The New Zealand Herald. AUCKLAND, TUESDAY, AUGUST 22, 1865.

New Zealand Herald, Volume II, Issue 554, 22 August 1865, Page 4

The New Zealand Herald.

AUCKLAND, TUESDAY, AUGUST 22, 1865.

SPECTEMUR AGENDO. " Give ererv man thine e-ir, but few thy voice : Take each man's censnre, bat reserve thy judgment. This? above all, —To thine ownself be true; And it follow, as the nii*ht tin; 'lay, Thou canst not then be false to any man."

Tiie Tar'irua arrived in harbour yesterday morning, about half-past eight o'clock, with the English mail, after a quick run from Sydney of five days and a half. Her European news is to the 14th July. The English news is rather meagre. The parliament was to be dissolved, aud a new one elected in July : and the Atlantic telegraph to unite England and Canada was expected to be laid, and in working order by the early part of August. The chai'ge for messages to be per word. It is reported that all the troops iu Kew Zealand are ordered home as early as possible. The future policy of New Zealand is to be one of self-defence. This latter about the future policy of New Zealand may be all very well in its way, but let us first be defended by the British Government from the mad fanatics whom British Governors have managed to raise up in this Island, and who are now at deadly war with Her Majesty's subjects, botli Native aud European, and witli Her Majesty's representative, the Governor of this Colony. British policy lias raised these spirits from the vasty deep, it is simple common justice that the British Government should put them down and conquer peace for us, and not leave a part of the British empire in the disorganised state this colonv now is at the present time, and likely to be for some time to come. Tlie British Government aud people require to be told some plain truths in a plain manner about their colonial possessions, and we are glad to see that Mr. Gavau Dull')', lately arrived in England from Australia, has eloquently defended thatfifth quarter of the globe from aspersions cast upon it by the ignorant, the envious, and the malicious at home. Every person returning to the mother country from any of the colouie3 should fearlessly enter into the the same way, aud defend the distant portions of the empire in which they may have been living from the aspersions them by ignorant, prejudiced, and designing men.

It appears that, the conference respecting tlie project of uniting the various dependencies of Great Britain in North America into a Confederacy has resulted in the British Government warmly coinciding with the idea She is doubtless pursuing a course under the leadership of the prophets of peace and cheapness, which will end in curtailing the extent of her empire and will sensibly lower her power and prestige. The secret and powerful motive of the ready adoption of the C ont'ederary scheme of 'he North American Provinces, and of tie acceptance of the AVeld proposals of Colonial self - defence in JNew Zealand is one and the same, a desire to avoid the cost of protecting her foreign property. The principles from which this feeling tlows are neither verv dignified tkt very patriotic. I'hev are simply very 6bort sighted and very seliish. The gr<?at struggle between the Northern and Southern Stales of America is over » far as the field of battle is concerned, bu

the li:ts only arrived at the beginning of the end. llio negroes are giving a "real deal *-'1 trouble : great distress exists among them; they are making demands tor full freedom : there is no disposition to yield to these tlema ds, and they are made to feci, through brutal ill-treatment in the Northern cities, that the Yankees do not yet look upon them as " men and brothers." The secret trial of JetVerson Davis, and the talk of bringing Confederate civil and mihta , *y ollieers to trial, is causing great excitement and ditlerenee of opinion in the North. It is strongly pointed out that there can be no possible reason why Davis should not have an open trial in the proper courts of the country. The course-pursued seems to prove the truth often asserted by historians, that the despotism and tyranny of democracy. are ott-timcs worse than those of a monarchy or an aristocratic oligarchy. There is also the plea put forward that Davis should not be put to death, because a large proportion of the people (both North and South) believed that individual states had the power to secede from the rest if they thought {'it to do so. On this ground alone, it is urged, the extreme penalty of the law ought not to be enforced upon the Confederate leaders. And another view may bo put forward. The sacriticing of the lives of these men will be a deep stain on the Xorth. Their spilled blood will disfigure and disgrace the national escutcheon, while the merciful and magnanimous use of the power of the Xorth will in future ages be looked upon with pride and satisfaction. Judicial murders are always hateful. In modern tunes they are doubly hateful, but in a modern republic they are a thousand fold more so. The execution of Nov, "the bravest ot the brave " of Napoleon's grand armv. all hough he proved a traitor to the Bourbons, and. ordinarily speaking, had earned the traitor's death, was. nevertheless, felt to be a grand mistake by both the majority of the French and every other civilised nation. 1* is to be hoped then that mercv. nor vengeance—magnanimity, and not nar-row-minded bigotry—will yet prevail in the North, and that the day of victory will not be disgraced by judicial murders in the sacrifice of the lives of most brave, even if mistaken, men.