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Lyttelton Times, Volume LXII, Issue 7412, 1 December 1884, Page 4

It apjwara that Mr Ballancc, who has done justice to certain Native chiefs, has done a pitiful and a mean thing, because, in certain other respects, he has publicly approved of the policy of his predecessor. The reasoning is of the funniest, especially when we consider that a great many people who approved of the policy of Mr Bryce were very outspoken about his treatment of Kemp and Ropata, and they have never been considered pitiful and mean. It is only a Minister, it seems, who is debarred from doing an act of justice to which he is pledged, because he has approved of some other act of some former Minister totally unconnected with tho act of justice in question. In this matter Mr Bryce’s friends claim him as a witness in favour of Mr Balianee. Mr Bryce, they tell us, intended, before he went out of office, to reinstate Kemp; therefore Mr Ballance was, as far oa Kemp is concerned, cnly carrying out Mr Bryce’s intentions; only giving, in fact, the finishing touch to the preparations made by Mr Bryce. It is not a little amusing to find Mr Ballance branded as mean and pitiful for having done what Mr Bryce intended to do. Perhaps it is intended that Mr Ballance ought to have resigned and induced his colleagues to put Mr Bryce in his place, in order that ho might complete his generous and just intentions. Tho stylo of political criticism is now, and wo do not think likely to become general.