The Daily Telegraph. THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 15, 1894. OUR CABLEGRAMS.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 6988, 15 February 1894, Page 2

The Daily Telegraph. THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 15, 1894. OUR CABLEGRAMS.

'; The news we receive by cable from the ; Old World is sometimes rather jerky, and often extremely unsatisfactory. A few days ago we were told that terrible gales were raging around the British coasts That was all, and nothing further was sent to say what destruction to life and property the gales had caused. It seemed as if the purpose was merely to raise our curiosity and keep us anxiously expecting the details of the storm. We certainly got no satisfaction. The cable to whicli we refer was dated the 7th, and the day before yesterday another message,- dated the 12th, was received which said that a great storm was raging in England. How provoking ! as the ladies would say. Is this tho same storm we Heard of as raging on the 7th ? Or is it a new one ? If so, what about tho old one ? Did it collapse suddenly and prematurely, before any damage was done ? It is really too bad to trifle with our colonial nerves in {his fashion. Our readers will notice that the second cablegram is as curt and unsatisfactory as the first. Nor is there any sequel to if either. Not a word in to-day's messages to say whether it has abated oi what ships have been driven on the rocks, or what towers and steeples tumbled' to tho ground. But in a week or so we shall probably have another cablegram to the effect that a furious gale is raging from .John O'Groats to Land's End ! From America we have some particulars of of the terrific storm or blizzard with which that Continent has been visited. Twenty persons were frozen to death in Oklohama, the newly settled district for which there was such a rush some three or four years ago, soi ie of the intending settlers losing their Jives in the press. Similar fatalities are reported from other parts. Jl>w easily the redundant population vi' (he wovkl could begot rit! of by purely -natural causes !" A few degrees 111■ -1"c frost, or a few degrees more heat, au< the disponing Malthusians would 1m relieved of their anxiety,—The House -ii Lords is having y, bad quarter of .in hour from its Liberal and Radical friends. Mr Bryce, a very clever pan. who

allow* his party feeling to dominate j his philosophical judgment, thinks it will be " necessary to decide whether they should longer tolerate the House of Lords as Tory tools," forgetting that if the Peers were Liberal tools, they would be of no earthly use to tho country. It is essential to the character of an Upper Chamber under the party system of government that it should be Conservative—a truth which our Liberals and Radicals habitually forget. They seem to think their ideas and doctrines

the perfection of wisdom, and that every obstacle to their being carried into effect should be taken out of the way. Whereas wisdom dwells with no party, and such political wisdom as we British and British colonials attain to is the resultant, so to speak, of opposing political forces. Heaven pity the country that should be subject to the wisdom oE such men, for instance, as Mr Richard Seddon and Mr W. P. Reeves ! It will be seen from to-day's cables that the Radicals and National Liberal Federationists are starting an agitation against the House of Lords; but, as we remarked the other day, the Peers have the knack of reading the public mind quite as accurately as the Liberal and Radical leaders. The country flatly refused to utter a single note of disapprobation when they rejected the Home Rule Bill, and the presumption is that they know perfectly well what they are about on the present occasion too. It is, at any rate, not the least likely that they would do anything to rouse the country against their venerable House. The mismanagement of affairs by the colonial democracies, especially in Australia, is a strong argument with the British people against democratising their institutions. True Liberalism is of course the proper thing, but true Liberalism can be got from no single party.—lt has recently been the fashion to praise New Zealand, and there can be no doubt that it entered upon a reformed course of conduct when the late Atkinson Ministry took office. Before that the colony used to be held up to scorn and reprobation by the London financial journals as the "bad boy" of the colonies. We have frequently said that the Government we have just named is no! entitled to the credit of initiating the new policy of economy and self-reliance. They were appointed for the express purpose of carrying out that policy, which had been declared by the country to be a necessity. But they deserved great credit for the manner in which they performed the task assigned them. Ever since Sir Harry Atkinson put the finances to rights and introduced the tapering off process with regard to expenditure on public works the colony has been in better odour with the London money-lenders. The rapid recovery of the country has been talked and written about almost ad nauseam ; for the people know only too well that though the colony has recovered its good name it has not recovered its prosperity—at least, to the extent alleged. But it has, we say, been the fashion to praise the colony, and we need not add- that the members of the present Government;, especially the Premier, have cracked it up in quite a phenomenal way. The tide, however, is begining to turn again. The shocking hypocrisy of misrepresentation in which Mr Seddon indulged is being found out. In the colony itself the absurdity has been constantly exposed; but it takes outsiders a certain time to get their glasses focussed, so to speak, to objects a.fc such ja distance. We colonists all" know tliat'tlia selfreliance of the present Government policy is all moonshine, and as the truth in such a case is always welcome, it is satisfactory to find Mr Wilson, of the Investor's Review, declaring the fact with regard to our world-famous surpluses in an article in the Chronicle. He says that the surpluses exist only on paper—what Sir John Hall and other competent authorities have said all along—and that the colony has gone a million and a-half to the bad. Which is the simple' truth. As it i 3 as sure as the sun will rise to-morrow that the Government will have to go upon the London market before long for a " thumping " loan, it is well, that the London financiers should know exactly how the colony stands, and especially on what shockingly false pretences the Ballance-Seddonites have been carrying on. Sly borrowing is the worst of all, not to say that, as it is in itself corrupt, it is also sure to be connected with other kinds of corruption. We may now take for granted that there will be no more blowing about the condition of the colonial finances in the London newspapers ; and this, we say, is exceedingly satisfactory, as it will show the Government that they can no longer carry on their imposture. The fact of the matter is that the colony badly requires another retrenching Ministry.—The British Empire, some seem to imagine, is becoming unwieldy. The Radicals, indeed, think it much overgrown, and this was even the opinion of the Liberals some 30 years ago—an opinion which has led to a great many foreign complications, for had Great Britain gone on annexing territory, especially in Africa, according to what we might almost call her desiiny, the bickerings between the late Earl Granville and Prince Bismarck would have been avoided. There is no limit, practically speaking, to the increase of the Empire, and now the political busybodies are planning how it is to be held together. General Chesney proposes a Council of the Empire, but really the Empire gets along very w«*ll as it is. None of the schemes of government yet proposed would at any rate be an improvement on the present system, which is what we may call the product of circumstances and experience.