COLONIAL DEFENCES.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume VII, Issue 1950, 27 March 1885, Page 2

COLONIAL DEFENCES.

(Contributed.) If the papers of the Colony are represent ing public opinion, and we have no reason to doubt that they are, then a .large majority of the Colonists are in accord with ttye Government in thinking that the question pf defence in a practical form has been long enough delayed, It is true that a yery small minority lipid, the quaker-like view that by tlio Colony holding a passive position in all disputes' likely to arise between' 'the- Empire and other States; in fact by assuming in the affairs of the world an attitude .which' would have won the approbation of Uriah Heep, we should escape molestation. We should be in a position to adopt !$ a motto foy op national flag (the device might be a sheep ready to be shorn) ■ '■ Noli me tangere." But we think most people in the Colony would prefer, if they chose this motky. to have for a device a wild boar with Ms passive end between theflangesof apukpjpatree. This latter is the attitude Switzerland has always maintained, and is there a freer, prouder state in Eurqpe f From the time that that small state hurled' Charles Burgundy to the c]i|st, have any o,f her powerful neighbors cared to meddle with her? Yet where would the independence of that State be now if her citizens had; been satisfied with the mild policy of minding their own business to the extent of not being able to take care of'that business ? It has been truly said, that a publie soh'oql ffltaina a sina|l world, and indeed is actuated by many of the impulses of the larger world. If the mild editors of these passive theory papers have been to something more than a girk school, they must have Been that the boy who was ready, aye and willing, to hold his qSyK'liad less trouble by far than ttye mi%|iiid water latj, who to " ftoli me tan§i\'f addec) "I'll tell my pa." And that is what this mild policy would come tojust substitute the .-.Empire for pa, and the analogy .is. complete. For on the past great history aiid present might of England and her dependencies would such a feeble policy throw us for that protection which is essential to thl life of a state or colony. Has human nature so changed since the days of English Drake and Frobisher, qf American ,'Paul Jqqe§, pf Danish Jorgenpen, %t such iqeq \?j!j'RQt come to the fore in any war against the great trade and monopoly held by the sons of England ? We trow hot i Doubtless at this moment eager eyes are turned to the prize'money and the adventure to be gained in the outlying British colonies, Qpuld the Quakeis hold their views in the present state of the world (far from millenimn) but fur the armed peaqe preservers —the police and the army 1 No! The day has not come for these views—the far off day when States will trust to tion, and trade's single enemy will be competition, As it iB, each state is ready to use any arms to seoure the trade' of the rich placeß of the earth—some arm themselves one way, some another—-proto oti ve duties, Martini-Henry's, torpedoes, what matter the mean? so long as the end be gained 1 The guidera of men are very little removed from the days when the Lord Chancellor qf flje day (1672), the Earl of Shaftesbury, announced ttyat the time had come when the English must gq to war with the Dutch; fpr that it wap "impossibleboth should jtand upon a balance,.and that if we do not master their trade they will ours, They or we must truckle. One must and will give the law to the other. There is no compounding where the trade is for the whole world." Or from the days when (1743) a leading man like Lord Hardwicke, said in the How? of Lords "If our wealth is, diminished it is time tp ruin the com l ' meroe of that nation which has driven us from the markets of the Continent, by sweeping the seas of their ships, and by blocking their ports," And are not these, though not confessed, the guiding motives underlying all state policy in European cabinets'! There is but one view held by England's neighbors, which is that England has too much of tho good things of the earth, and envy and itß natural sequei].cp, sw|ijh to (JSBrive, follows. That a persistent ppiypp li]i_o Russia should now attempt aggression is a thing tp be expected when every day's cable tells iiq afresh that on one point or another our empire is at discord with the • rest of the world, These things must be considered : are we to ignore facts and the teachings of history, or are we to prematurely assume that a time of good-will is at hand, when the yictoriqus non-combatant will ;be ; passed even as the Pharisee pagsetl' the sick man on the other Bide ? Are we to plead as Mouldy pleaded to Falstaff, "My old dame will be undone now to do her husbandry, and her drudgery : you need not have pricked me; there are other men fitter to go out than I." Or shall we, facing the danger of warlike raids on our coasts—" by opposing, end them?" At the cost of descending from the sublime to the ridiculous we will say—who of those who have been present at a boxing tournament have not noticed how quiet

the larrikin element is on these occasions, and why? The larrikin's next neighbor may be a fighting man! Is not this the feeling which may check trouble on our coasts? New Zealand is a fighting colony! ■■ Reduced to figures, our defences mean an expenditure of five shillings per head—and for what? National honor saved, and incalculable loss,averted. It is surely but a small insurance premium to pay, all things considered,