MANAGEMENT OF EMIGRATION. (Otago Guadian, March 6.)

Waikato Times, Volume V, Issue 290, 21 March 1874, Page 2

MANAGEMENT OF EMIGRATION. (Otago Guadian , March 6.)

If anything were needed to condemn the emigration management of the Agent-General thoroughly and without hope, it would be the condition in which the fine »hip Scimitar aimed in harbour yesterday, after the ahorteit run from Englard on record. Had tho passage been a protracted one, the position of the unhappy human beings on board would hare been of the most perilous character. As it was, despite the unremitting attention of the medical mnn in charge, and of the captain and officers of the ship, twenty-six deaths occurred on board, and her passengers are still infected. So thoroughly did the disease obtain the mastery, that anj attempt at isolation had to be abandoned : the sick and healtny lived together in the close atmosphere of a ship's 'tween-decks ; the living and the dead seldom separated And what makes the matter worse is the fact that it was well known to the representatives of the colony in England, that the emigrants placed on board the Scimitar had been exposed to a contagious disease in the depot. The same fact was likewise well known to them in the case of the Mongol's passengeus; and we now learn, on the arriv*l of the Scimitar, that precisely the same set of circumstances occurred in the case of tho Carnatic j— another plague ship lying in our harbour. We really do not like to trust ourselves to write of this subject in terms which alene could express our feelings. Sufficient to say, that the most culpable neglect and utter indifference to human life, are distinguishing characteristics of the New Zealand Emigration Agency. We do not hesitate to §ny no : we might cay even stronger and harsher tilings, from tho facts at our disposal, with perfect truth also of this agency ; but matters havo arrived at that pats now that it i» necessary to speak out, without mincing matters, if the Press of the colony it to esoape the charge of complicity in the misdoings of the Homo agency. The Government l>a< long been warned. o£ the actual state of things, and what it was likely to lead, to ; but owing to too great defererce to local sentiment in the Sent of Government, and perhaps, al*o, to political pressure, Ministers have nottaxen the steps which, in the circumstances, it would appear to have been their duty to havo taken, to render the emigration scheme of thn colony one that would command public confidence in the United Kingdom and in New Zoaland. It has long passed the stage of not commanding public confidence in tho colony itself ; in a few months we may expect to leara that it has lost tho confidence oven of the more destitute classes at home, who might be expected to emigrate, for the guarantee of a free passage to tho colony as a relief from ever-present misery. As for the moro respectable classes, which it is desirable we should indue© to come here, they cannot bo expected to look at a New Zealand emigrant ship, when the facts become generally known, as they undoubtedly will, through the local agents of competing colonies. The reputation of New Zoaland is being lowered ; its money is being wasted ; and its industrial euergiei are being crippled for want of businens tact, energy, and organisation nj its English agency.

* Goras. ISuo noxw\.» plant requires another '«tter.