The Westport Times. TUESDAY, JUNE 7, 1870.

Westport Times, Volume IV, Issue 668, 7 June 1870, Page 2

The Westport Times. TUESDAY, JUNE 7, 1870.

We cannot but think that the claim of Mr Reuben, Waite, for compensation, in respect to his runs, situate in this district, was deserving of mora weightyconsideration from tbe Council than the subject, recently received. The matter was introduced by one of our local members in the Council, and its further deliberation was cut short by the Provincial Secretary stating, that the sum of £IOO had been already paid by the government, as a set-off against any proper demand that Mr Waite might urge. The latter, while admitting the receipt of this amount, denies in ioto that it was to be accepted as an equivalent for the damages that have accrued, in consequence of his runs having been taken up for gold-mining purposes, and states that it was only to serve as a recompense for labor performed, and destruction of fencing &c. in forming the necessary roads. It certainly does appear most improbable that either party should have regarded so small a sum as a sufficient compensation, and on the part of tbe Government such an opinion would have been altogether inconsistent with the payment of £IOOO, as compensation to a runholder in the Grey district, when that portion of the province was included within the boundaries of tbe Nelson South-west Goldfields. If the latter sum was not deemed excessive in the case of one who at that time had suffered no inconvenience from a mining population, operations not having extended to his immediate locality, the payment of £IOO must have been regarded as altogether inadequate to compensate Mr Waite for the real and not imaginary injuries sustained. Mr Waite obtained his depasturage licenses in 1863 and since that date the rents have been regularly paid. The run has been stocked, but, as is generally known, the investment has proved a total loss to Mr Waite. It was impossible that a population of two to three thousand miners could be located on a run without disturbing the cattle that were depasturing, and, as a matter of fact, the cattle were scattered over tbe bush andirritrievably lost to the owner. Beneficial occupation of the runs for grazing purposes being thus entirely out of the question, tbe proper course would have been for the Government to have come to a reasonable settlement with Mr Waite, and have cancelled the licenses. While on the one hand Mr Waite has been a heavy loser by the discovery of auriferous country at Addison's, the Government have in an inverse ratio benefited by his misfortune, and the revenue derived from Addison's during the past three years from the issue of business licenses, miner's rights, mining leases, registrations, &c, should certainly have induced the Government to have dealt with the matter in a liberal spirit. We cannot regard this petition of Mr Waite'a as urged on the ad misericordicn/i principle ; his grievance is real and not imaginary, and, doubtless, but that a portion of"tho Council were led to believe that com-

pensation had been already made, the subject would have been properly ventilated, and an arrangement arrived at, satisfactory, no doubt, alike to Mr Waite and the public.