The New-Zealander.

New Zealander, Volume 5, Issue 317, 13 June 1849, Page 3

The New-Zealander.

He |ust and fe;u not: Let all tl.c end thon aims't at, be thy Country's, lliy Go')'s, aiit't Truth's.

We'dUES DA. V, JUNE 13, 1849.

Whilst catering from the pile of Colonial journals, with which we are periodically furnished, we were struck with an article in the " Cape of Good Hope Observer," of the 20Lh of February, entitled, " Great Britain and her Colonies." We were struck, we say, with this article, not because of the soundness of its arguments, but because of the boldness and the incorrectness of its assertion that " nearly all the colonies of Great Britain are alinstakers from her." At this hypothetical conclusion, the South African Editor professes to arrive, by means of " the remarks of Sir William Molesworth, in his speech of July last, in the House of Commons ;" — and, upon the dicta of that senator, he pioceeds to echo his sentiments and to weave a web as sophistical as penetrable. If even a portion of the British Colonies he reduced to the necessity of " alms-taking," we contend it is the imperative duty oi a public writer to demonstrate the causes that have conduced to their eleemosynary state, before he shall venture, upon such exparte, and by no means unquestionable, evidence, to fling the charge of mendicity in the teeth of nearly every British possession. As " alms-takers," — that is, after the manner in which the Cape Observer deals with the question — there have probably been none so extensive as the West Indian Colonies. Nevertheless, a candid political economist would pause ere he ventured to twit those once flourishing provinces with a sordid desire to dip their fingers into the public purse, or to wring from the striving people of England the fruits of an industry for which they themselves had forborne to toil. " If," to quote the apostrophe of Rob Roy to Rashleigh Osbaldistone — " If we know what they are, we also know the causes that forced them to become what they are." Instead, therefore, of accusing such men of being alms-takers, — voluntary alms-takers — the writer should have shown that either through ignorance, or indifference, they had sunk to the degraded level in which he has placed them, otherwise he was bound to admit that they were hurled to their present pauper position by a series of acts, emanating from the Colonial Office and the Imperial Legislature combined, which undermined every element of their prosperity, compelling to penury those once the magnates of the land, and who if suffered to regulate their own affairs, as other " integral portions of the empire " are permitted to do, would have contributed quite as liberally, as they have been driven to abstract largely, from the Tieasury. Ab unodisce omncs; — we shall not even except the Cape, of which the writer speaks in the following terms — Sir William Molesworth's assertion that England taxes heiself upon an average, at the rate of nine shillings in the pound for the privilege of her Colonial commerce — supplying the text — " Is not the Cape a receiver of alms from the mother country to an extent even beyond the average of nine shillings above mentioned 1 If so, — is the Cape worth anything to the Government of Britain ? And if she is as yet only an humble dependant, liable to be cast off for utter woithlessness at a ly time, ought not this idea to in&til some eneigy into the men of the Cape ? Ought not the knowledge that we are — for our safety and protection — alms-lakers of the Btitish; to induce us to make an earnest

