Wairarapa Daily Times. [Established 1874.] THURSDAY, AUGUST 10, 1894. THE BED ROCK.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume XV, Issue 4801, 16 August 1894, Page 2

Wairarapa Daily Times. [Established 1874.] THURSDAY, AUGUST 10, 1894. THE BED ROCK.

It was pleasing to leni'ii from tlio Government the other day that in New Zealand land had corao down to a bed rock price, had not some sceptical member pointed out that the value of land depended upon the value of its produce, and that in the valuo of produce tlioro could be no guarantee of a bed rock, A.newspaper has reached us from South America which confirms this view. Buenos Ayrcs is a country which has been much fancied by evon enterprising Colonists in this (garter of tho Globe, and in some respects it is ahead of New Zealand. Here, for example, wo are only just entering upon financial condition where n paper currency must be resorted to as a pick-me-up, but in Buenos Ayrcs they have enjoyed a paper currency for a considerable period, and as a consequence the bed rock there is a good deal lower than the bed rock in Now Zealand In the laud of the "paper dollar" things have been getting very shaky latterly. To illustrate this wo might cite tho experiences connected with a big stock salo held there in May last on the Soler estate, a sale which included a very largo number of high-class animals. Tlio late Mr Soler was an improving proprietor, and a largo importer of pure-bred horses, cattle, and sheep, so that when his stock had to be put into the market, the highest current rates were expected from purchasers.. But when the salo was over, our Bnenofi Ayres contemporary groans terribly, and asks: "What is tho country coming to," aud'declares that the [ "fall in the paper dollar," tho great I catastrophe of the day, .is nothing compared with the blue ruin of this j sale. Purebred cattlo from sires, imported at a cost of £SOO each, were knocked down at modest bids of four nuifcu'sGs a piece, and then adds the journal from which we quote ; "Tho ratio of everything in the River Plato, in morals, politics, cows, 1 sheep and gloves is upset, It'takes three niestiza Durham cows to pay for'a pair of lady's long gloves, 17

buttons, for the opera—and it takes the whole livestock of Goyo Solei's cstancia to cover the cost of-the bridal presents in last night's ZJt'ario,' Poor Don Goyo Soler! We knew him well: he was a man of infinite humour, and a bosom friend of General Koca, Could we lift the coffin lid and tell him that all the live stock, which for so many years he was refining, was sold at auction for four shillings a head "al corto," his ghost would jump from the Recoleta to the heights of Curumalan and in Spirit language address the Argentines." Can we, in the face of this Argentine experience, say that either stock or land lias reached the bed rock in New Zealand, at a time whon we aro proposing.to imitate in this colony, the Argentine methods of finance f