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New Zealand Herald, Volume XIV, Issue 5018, 15 December 1877, Page 2

Evanescext as is the breatli of popular applause, rarely have we seen it more settled in appearance, like a steadfast trade-wind, than is the current of favour which at present fills the sails of Sir George Grey's Ministry. The greeting and support afforded to the Premier and the Native Minister, Mr. Sheelian, at Napier, yesterday, is a marked sign of the times. In the centre of a district where the late Ministry was credited with having its foremost foothold, and its greatest influence, the public at large, represented by an immense and enthusiastic crowd, with one v.. ice pledge themselves to support and • assist Ministers to the utmost of their power. The speech of Sir George Grey embodies three popular principles : those of manhood suffrage, which .almost iu effect, if not in name, New Zealand possesses already ; a re-constitution of the electoral districts, with a consequent re-distribution of members, and a direct taxation, so that wealth may properly bear its due share of the burdens of the Colony. A fourth principle, and a most righteous one too long withheld from operation—that of the generalisation of the Land Fund—Sir George Grey has already succeeded in effecting. At least the work is four-tifths done, and the securing for general use the remaining 20 per cent, the coming year will witness as an accomplished fact. To these, and especially to the two latter points—the Land Fund and the direct taxation of wealth which at prescn t escapes its fair liabilities —we have for years given an unswerving advo-. cacy ; even when striving to aid in the fulfilment seemed like hoping against hope. Now, one has been mainly secured, the Ministry and the Parliament are pledged to this other ; and though it will be unpopular among many, even amongst some of i's advocates when they feel its earlier pinches, justice to the Colony, to say nothing of the Colony's creditors, makes it inevitable, and iho Grey Ministry will, wo do not doubt, make it law.