THE Marlborough Times PUBLISHED EVERY MORNING. SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 25, 1888

Marlborough Daily Times, Volume X, Issue 314, 25 February 1888, Page 2

THE Marlborough Times PUBLISHED EVERY MORNING. SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 25, 1888

Tun economical professions of the present Ministry arc not, after all, so sincere as they are generally supposed to be, and apparently the austere virtue is as a cloak that can be put on or removed at pleasure. That the Ministry are amenable to the persuasive tones of a warm supporter and can skilfully offer a bait to a wavering member is evident by the result of the visit of the Hon. Mr Mitehelson to the West Coast, which is stated to be that the Greymouth-Hokitika railway will now he pushed on with the utmost vigour. A large sum has already been expended on this railway, but the works have been allowed to fall into decay like our own Awatere line. Unlike the latter, however, the G-reymoutli-Hokitika section is a mistake, a huge economical blunder, and its initiation can only bo explained on the ground of a political exigency. In the light of this transaction the humbug that was talked by West Coast members when the paltry vote for a bridge over tbe Awatere was under consideration savors of intense hypocrisy and ignorance. It has been repeatedly urged against the continuation of the Awatere line that it opened up no agricultural country, and what little there is belongs to one or two persons only. The fallacy of the former statement is so apparent that it seems unnecessary to contradict it. True, the tail’d is in the hands of only a few people, but the whole tendency of the owners is to break lip these large estates and offer them for settlement. The fact is that in a country like Now Zealand it does not pay to farm large areas of agricultural lane}, as many people know to their cost, The “little farm we 1 ! tilled” has been found to ho the most profitable, and without the aid of a burstingup Act the work of subdivision will gradually go on. It may be that the rumour with regard to the completion of the GreymouthHokitika line has no foundation in fact, and that like a great many similar works it will merely he kept “ steadily in view," and go no further.

T/iat horse racing, p ire and simple, is an ancient and honorable sport few will he found to dispute. Like other national sport i, it is .dearly loved bv the average Britisher, and wherever the Anglo-Saxon race form a colony, among the first institutions to be established is the popular race meeting. In the medieval era royally itself was a patron of the turf,' and it is on record that even the stern Puritan Cromwell, observing- the effect it had upon improving the ope.ed of horses, encouraged tne sport. Unfortunately, in these later and more scientific days the sport is too often degraded into a mere gambling machine, and has created a most undesirable profession of blacklegs and swindlers, who come from no

one knows where, and silently steal away, turning up at the next race meeting in the same mysterious manner. The law seems powerless to deal with these gentry and prevent them fleecing the public. It is possible, however, for the stewards of a race meeting to purify the course from such an objectionable element, and until that is done the turf will deteriorate in popularity and be tabooed as a place unfit to bo patronised by respectable people. Always on tbo alert, by tho aid of confederates, to catch the unwary, they are a most objectionable class, criminal by instinct and in actual practice when the chances of detection are remote. Ail who have anything to do with promoting race-meetings will be acting in the interests of genuine sport if they set their faces resolutely against permitting the speelers to ply their nefarious games upon the public.