THE "OTHER FELLOW'S" VIEW OF CO-OPERATION.

Waikato Times, Volume XXII, Issue 1858, 3 June 1884, Page 2

THE "OTHER FELLOW'S" VIEW OF CO-OPERATION.

TO THE KDirOK. Sir, - It is always easy and pleasant to sail with the populai cuneut. Palliamentary candidates seem to have discovered «his important fact. Now, we ha\ c had in your columns lately quite a fdirshaie of co-operation and co-opera-tors. Your eloquent debaters, and your gifted correspondents have dragged from his obscurity a wretched animal yclept, "the middleman, '" and the one with the tongue and the other with the pen belaboured that unfortunate animal to their heart's content. Is the price of butter low ?— kick the middleman. Is the grain mmket depressed ?— tweak his nose. Are the farmers title deeds in the strong box of the capitalist?— the middle man has done this dreadful thing. What wonder if the unfortunate middleman begins to feel like Mr Pickwick when the learned Buz-fiu was opening the plaintiffs case that he really must all along have been a depravel seoindiel without being at all aware of the fact. Now, after this preamble I need not say that I expect more kicks than ha'pence if I paddle my little canoe at a somewhat slower pace along the popular current before referred to, than that at which thtt mighty three-deckers arouud mo are rushing along. When [ tell thefarmcrthat co-operation, as it is generally understood, or misunderstood, is not the cure for all the ills that flesh is heir to ; when I say that merchants are not all extortioners, that the butcher who attendeth to his block in white kid gloves is a rara avis, that the miller who dieth and leaveth a goodly heritage to his family is not often seen, and that the storekeeper after all is not a vampire living on the farmeis' life blood ; when I point to the recently established cheese factories and say that perhaps five times as much cheese is now sold without difficulty at a good price as was sold a few years ago vrit'i di Hculty at a poor price ; when I say to the fanner "What 5011 ha\e done with your cheese do also with your butter ; turn out an article to w hich the good shall bear as large a proportion as the indifferent now does." Co-operate to produce your goods "All good alike." Co-operate to send your beef and mutton by the best meansto the hungry British woiluuan. Cooperate to sow, reap and thresh your grain by good machinery, that fie sound of the flail, wielded by th > farmer, and the farmer's wife and daughter be no more heard in the land. This do, and you may then buy your sugar from that unreueiicrate man, the storekeeeper. You may have your grain ground by that cormorant, the miller. You may purchase your pound of chops from that dreadful butcher, and your unsavoury, but useful bonedust from that never "sufficiently to be anathematised creature, the manure merchant. Then shall the lion lay down with the lamb, and the muscular " flipper" of the former be once more enclasped in the digits of the middleman." — I am, &c , Te Tanuata ki Waexganui.