(FROM THE "TIMES.")

Daily Southern Cross, Volume XX, Issue 2238, 22 September 1864, Page 6

(FROM THE "TIMES.")

Tke present war in JNow Zealand will bo momoidblo in the annals of the British Empno if il really arouses the attention of P.uliament Lo the vciy peculiar relations that c\ist between ourselves and our colonies Tke old system of dependence is gone, but it has left behind it many a bi( tor leg icy. Wo are at the present moment subjected to the evils of the old and the new systems. "We find that wo have raised up in the bosom of the "Empire independent .Republics, 'with policy, feelings, and interests entirely stninge and uncongenial lo us. We have handed over to them oui pilrouagc, ■which we do not regret, and the power of burdening our tiade with heavy imposts, which we luu c often reason to regret sincerely. We have sent out the young people into the woilJ, and they have not been slow vi showing us how cutiioly thej r feel themselves emancipated fiom parental conliol For all these sacnficcs, for all these concessions, we naturally look for our row aid It is not much that we ask. W r o do not seek for contributions to our revenue , we do not requhe that the colonies bliould cousiJei our w islils iv time of peace, or lend us tho slightest aid m tune of war We only <isk tliat they should give us no tioublc and pat us to no evpense , that, as the3 r have undei taken the management oi their own affurs, they will bo bo good as to conduct them in their own way, uul tioubleus neither for advice nor assistance Oar wishes have not been gi anted In the far NorthWest, Canada diawsofT a large proportion, of our army to defend a fi on tier which she is well able, if she wcie but w llling, to defend for herself, and now IN\w Zealand diaws upon our cic Jit, dennnds ten thousand of our hoops, and will not allow vs the miserable satisfaction of legul itmgthc policy tor which we are to pay so do illy Geneial Peel asks win I power the Government of jSTcw Zealand lias m directing the movement of tho Bntish troops m that colony Jle might lune asked what power the Government of Kngland has m directing the policy towauls the nalnes w Inch the tioop3 aiosent lo New Zealand to enfoiee. It is ooilamlybad enough that our troops m New Zealand should be uadov the command of a G-enc-lal who must obey the oirl^is of a Governor, himself vutually dependent on the Colonial C!o\ eminent JJutit is infinitely wOl so that our troops should not only be employed and directed by whit is essentially a foreign Power, but should be the blind nislrii'iicnfo of a policy m forming w Inch the Eugbsh Cloveniinent has ie illy no voice If we lend our nnlilai v and na\al assistance to a European State, wo at least know whit wo are fighting fir, and lun o debbeiahMV espoused tint side of the qu vi el But mNer Ze iland w o arc fighting, not because we behe\ c tho qvuuicl of tho colony lo be just, but because wo aie leduced timely lo follow in the wiko of the Pailumcnt and Ministers of Xcw Zealand , and to employ our troops, not as all.es and partners in the wir, but as unieasom.ig instruments to excculo a w ill which is not the will of the the eo.intry they serve. This is to us the most morliiying and degrading pait of the whole (lansaction It is bad enough to spend a penny m (he pound Income Tax; on a wai in which we have no interest, and from which we cannot possibly den\-e the slightest advputage. It is wOl so to Ik-m c our army, which has so many claims on its services, draw n off to .a remote and ignoble field of ac tion, where victory is attended with no honour, and defeat with unusual disgrace But worse than all these is the helpless feeling ihat we arc not m our own hinds, but in the hands of others , that wo arc no moi'e masters of our own policy than wo are of our own tioops , and Ihat Sir Fox and Mr Win I ilcer, and not Loid Palmerston or fjoul Russell, aie tho persons to decide for what objects w c are to make war, and on what! ei ms we are to make peace With an empne that girdles the earth, with a magnificent trade, with an cnonnous revenue, at a ponodofour highest pios-peuly, we find ouisolves reduced to something like a state of subjection, our policy thwarted, our credit commanded, our army conti oiled and duected by a community the whole population of which is not so large as .i single electoral distuct of this metropolis. This comes of setting up independent colonial governments without following the piinciplc to its legititnuato conclusion, and leaMiig tho colon}- to defend for itself the rights which we have so cheerfully conceded. If it be sound reasoning that cveiy colon y should be cnti listed with the management of its own aflairs, it is at least equally reasonable that it should defend w ith its ow n hand the rights winch it claims lo o\civise In the picscnt instance, we arc not only fighting and squandering our money for a policy which is not our own, but for a policy as conliary to our own as anything can possibly bo conceived Wo have no quarrel wiLh the aboriginal race of New Zealand We pudc ouiselvcs, and nobunjuslly, on being superior to the pivpulicos of caste and colour, and of being the fi lends — in theory at least — of the whole human race We have quarrelled with half the natioiH of the earth for the sake of the ncgio, yet we find ourselves employing our choicest troops, with very indifferent success, as the agents m a w r ar of c\tcimmafion We are shedding our blood to add one more to the long list of nationalities which the gentle and pious Anglo-Saxon race have swept off the face of the earth. And this wo do at tho bidding of a small colony, for wdioso selfish pui poses we are content lo assume the ignoble oflicc of oxecutioner upon a lace fighting for all that makes life woith having. If tho colonists of Now Zealmd have determined to cxtirnnnatc its aboriginal inhabitants and talec their land for a spoil, c in nootheraim than ours befouud to light the ignoble battle and execute the cveciable sentence ? Let the colonists of New Zealand make peace or wage war at their pleasuie with their native neighbours, but do not let us, by the loan of our credit and our army, relieve them from the legitimate responsibility for their own aels If they mo to divulo the game among themselves, lot us leave to them the honours and the perils of the chase As it is, we have conlnved to make it the interest of the whole colony to carry on upon as largo a scale aud for as long a period as possible a, war wdiich is lo them a mine of wealth. Tho revenue nourishes, lucrative contracts abound, every department of of industry receives an unwonted stimulus by the profuse expenditure of British money that the w ar has occasioned. Wo, who have wisely refused to give our colonies tho assistance of Imperial credit for the pui pose of w oiks of reproductive indnstiy — for tho making of roads, the building of In ulgcs, and the construction of railways — aro lavish of our credit w T hcn tho purpose is war and destruction, the waste of the resources of tho present, and tho anticipation of tho hopes of the iu tare Who can woudtr that, with such encouragement, little hopes arc hold out by the New Z aland Government to induce the natives Iq fin ponder ? In a recent pi oclamalion the lands of lh" Wailvaloi are declarod forfeited, and tl ose who weie concerned w ilh the King movement — that is, the most influential chiefs of Now

Zealand — are threatened with death. If; seems as if capitulation and surrender were not desired, — as if the object were to prolong tho conflict for the purpose of making it more complete a meana, not of conquest, but of extermination.