Striking Diversity and Strange Unanimity.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume XVIII, Issue 3085, 28 March 1892, Page 4

Striking Diversity and Strange Unanimity.

JTHB WORDING MAN'S BiIIiLENNIUM.J '» Itf ia 'said that "Variety is the spice of tffe,'* ancUthat "it adds to its flavour/" ■TheviKfefc (Iwao N Wafers, or Cowper, we , forget which) was not very far wrong when he penned this couplet, for ceitainly if c would be but a dull monotonous thing were it not for its pleasing contrasts. In JWatiimal world we have the graceful and shy deer; and the bold and ferocious lion, the huge elephant, and diminutive though <featrttotwe mouse j there is the plain, inunble-loofcuig thrash, with its rich song, and the beautiful bumming bird whose musical talents (and he has sense enough to know it) are conspicuously absent ; tlren ihere iB the monster whale and the tiny shrimp on which' it feeds. Whilst in mankind the contrasts are still more marked and numerous, for not only are their •' physical features," so to speak, different/ but they differ intellectually and morally also. In some countries certain acts are considered dishonourable and even criminal, and in others the same acts would be looked upon as ligitimate and

onourable In China and India, for instance,llwe believe, lying is a virtue— we won't say a rare 'virtue j while among the Negroes of America chicken-stealing iB considered one of the favourite nocturne! pastimes, nd perfectly praiseworthy, too — provided hey " don't get caught in the act." In his country our tastes differ, and our ambitions cairy us higher. We don't believe there is a single bank-teller in the whole of the country mean enough to If y violent hands on a poor unprotected fowl. As to varying opinions on political matters, they are legion, everybody has an opinion of some sort; some thiDkthat Ballance and his party are the willing instruments of the evil one; others think them the only men capable of ushering in that era of unexampled prosperity termed by some enthusiasts the Working Men's ( Millennium; otters, again, are loud in their praises of the author of the Public Works Policy, whilst others clamour for Six; Harry Atkinson ; but one and all are unanimous in pronouncing Buchanan's House of Commons Whisky " the Purest and Best in the Market."