Nelson Evening Mail. MONDAY, AUGUST 8, 1881.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XVI, Issue 187, 8 August 1881, Page 2

Nelson Evening Mail. MONDAY, AUGUST 8, 1881.

Ocit telegrams advised us of a meeting which was held at Wellington last Monday for the purpose of offering encouragement to tbe Irish Land League. Probably these who attended, and Home of thos-j who took part in, that meeting never intended to permit their feelings, or want of feeling tr. overrule (heir better judgment to such ar' extent, but upon rc-c-ipt of th.;- newspaper reports of fus sp'tchis it became perfectly clear th^t the proceedings ultimately developed into a hilarious expression of sympathy with the murderers of landlords in Ireland Had the bloodthirsty Luodou gone the length of proposing "That thia meeting cordially approves of the shooting of laudlords/' it ig possible tbat the resolution might have been negatived, but the reception accorded to his sanguinary expressions of regret tbat every bullet aimed at a landlord had not found its intended billet was very nearly equivalent to carrying such a motion. Apart, however, from tha extreme to which the

meeting went In this respect, it is, we think, much, to be regretted that such an attempt 'rt-as rnada by meny of cur leading men to irtfrrdrce iuio the colony such a bone of coutcni-oii. We have quite enough to do to ma;v :rc err ry,- :1 EffairOj ai : { | i n arrarging ihtii! fir.J Pi-PJci'jj-.t prruni'^ for qnnrreilir^ ; ; 'v:p: ;; cujv [~va wifbou' providi.-'g an ndoiistv.r.] '■-•::.. -..live to (iißa^rocnjei'.t in the imrr rtr.r.t.rv w ?uch p. qucsik-n into our mi cist, find w: sto ci, (i ; tc f 5: 1( i that that remarkable EMihei-irj£ cf Mr:ru:ay last is mceiing with vr-ry frf-r.crnl cendf-mflation, and that foi-e---most amorrr thofo wi'.'o denounce it is the Ly teller 7 hue, which is Icokcd upon as H.o lui-jiiisr rxj-cneni of tho views of the " Liberal " p'.rty. Tho following resolutipn movt-d ly Mo Tole, M. H..K., in specially sok-cted for disapproval:—" That in order to give (ff.cct tn the foregoing resolutions thi3 meeting d?ems it advisable to establish a branch of the Land League in Wellington for the purpose of securing just legislation on all questions relating to land " Commenting on the meeting generally the Lytte'ton 7YJhes says': —"It is a deliberate proposal to import the feuds and grievances of the Mother Country into this community. As such it calb for sharp rebuke and disavowal. Sanctioned as it is by members of the Liberal Party in the Assembly, eftorts will doubtlesß be made to connect the project with New Zealand Ljberalism. On behalf cf that Liberalism, a prompt denial should be made. As a mere matter of expediency, nothing could be more shortsighted than to attempt to force a branch of the Land League on New Zealand. What have we to do with the league, or it with us ? The very name would throw an ill-omened shadow c'n the party concerned, however indirectly, iv the attempt. Most assuredly, either the language of the last resolution has been misreported, or the meeting which endorsed it must have done so with very little consideration . )b K critic in the Chtistchurcli ?jps writing before seeing the newspaper report was inclined to resard the telegram as a bcax, so incredible old it appear that such an assemblage as that which was siated to have been on the platform should have countenanced proceedings of such a character, but he adds :— " Should the report bo true in bitter earnest and the names of the Europeans Syno attended and spoke correctly given, then indeed I trust that each doctor will keep careful record of the names of those men who have shown their willingness to import anarchy, ruin, lawlessness, murder, and rapine to our shores, and will show his sense of the probable favor? to b<e received from such nun by refusing to return them to their present places in the House as our so-cnl!cd representatives. As well deliberately send for a cargo of smal-pox, which happens' just now to be a prevalent European disorder, as import knowingly, and establish in our peaceable communities, a branch of the Land League." Such are some of the terms in which this meetiog has been spoken cf, ;but there is another, and, under the circumstances, a somewhat peculiar feature in the affair that, bo far as we know, has hitherto escaped notice. There seems to be little or no doubt that Sir George G.rey was the [prime mover in the matter, and that he and Mr Sheehan, than whom there are no more cunning Bchemers, or more clever manipulators of their fellow men in the House of Representatives, were but using as their tools the others who took part in the meeting, and we shall be greatly surprised if on tho account reaching home it is not found that very much is made of the presence and of the utterances of MTawhai. M H.R. In New Zealand but little importance will be attached to his appearance on the platform or to bi 3 remarkable speech which was more like a parody en the famous " 1 inafore " sr.np, " For he might have been 11 itusuan, a Turkey, or a Prussian, &c." than anything else, but we can easily understand what s point Sir George will make of a great Isativo chief being so eiirred by the accounts he had hoard that he voluntarily came forward to denounce the action of the Lritiah Government, But tho peculiar toatuTO to which we refer is this:— lt may be remembered tbat at the time Sir William Fox was knighted, the Grey Ministry was in power, end Sir Georgo was intr;i:selyVexed at tlie Homo Gove rnmr-nt conferring such an honor upon a New Zealand colonist without first obtaining the sanction and approval of the Colonial Government. So wrath, indeed, was be that on the 2nd July, 1879, he addressed a lengthy memo to the Secretary of State on the subject, in which he stated his objections to the course pursued, one of his principal reasons being the following:— '• At the time, Sir William Fox was in violent opposition, and making public communications, which were embarrassing the Government with the Native race. The action of the Crown, therefore, had the aspect of a party movement of an embarrassing nature." There is a homely but a pithy proverb that " What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander," and Sir George, if he has not forgotten the reasons he then urged against the action of the Home Government, may well devote a few minutes to considering how the objections he then raised must, if there was any force at all in them, tell against him upon the present occasion. His complaint was that a Government engaged in managing the internal affairs of the country over which it had been elected to rule might be seriously embarrassed by outside interference, even in Btich an indirect and unintentional way as the conferring of an honor in recognition of past services upon one who, for the time being, was in opposition to that Government. Has Sir George reflected — it is useless to ask the question, for there can be no doubt that he has done so— upon tho effect that might be produced upon the Irish mind by such a meeting as that held at Wellington, and the embarrassment to the British Government to which that effect might give rise ? " Here," will argue many an impulsive Irishman, especially should he be one of Mr Lundon's lar:dlord-3hooting friends, "is a late Governor of an important colony like New Zealand, and one who has filled the still higher and more important position of Her Majesty's Representative at the Cape, and who has since been Premier of New Zealand, taking an active part himself, and inducing other leading men in the co'ony to take an active part, in expressing sympathy with the objects of the Land League, and disapproval cf the measures adopted by the Government to bring the anarchy now prevailing in Ireland to an end. Surely when we have such backers as these we shall be right in acting in violent opposition to the Government, and in using our best endeavors to perpetuate the lawlessness that now reigns supreme in our unhappy land." Of course, Sir George Grey thought of all this, and we should like to know how he is going to reconcile it with his memo of the 2ud July, 1579, to the Secretary of State. "Last year," writes 'An Hibernian ' in a Wellington paper, " all creeds willingly and liberally subscribed to the Irish Relief Fund when our countrymen were starving, but the programme now put before Irishmen is quite of another character." So it is, and its character and promoters will, we trust, be loudly and indignantly condemned from one end of the colony to the other.