JAPAN AS A COMPETITOR.

Gisborne Times, Volume VI, Issue 274, 28 November 1901, Page 2

JAPAN AS A COMPETITOR.

A few years ago a great doai was hoard about the rivalry that was to bo expected from Japan as a manufacturing centre. What with the cheapness of labor and the cleverness of the little brown man, groat things were expected, but now it seems that there is not so much for our industrial workers to fear after all. Mr M. Harris, of Christchurch, has returned after a tour of Japan, America, and England, and in an interview with the Christchurch Press, he gave some information of a valuable kind. I have been there on several previous occasions,” said Mr Harris, “ and I always thought more of its future as a great industrial country than I did when I came away this time.” Mr Harris then went on to say that he did not think Japan would ever become a serious competitor as a manufacturing country in the world’s markets, and he gives his reasons for that opinion. Wages have gone up enormously and the cost of living has become much higher. Indeed, Japan has progressed so much in Western ways that she cannot keep it up. In eight years the cost of living has almost doubled. Then almost everyone in the cities wore the native costume, and it was a rare exception to see a Japanese wearing leather boots. Now the people are aping the Western ways very much As an outlet for New Zealand produce he did not think that Japan would ever be worth seriously considering. For one reason it is only sixteen days' journey from San Francisco, while the journey from New Zealand could not bo made under forty days. As to Japanese territory, he says that the formation much resembles that of New Zealand. The country is very highly cultivated, which is necessarily so where there is a population of about forty million people. Mr Harris was much struck with the way in which the Japanese conserved their supplies of water. There, he says, they eoutrol the rivers, while in New Zealand the rivers control us, and take as much land as they like with them. In Japan the water is lifted to the otherwise barren hill-tops with the aid of water-wheels, On the hill-tops reservoirs are built, and then the water is itc down from paddock to Paddock as required, little clay fences " ; n; each terrace. The rivers in miose in New Zealand, ?«!»•... " from their

- - r ___ , formation arc in._ but :he people control tuu—sou ces by means ot" walls and aqueaue.o. Jlr Harris is a gentleman well able to give a rood, sound, and practical opinion, and therefore bis observations must be of deep in crest to the industrial classes, and also to those who have been regarding Japan as a now market for our products.

The <r 1 ’ vC'-i-lv summoned meet mg 0. T ; n-uids takes place a;, trie Masairi'.- Hull to-uigiit. Mrs Bruce and Miss O'Connor, of Gisborne. are Dassens.’er~ oy the lumutnKu, which left Loudon on the 12th October. V he«t of the Gisborne Rowing Club’s trial fours was rowed oil last evening, when Harding’s crew defeated mierriti » by a length. •U the Police Court yesterday V • A. Collins was fined Ids an.l 7s costs tor riding a bicycle on the Stout street lootpath, Whataupoko. . Ti.e brethren of the American Order 0 Oddfellows intend holding a picnic at Mr John Clark’s bush, Matawhero Point, on New Year’s Dav.

The Countv Council yesterday reappointed Messrs A. Tuohy, J. Macfar-laue,-I. Warren, and J. Nolan Hospital Trustees representing the Council. Captain Edwin telegraphed yesterday : North-east to oast and south-east gale soon ; sea heavy ; tides high : glass further fail ; heavy ram.”

Messrs Williams and Kettle and the New Zealand Loan and Mercantile Agency Company hold their stock sales at Matawhero yards to-day. Dr Cole had a narrow escape yesterday. The horse attached to the buggy bolted, with the result that the buggy was much damaged. The doctor, fortunately, did not suiter any injury. lteferring_to the speculations regarding the seat of the recent earthquakes, the New Zealand Times remarks editorially : All this points in support of the Lake Sumner theory. It is a theory more comfortable for Wellington than for Christchurch.”

Tho Public Health Department finds there is a mild epidemic of scarlet fever all over the colony at present. The Department has now far-reaching powers to compel the enforcement of precautions, and will use them should any neglect on the part of local authorities be brought under notice.

Our Premier in a judicious way has contrived to keep himself very largely in the eye of Royalty for some years past.

and there are very few things the King would deny him. except, perhaps, the Crown jewels or tho head of Mr. F. Pirani on a charger. What form his reward will take depends largely upon his own de-

sires.—Gore Ensign. From and after Monday, December 2nd (for summer months, October to May), mails for Kanaekanao will leave Gisborne on Mondays and Fridays at 10 a.in., and arrive at Kanackanae on Tuesdays and Saturdays at noon; mails will leave Kanackanae on Tuesdays and Saturdays at 1 p.m., and arrive at Gisborne on Mondays and Wednesdays at 1 p.m.

The Cheviot correspondent of Christ-

church Truth says —“ I was shown a resident’s larder—a large room formerly filled with preserves, groceries, bottles, candies, soap, tinware, and a hundred other similar articles. The room was loft three feet deep in a sort of a stew compounded of these ingredients, which were smashed to pulp, and as carefully mixed as if stirred by a big spoon. The whole presented a most extraordinary effect.”

It was a wintry day in Gisborne yesterday. The Government weather report states :—Auckland, fresh S. breeze, smooth sea Manukau, Tiritiri, and Tauranga; Napier, light S.W., overcast, rain, considerable swell, heavy sea Castlopoint; New Plymouth, light S.E., blue sky, smooth sea ; Wellington, calm, blue sky ; Greymouth, light E., blue clouded sky, moderate sea; Christchurch, fresh E. breeze, blue sky; Dunedin, light N.W., overcast, gloomy ; slight swell at Oamaru. A dastardly attempt to wreck the engines of the stoamor Alameda is reported from San Francisco. Tho white firemen had been replaced by a Japanese crew. A couple of days before sailing for Hawaii a machinist dropped his square into one of the cylinders, and in order to recover it the piston rod had to bo taken out. Then it was found that fiat pioecs of iron had been placed in the steam ports and the oil pipes had been charged with emery powder. Had the Alameda gone to sea without these things being discovered the emery powder would have oaten all the face off the brasses, tho steam when under high pressure would have driven tho pieces of flat iron into the cylinders, and the piston rod, working at lightning speed, would have done the rest. Tho bottom would have been driven out of the cylinder, the steam chest would have been wrecked, and the mail boat would have beou help’ esB _ Commenting upon the future outlook of the colony the Wairarapa Times says : —Everybody’s income Ims been extended and everybody’s wages increased. The last to profit by the spirit of the times were our legislators, those distinguished uttorers of boneless commonplaces, who put up their own salaries twenty-five per cent. This is perhaps about the average unearned increment, and while it can, in these days of expansion, be obtained, it is doubtful whether it oun be maintained in tho sober days which follow. Of lath we

have been taking short views of life, and a breezy optimism has prevailed upon all sides ; but, as the pendulum swings back circumstances, over which wc have no control, may once more compel us to follow the old paths of economy, prudence, and retrenchment. Tho falling-off in the wool market was our first note of warning, and the depression now evident in the stock market, which will bring about a corresponding depreciation in land values, is our further omen. The latter, however, is very much the outcome of a phenomenally dry spring.