The Wairarapa Daily. TUESDAY, AUGUST 24, 1886. THE MISFORTUNES OF OTHERS

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume VIII, Issue 2381, 24 August 1886, Page 2

The Wairarapa Daily. TUESDAY, AUGUST 24, 1886. THE MISFORTUNES OF OTHERS

Is these dull times it is possiblo to derive some comfort by contemplating the misfortunes of other people. It is recorded that an old Eastern philosopher declared, that he only repined at his lot on one occasion, when poverty compelled him to go.abroad barefooted. but his discontent speedily vanished when ha met a man worse oS than himself,, inasmuch as the latter bad no feet to cover. In'.tbis- district, to use an American expression, we are "kicking," though we niay not be "kicking high,"and our lot, compared with that of our fellow colonists in the north and in the south, is a happy one. A tale from the Middle Island which has recently gone the rounds of the colony graphically illustrates the straits to which some men are reduced. The tale is no work, of fiction, but a simple record of a case in a Magistrate's Court where all the material points in if came out in evidence. We refer to the ''starving stock" casein the settled fertile distriot of Lincoln. A man named William Neill was one day last week charged with cruelty to animals. Neill is the owner of a farm, of 150 acres in that neighborhood, supposed to be worth £lO an acre, and only mortgaged to the extent of 1700. A constable who visited, this farm deposed as follows:—*' In a paddook of about twenty five aorea he found tbirtyffve cattle; two were dead, one was dying, and the rest were in a most miserable condition, They were thin, and so weak as to be hardly able to crawl. The paddock was bare, and had lately been flooded. Witness asked defendant's son, whom he saw, why the beasts were allowed to get into that condition. The boy said they had no Btraw, and could not get any for them. Witness then saw the defendant, and told . him. that the cattle appeared to be dying,of starvation, Defendant asked how could he help it? He had no• mere hay or straw, and he eould not get my to buy. All defendant's neighbors

badly 6ff .teHeed as-, himself. Their stppk bad to be band'fjed. .fmw 'Steiii, a; farm laborer, said he passed defendant's paddoeks three or four times .every week. He had noticed the cattle for the last three months, They were in want of food. Re knew that very well, there wag no grass, On July 27th he saw two dead, and one lie down and die." For the defence it was pleaded that Neill had no money to buy hay, that he had sent fourteen head of young stock to a sale where they realised four shillings per head, that he had slaughtered others, and that the: balance of n j s |, oor beasts were too weak to drive to qarket. Neill' was,, convicted of cruelty to animals, but the sympathy of the bench was displayed by the infliction of a nominal fine of one shilling. An instance liko this illustrates forcibly the; unhappy condition to; which the farmers id the Middle Island have been reduced. The high price of land in Canterbury as compared with this district, tnd the stress of winter weather, which haß been more severe down South than with us, have intensified the hardships which country settlers have so long endured in that district. No' doubt there is a good time coming for our Canterbury friends as well as for usjbutthe winter of 1886 will be to them a season of privation whioh will be long temembored.