The Nelson Evening Mail. WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 1867.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume II, Issue 219, 18 September 1867, Page 2

The Nelson Evening Mail. WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 1867.

We think it may be regarded as a legitimate subject for regret that so few opportunities are afforded us for a more immediate interchange of relations between ourselves and our neighbors in the surrounding colonies. Time was when Nelson horses competed, and with marked success, with Australian racers on the Sydney and Melbourne courses, and a kindly feeling was engendered between the sportsmen of New Zealand and Australia which promised and deserved a more permanent existence. But this has now, we fear, become a thing of the past; and the only instances in which we have emerged from our isolation, and sought for representation amongst our sister colonies, were at the International Exhibition held at Melbourne in November last, and at the Exhibition held at Dunedin a few years ago. The mutual advantages which have resulted from the representation on those occasions of the resources and manufactures of the various members of the Australasian group are sufficiently obvious, and do not require further illustration at our hands. }

Equally important and beneficial, in their kind and degree, are those sporting congresses which have become matters of periodical occurrence in the other colonies: such, for example, as the champion-races, intercolonial cricket-matches, rifle-meet-ings, &c. These are not only useful and valuable in regard to the competition they excite aud the emulation they provoke, as well as in respect to the encouragement they afford to manly exercises, invigorating sports, and to the acquisition of skill and strength in certain pastimes, and in the employment of the means of national defence, but they have also their social uses. AH colonial society has a tendency to provincialism; partly by reason of its isolation and remoteness from the great centres of intellectual, commercial, and political activity in the other hemisphere, and partly by the separation of the inhabitants of one colony from those contiguous to it. There would unquestionably arise from the operation of these causes a feeling of self-complacency and superiority, which is either ridiculous or offensive, and very often both. Perhaps there is somewhat less of this feeling in New Zealand than in one or two of its neighbors, because most of us have come here fresh from Europe, and therefore measure men aud things by other than local standards. But it is observable in our native-born population, who have had no opportunity of correcting their estimate of objects and persons by comparison with something so immeasurably greater at the other end [of the world; and who may therefore be partially excused for their self-satisfied notions and provincial prejudices. These will be found to prevail elsewhere, and their indulgence gives rise to local jealousies, local euperciliousDeea, and local arrogance.

We are apt to form rather a derogatory than a complimentary opinion of the next door neighbor with whom we do not happen to be on speaking terms; but when a chance meeting at the house of a mutual friend causes as to become acquainted with that neighbor, the probabilities are that we find him a pleasant companion, if not a desirable friend, And what is true of individuals, is equally true ,of c&mmunitiea j knowledge must precede esteem. Hence, the utility, in a social point of view, of these intercolonial

gatherings, whether the purpose be an exhibition of our respective resources and manufactures, a horse-race, a cricketmatch, or a rifle meeting. They break down the geographical barriers between the various colonies. They help to remind us of our national relationship and our common origin, and that though New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, Tasmania, Queensland, and our own provinces of New Zealand are distinct settlements, yet they are as much integral portions of the British Empire, and as closely bound together in the ties of sympathy and interest as Yorkshire and Somerset, as Westmoreland and Kent, as Sutherlandshire and the County Wicklow. And the more warmly this friendly feeling is maintained, the more frequent these intercolonial meetings, the more intimate our relations with each other, whether for commerce, sport, or amity, the firm and lasting will be the union amongst us whenever the time arrives — - as ifc has already done in our North American colonies — for federation, and the bolder and more confident the front we should unitedly oppose to a foreign enemy, if we should ever be threatened with invasion.