VOGELIAN POLICY.

Clutha Leader, Volume I, Issue 40, 15 April 1875, Page 6

VOGELIAN POLICY.

! That we, should give; honor, jto .whom honor is due is "a -healthy injunction. It i» invio^ioukj and;-, withal^somewh^at ( paltry to attempt. to, snatch from a man ; an Ji of those v ti:ophies;/ofi victory to-.' which he is rightly entitled.. Arthe same* time, however, probably no injus.ticei will be. dorieUby subjecting; a man's ..action ,tp ( strict .in vestigatiop j besides, Mr Togo! ih how so firmly . •fixed, upon. the pinnacle of public favpr fiiat any attempts made by an insignificant 'scribbler to ease him down a peg or two are likely ; to: prove' altogether futile and absurd. Perhaps some years ago, while the colony was still plod</ ding along at agnail's . pace,. ,the mind of our now illustrious Prime Minister may. have, suddenly been electrified by an idea, and he may have exclaimed to himself-T-" Happy thought! Borrow, ten million off-hand, and enter upon the heroic work of' civilization." Pro- < bably the same " . happy ;, thought" of borrowing cash has often entered into the mind of a private; individual who happened to be hard-up. It. is not absolutely .necessary/ for (&. man to be a great inventive genius;, for, this- sort 'of. ** happy-thought" to occuiv to his minjdv Hpw> js i it. that t^is. sarhei ideal never occurred to^py- minister previous to MrjVogeJl-^to.M*} Stafford, for instanpe — ror^tfaat, if it did^ thoHpossessor. of jit 4M not attempt ta realize itHti the way Mi- Yogel has done ? The,, "fact, I . believe, is_ thM..pr6vipjjs_.mjniit.exs_did not possess^ the jreqpisi to amount of that highly useful Colonial commodity called " cheek." Whether or not Mr Yogel had, before he proposed his policy, acquired such a correct estimate ..pf/rtne^ national resources as to "convince him that there j was -little or no danger in=. involving the country in a large defytj or whether he considered the scheme as only a speculation, we do not know ; but if it was. a mere speculation, it seems to he now considered a lucky •one. At present it is rather incomprehensible why there should have been at first so much opposition to a proposal to apply borrowed- money in reproduc-' 1 tive works, such as railway making, and; the introduction of immigrants I expect, a considerable,; amount o^. opposition was "dye to^the-fact of Mr ; i Yogel happening to^he the propoundjsr j of the scheme. „There 4 was, at one; time;, no great, faith in Mr. Yogel; apd. he was considered to be rather a reckless financier. Had Mr Stafford- proposed .to borrow a. few millions for reproductive work, I believe his proposal would have met with little or no opposition ;■ but when Mr Yogel astonished Parliament with a sudden proposal to borrow ten million* . the country was taken by surprise.. Perhaps, after all, on the same principle, that we ballast a ship, it/is well theije was/ some opposition, and that the Fox- Vogel Government had not altogether its own. way. It is well th^t Mr Yogel has bei?,n fortunate in hisnative policy, and that the carrying out of the scheme was not accompanied/ bjy • an exhausting and expensive native war. Thanks to the sagacious maneuvering of. Sir. Donald M'Lean, it is now so long since there has been any serious native disturbance that little or rib apprehension exists of the entenfypordialejbeing disturbed. After all, it is more satisfactory to lay out ? our borrowed millions in useful works than in the purchase of powder and shot for the slaughter of our fellow countrymen. Where now are those miserable ob,-. structionists who once lifted 1 ' their voices and wielded their pens in dejnunciation of the Vogelian policy ? They have,'? most of them} seen the. error of their ways, and are somewhere hiding their diminished heads, or have sidled or are, sidling round to point in \ another direction. Among the most ; vigorous. and caustic antagonists of Mr Yogel and h|s policy once flourished : our worthy friend the, / Daily Times,? or local Thunderer of Dunedin. Mimicking its great London prototype, our smaller constellation appears to affect rather, to follow than to lead public; opinion. With regard to the ' Times,' lwe might reverset the .Latin proverb, ; and say, -.?*. we. change, and tha ..^ Tinsel ' : changes with us." The * Daily Times ' hever admitted- its error, but coolyi pointed iv an exactly contrary. direc-i tion to that which it had- previously! indicated as the right one. It has now! taken up ; the cudgels, and handles, them-in a scientific-manner, in support' of Mr Yogel and 1 his policy, and hasactually got so far as to insinuate that; . a writer like Mr Fellows, who s/tiu|holds, the. same. yiewfiL once r forcibly i * enunciated" By itself, is littlebetter than; ; % fool for his pains, and /Sfc-iSedrg'e; GTey, I, pbseirfe^ , it :ca%:A;ucitkn^s • Grandmother; and so ori; and so oJKiti lets fall its blows upon the pates' of j those who are so miserably; unfortunate i as to have incurred its displeasure in a j tolerahjyi / judrdious, but perhaps we! m *P>toatfd, -occasionally in ,a rriciousjor ' malicious maimer. Let' me, tioweyejr, ', iieconjtmend our,gmati contewp^raryito confine its attention more to elongated h^hig articles, and deal sjomowfial less m sm^V,o^i|nge;\pr 9 instead - ©? ous cognomen /of "Me C«T.deal IMximeWmh mtli^^^mimmmm !