BOERS TOR NEW ZEALAND.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXIII, Issue 7, 9 January 1902, Page 2

BOERS TOR NEW ZEALAND.

(To the Editor.)

Sir, —I have noticed with great surprise the statement that the Home Government should be asked to allow a number of Boer prisoners to take up land in New Zealand. When I think of the tons of type and rivers of ink that have been used by the newspapers for-the last four years (and more) to depict the Boer as one of the lowest, most ig-norant, and degraded specimen of the human race, I wonder what he has done lately to be allowed the privilege of settling in New Zealand. But a short time ago, we had a most appalling account of the Boer women, how they treated their sick children in the concentration camps, painting- them with green paint, and plastering them with cow dung to cure their bodily ills. According to your newspaper's own showing, these people are not desirable immigrants, and far beneath the Chinese, the Maori, and my own country people, the Irish. But a comparatively short time ago, a learned professor went out of ibis way to prove that much of Auckland's want of progress was clue to the fact that in the early days most of her pioneers hailed from the dear old land of the Shamrock. Surely then the people stigmatised as degiraded, amdi brutal, jsirould* retard New Zealand, and make (heT rival America, for being "the dust heap of the world." Of course, any levelheaded person that reads both sides of this question must know that the immense trouble taken by the press to paint these people so black have a .powerful reason far (these misleading statements. My own impression is that a section of this brave, independent race of farmers would be an. acquisition to any country, but still, I cannot help expressing my surprise at the want of consistency shown by the frantic jingoes of a short time back. —I am, etc.,

CLEMENT EHUvBY. Karangahape Road.

(To the Editor.)

Sir, —Your correspondent, Mr Win. S. Aickin, pleads for the immigration of Boer prisoners to New Zealand. I fail to see that he has proved any necessity for such a course. We have already too many nationalities in this colony, and if "we do not take care the British in a few years will find themselves in a minority. Mr Aickin thinks the Boers -would make good . citizens. Judging by their past history I take leave to doubt it. We have already too many disloyal citizens in New Zealand, and in the event of any trouble with France or Russia these disloyalists would -all side with our enemies. Foreigners of many nationalities are rapidly ousting' British citizens out of their positions as traders, etc., all over the colony. They are able to live cheaper, sell cheaper, and give higher rents to landlords, and hundreds of British families are impoverished in consequence. Even in the Government service foreigners are employed out of all proportion to their numbers as colonists when compared with Britons. Boers axe too slim for us in war and would be too slim for us in peace. There is plenty of land in South Africa. We have not enough left here for our own people. —I am, etc.,

DONALD DUNKELD.

(To the Editor.}

Sir, —Mr O'Meag-her's letter on the above subject reminds one of what may come through practice—in this instance the practice of long experience of defending prisoners in police courts where, although there was no legitimate defence, the lawyer must earn his fee (which Mr O'Meagher always did) by saying something. He has occupied a. considerable portion of a column in writing nothino—verbiage excepted. The raison d'etre of Mr O'Meagher's opposition to the Boers is their ultra Calvinism Well, why not object to the Scotch'

for are they not ultra-Calvinistic?:, I was baptised in the Presbyterian Church, yet to my mind there.is no more bigoted man on earth than a typical North oi Ireland Presby-. terian. But, on the other hand, there is no better citizen. Quite so,-Tito, no. Protestants need apply. But there axe folk, no matter what you and I may think, who believe one could not find a better breed than the Dutch-French Huguenot mixture, and that the beneficial effects of the immigration of the latter into England, thanks to the revocation of the edict of Nantes, is observable in England even to the present clay, about Norwich for inc"j"*i li cc. Mr O'Meagher is Irish, so am I. As it is said people in glass houses shouldn't throw stones, perhaps it would not be indiscreet to allow the question of personal cleanliness alone. It is not every morning I take a bath, nor even a whisky. True, the colony has mainly been built' up by English, Irish, and Scotch, but we have welcomed everyone who came along, and many of; our best colonists are foreigners, not even Irish, As for Mr O'Meagher's anxiety about the land, if Government cannot find it, the other numerous energetic land agents, about Auckland will soon do so for the English Government if they wish to settle Boers on it. History shows bitterest enemies frequently beco&e the warmest friends—English and Scotch for instance, not to mention the Maoris. And are not many Boers beginning to help us now? Fellows who could do as was done at Majuba and Tweedfontein are just the stamp of folk we want. They understand roughing it, you bet. —I am, etc., WE S. AICKIN.