THE WANGANUI CHRONICLE AND RANGITIKEI MESSENGER. "Vérité sans peur.” Wangvnui, March 8, 1860.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 4, Issue 181, 8 March 1860, Page 2

THE WANGANUI CHRONICLE AND RANGITIKEI MESSENGER. "Vérité sans peur.” Wangvnui, March 8, 1860.

It is gratifying to learn that the Governor is alive to the importance of immediate action in the Taranaki affair. Particulars of what has yet been done will be found in another column. Next week we may take occasion to refer to the policy the Governor has hitherto pursued towards the natives in those points which this disturbance naturally brings under the consideration of every settler. .The Supreme Court Sittings, at Wellington, for Criminal business, was held on the Ist jnst; there were only five cases, mostly of a trivial character.

In the greater part of Europe and North America, the Electric Telegraph has become an indispensable adjunct to civilised life. It has modified all the relations of political, commercial, and social existence. By its means mercantile negotiations are carried on and concluded, marriages are contracted and solemnised, treaties between nations are arranged and signed. It annihilates space and multiplies time. If, as the metaphysician measures time by the succession of ideas, the merchant or statesman were to do so by the amount of business he transacts, while one who has no telegraph at his command had reached the respectable age of threescore years and ten, another, with the advantage of telegraphic communication would have lived to the age of Mathuselah. The traveller sees the small, insignificant looking wires climbing the most rugged mountains of Europe, and sweeping along the broad rolling prairies of North America, and his bosom swells with pride and satisfaction when he thinks of the scientific knowledge which has originated this wondrous means of communication, and the numberless benefits which it confers. What is beneficial elsewhere could not but be advantageous here. There are no railways to facilitate communication, and the means of intercourse, apart from the few steamers that ply along the coast, are such that the emigrant from England is, on his first arrival, amused, and afterwards unreasouably dissatisfied, at finding himself thrown back two or three hundred years in the history oi his country, and put in the same position with respect to travelling and postal communication as his venerable ancestor wbo made his will before setting off from York for London, and was truly grateful to Providence if he arrived at his destination within a fortnight. The 8 mount of population will scarcely warrant the formation of an extensive railway system here for many years to come, but in the meantime communication by electric telegraph is urgently needed. The isolation of the various settlements, and the benefits to be obtained from their being brought more closely together, need scarcely be mentioned as a sufficient reason for this statement. The advantages are obvious to all. The only difficulty is in obtaining the necessary means. That such an undertaking would not answer as a commercial speculation is evident. But there is scarcely a possibility of over-estimating the advantages which the Government would reap from such a system of communication. At a moment like this, when groundless apprehensions are felt in many parts of the island as to the probable proceedings of the natives, arising from the disturbance at 2’aranaki, how satisfactory would it be to have immediate intelligence of what is transpiring ! And in the case of a llireatened rising of the natives, how much sooner would troops be concentrated at any required spot,- and the movement crushed, before occasioning the loss of life and property which its extension might cause ! It may be well to believe that the natives are too shrewd to engage in such an unequal contest, but it would be also satisfactory to know that that the Government was prepared for any possible emergency of the kind ; and the Electric Telegraph would greatly conduce to its being forewarned, and thus forearmed. These considerations, and others that might be adduced, make it an incumbent duty of the Government to establish telegraphic lines. Nor is the expense an insurmountable objection. At the same rate as such lines cost in Great Britain, all the settlements in both islands might be connected at an expense of .£30,000. /f Government was to execute the work, the cost would not be so great. The wire might be brought out in some of those Goxerriment. ships which Messrs. Cobden aud Bright denounce as lying for show at the mouth of the Tagus or in some of the Mebiterranean ports. The soldiers ol the island might he employed in its construction at a much lower figure than the current rate of wages, so that the whole expense might not exceed .£20,000, or, at 5 per cent, interest, ,£IOOO a year. At a liberal calculation £3OOO a year would maintain and work the line. From this sum would fall to be deducted the receipts,.which might amount to £IOOO, probably considerably more. So that for £3OOO a year, which a tax of Is per head on the white population would raise, the Government would confer incalculable benefit on the settlers. A petition should be presented to the Asserabty so soon to meet that such a scheme be taken into its consideration, and if found desirable carried out.

The “ Wonga Wonga,” which was expected this week, will not, we understand, be here till she makes another trip to the y/hurin, where it seems she has no difficulty in procuring full cargoes; and in future she ■will, in consequence of the insufficient support she recehes here, and the reduction of the subsidy to £ooo,

■which is at present in arrears, only call once a month, instead of being a fortnightly, or, as we had at one time anticipated, a weekly means of communication with Wellington and ’the East Coast. This change we much regret, •as, notwithstanding the very efficient line of mailing packets between this and Wellington, iit denotes anything but progress, and must be •detrimental to the interests of the district, inasmuch as merchants may be disappointed by •not receiving goods of which they are in want, ■and passengers exposed to the discomfort and delay of a long passage. No doubt the shoit stay of the steamer at our wharf was against her receiving a large quantity of goods, but we understand that a store is now erected for the reeeipt of produce intended te be shipped by her, and we hope that this accommodation may induce such additional support as may justify the owners iiv sending her at least as often as before. It would be very mortifying indeed to have her altogether withdrawn.

Local Intelligence.

Sudden Death. —Mr. McNally, a settler on the left bank of the Wanganui river, dropped down dead yesterday at Duuleavy’s Wanganui Hotel; the cause of death is not ascertained as yet. A Militia List is to be formed .in Wanganui, according to announcement in our advertising columns.

Correspondence.

To the Editor of the Wanganui Chronicle , f ADVERTISEMENT. March 6, 1860.

Sir, —I cannot allow Mr. Sims’s letter in your last to pass unnoticed. The answers he has given through your paper were never vouchsafed me at the meeting. In reply to his statement that the river bank road is but twenty chains further round, I beg to inform Mr. /Sims, and the public, that it will require the construction of 141 chains of new road more than the direct line to the No. 3 line, where the road is already formed. Also, allow me to state, that the chain of river frontage, reserved by her Majesty’s Government, throughout all her Majesty’s Colonies, on all navigable rivers (since the passing of that act), is for the purpose of erectiug forts, wharves. &c., but is given in beeping to the adjoining land proprietors for their use until her Majesty may require it. Francis Williamson.