endeavour to be free from the bonds of almsgiving, — to protect ourselves, — to trade for ourselves, — to govern ourselves, — and to be not a weight and burden upon the people of Britain, so heavily taxed already for their own government, but to be indeed their friends and fellow subjects, joined in like interests with them, and united with them for the teaching of freedom and the universal triumph of justice in the world 1 ? We know that there are men in the colony who tremble at the idea of the withdrawal of the military expenditure, — but why should this be 1 ? If the Cape cannot exist, — if Cape trade cannot flourish without a war expenditure — then was Sir Anthony Oliphant pufectly in the right when he blamed the Europeans for having crossed the Hottentots Holland Mountains in their first efforts at colonization, and then the sooner we withdrew within that limit of territory the better. But it is utterly in opposition to all justice that we should claim, as we do claim, protection from the Bntish Government, us a right, when we well know that we are a burden upon them, and are yet of scarce any use or value to them -nhatever." There are some primary questions, as it strikes us, to be considered, which are these. — Are the i Colonies creations of English discontent, — of individual English enterprise 1 Or, are they provinces founded for the real, or supposed, aggrandizement of the British Empire'? If they were individual experiments of particular classes, left to the undisturbed administration of their own laws, to the internal regulation of their own local affairs, and to the practical developernent of their own prosperity, then Sir William Molesworth and his Cape disciple might reasonably grumble, and exclaim against their mendicity, should they the free agriUs of their own destinies, demand the Naval and Military protection of England in suppoit of possessions in which she held neither interest nor supremacy. But, when those Colonies have been originally founded by the Biitish Empire, or have been won from the enemy by the Imperial arms, common sense and common honesty alike indicate the national obligation for national defence. To charge the Cape of Good Hope, then, or any other British province, receiving British protection, with " alms-taking" is quite as ridiculous, as to stigmatise Dublin or Chatham, or Portsmouth or °Ply mouth with a like beggary -.—and we defy these lachrymose doctrinaries to point to any state, in any age, where property, whether national or individual, has failed to require an expenditure commensurate with the importance of its protection. We have long intended to discuss this question of Colonial alms-taking, to which Sir William Molesworth's allegations have given birth. The subject is one of the deepest interest — not lightly, nor hastily to be handled. We feel grateful, deeply grateful, to Sir William Molesworth for the active stir he has created in the Colonial question. Nevertheless, he is by no means the man upon whom we should feel disposed entirely to rely for an impartial accomplishment of Colonial Justice. He views the subject in much too contracted a light. He fails, we think, to discover that figures are, at best, but most fallacious tests in demonstrating the importance to England, even m a pounds, shillings and pence view, of England's colonies. Of what value for instance is the grand solution of Sir William's financial problem — namely that for every twenty shillings worth of direct colonial commerce, England pays nine shillings, on an average, for its pui chase, by protection ? Admitting that there were no previous indirect gain in employment of British shipping, in primarily importing the raw material for British manufacture, or foreign produce for British re-exportation — admitting that but eleven shillings worth of trade were created, — is that altogether beneath consideration, or does not the very demand for the protection it creates at the same time compel a fair share of remuneration, and afford legitimate employment to the Navy and Army of England? If the Colonies be integrals, for whom is England disbursing but for herself ? That the disbursements pinch her is her own fault, because it demonstrates that she treats her integrals in a manner foreign to their and her best interests ; — and shows that her protection is of double faced character, partaking very largely of coercion, in compulsory provision of the hordes of privileged drones who invariably expel the Colonial working bees from the very hive in which they should be especially encouraged to labour. Do the French, or the Americans, both without colonies, or with comparatively few, fail to arm and to commission their ships of war to guaid their distant commerce ? One would imagine from such constant iterations, "Of what use aie the colonies," that England was the only power that expended a part of her revenues in defence of her own, or that her fleet was more costly to her than those of the foreigner, from the mere fact of her possessing colonies which her ships can assist, and where, in the hour of need, they can reiit. We shou-ld be glad to know, were England to lose her colonies, and to be cooped up within her own island limits, how long she would hold her rank amongst the powers of Europe ? The question is one she would do well to ponder seriously, for it is clear she is thieatened by a poweiful domestic party inclined to agitate an unwise economy, — a party which will not perceive that an increased and

an increasing sovereignty demands an equally increased expenditure. A dead set is made at our Navy and Army, the latter the smallest of any European state. Parsimony and economy is the password to popularity. That the colonies may be made infinitely more serviceable to the Nation is clear. We have but skirted the subject ; but, as one of the almstakxng provinces, we shall return to it shortly, and endeavour to prove that, if permitted the free exercise of our energies and capabilities, we might be contributois to, insteai of powetless quarterers upon, the public purse •, a thriving colony, instead of a few disjointed settlements, struggling for existence.

The barque " Inchinnan," Captain Pearse, arrived, on Sunday night, from Newcastle, with stock, after a tempestuous passage of thirteen days. She brings no mail. Of one hundred and seventy head of cattle shipped, but a hundred remain. Sixty tlnee horses out of seventy five have arrived. Fifty sheep of four hundred and fifty have perished, — whilst thirty -seven calves, the entire number shipped, have been brought down in safety. The whole will be submitted to the hammer by Mr. Hyam Joseph, to whom printed catalogues and pedigrees have been simultaneously transmitted.