SIR GEORGE GREY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXV, Issue 9015, 30 March 1888, Page 6

SIR GEORGE GREY.

The Otago Daily Times lias a leading article on the present position of Sir George Grey, from which we make the following extracts :—

It is riot at all surprising that the people of Auckland should be concerned at the prospect of the departure of Sir George Grey from amongst them, We do not there is any truth in the rumour that Sir George Grey intends to pass the remainder of his active, and honourable career in England, but the recent sale of the beautiful island he has for so lonjr made his home, the bestowal to the people of Auckland of all the books and art treasures amidst which he has delighted to dwell, and the knowledge of the natural desire, common to almost everyone, to pass his declining years in the land of his birth ana among the friends of his youth, are all circumstances calculated to lend likelihood to the idea. To the •whole people of New Zealand Sir George Grey is a familiar figure, but to the people of Auckland he is something more. In earlier and more turbulent days, as the Queen's representative, they were wont to look to him in the hour of danger ; later he was the elected superintendent of their province and the representative of their city in Parliament ; during recent years he has in a sense acted to them the part of guide, philosopher, and friend. Whatever judgment may be passed upon his career as Governor ; whatever opinions may be held of the part he has played as politician, all will admit that as a citizen he has been a striking figure, untiring in his zeal for what, however erroneously, he conceived to be the public welfare, lofty in his aims and helpful to his fellow-roan. To the people of Auckland he is at once the familiar friend and the distinguished colonist, and his departure would be to them a double loss. It is therefore no wonder that they should now be busy with schemes which, in their view, aim at doing him honour, and at the same time preventing him from entirely severing his connection with the colony. For the position of Agent-General Sir George Grey, with all his gifts, is singularly unfit. The essential quality of an Agent-General is a thorough business knowledge, and a knowledge of business is precisely what Sir George Grey has not. The routine of office work would be thoroughly distasteful to him, even if he were disposed to settle down to it; and for the mastering of details he has shown either a very great incapacity or an aversion which is but the equivalent of it. Sir George Grey has been a graceful and delightful public speaker. There are some subjects in dealing with which he has no equal here, and upon which there are "but few we suspect who could excel him in England. But these are subjects in which generalities only can be dealt with—inaugural addresses, statements of constitutional principles, and others of a kindred nature. If to the English people New Zealand were still a. terra incognita, and all that was wanted was that attention should be directed to the colony, a better than Sir George Grey for the work could scarcely be found. The misfortune is, however, that New Zealand is in some respects too well-known— getting, indeed, an unenviable notoriety. Glowing oratorical accounts of a country staggering under an increasing debt, and heavily laden with taxation, would be absurdly out of place. It is an important function of an AgentGeneral to correct evil impressions when they arise. But it is within the domain of finance and business that such impressions do arise, and with matters of this kind Sir George Grey seldom or never troubles himself. . _ The proposal to petition the English Government to appoint Sir George Grey Governor of New Zealand is scarcely one to bo treated seriously. Colonists have a right to approach the Crown on such a subject, and their views would doubtless be treated with respectful consideration. Sir George Grey's intellectual fitness for the high office of Governor has of course been demonstrated by his past career. Without desiring to enter any ground of controversy as to the justice or otherwise of his recall—for it amounted to that—in 1£67, there can be no doubt that his qualifications are of a high order. Nevertheless, such an appointment is quite out of the questionis indeed only one degree removed from the ridiculous. In the first place, Sir George Grey's career as a local politician wholly unfits him for the Governorship of this colony—that is, of course, according to the ruling and generally accepted ideas regulating such appointments. Antecedents calculated to give a sort of guarantee of rigid impartiality form a necessary ingredient in the qualifications of a Governor. Apart from that, however, there are temperamental defects in the character of Sir George Grey, always conBpicuous, and of late years much intensified, which would be ample warrant for a sharp refusal to again take him from private lite into the service of the Crown. During both his terms of Governorship here he was in perpetual hot water. He quarrelled with everybody, and would impose his will upon everybody. He quarrelled with the military commandeis, with his own Ministers, with successive Secretaries of State, and with succeeding Governors. On various occasions he has indeed run-a-muck at the .Constitution.