times AND GLODFIELDS REPORTER AND ADVERTISER. SATURDAY, JANUARY 3, 1874. "Measures, not men,"

Tuapeka Times, Volume VI, Issue 318, 3 January 1874, Page 2

Tuapeka Times AND GLODFIELDS REPORTER AND ADVERTISER. SATURDAY, JANUARY 3, 1874. "Measures, not men,"

The year 1873 has gone, and we have now entered upon 1874. Moralists look at, iho lapse of time from tlie opportunities for good which havo been seized and improved, or allowed to slip and been lost. But, without abdicating this higher place, we purpose loi'kin^ at the year that has passed iv tlie liyhfc <>f its material opportunities and their results. Never perhaps in tlie history of the colony, since the discovery of g->kl in Gabriels, has the country been placed on better footing forsucccssf ul head- way than during the year that has gone. The season, so far as it lias advanced, lias been all that could be desired, asid the fields yield failpromise of plenty to our settlers. The Public Works and Immigration scheme of 1870 has now begun to bear fruit. Never since the period above referred to did immigrants land in such numbers on our .shores, and the prosecution of the Public Works has given ample employment to all hands not already employed in the ordinary occupations of tlie colony. Our merchants, storekeepers, and artizaons have reaped the advantage of the money thus expended. The year has been one, during the latter h-ilf of it at least, of no inconsiderable material prosperity. Wu are aware that there are those who look upon all this prosperity as fictitons — the result of borrowed capital, and when the aid so received ceasea, so our prosperity will in like manner collapse. For our own part, we do not share in those fears. The history of the past twelve months is sufficient answer to such fore-bodings. The vitality and enterprise of the country, as well as its appreciation of the passing opportunities, have been displaj'ed in the commercial activity of the year. With money plentiful, arising from the high price obtained far colonial products and the money borrowed on our Public Works policy, our merchants have shown skill in the application of the same. Insurance and mining companies, as well as f< r industrial purposes, have literally teemed Nor has private enterprise been at all slack.' The country seems to have risen to grasp the opportunity so strikingly expressed in the words of our great poet, There is a tide in the affairs of men which, if taken at the Hood, Leads on to fortune. We have good ground to hope that, when the borrowed capitals shall all be expended, anil country be left to its own resources, the development of our coal and gold mining deposits and our industrial enterprises will have done much to secure employment for the hands set free by the completion of our railways.