OUR LETTER HOME.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 11842, 20 December 1901, Page 1 (Supplement)

OUR LETTER HOME.

Mr. George JJunnet, agent for the Oceanic Steamship Company, has ? 'received a cable message from Mr. J. D. Spreckels,! the president of the company, accepting the conditions of the San Francisco mail service as - agreed to by the New Zealand House ' of Representatives, provided that arrangements are not insisted upon . which may be found to conflict with I- the terms of his .contract with the : United States Government. Mr. Spreckels' message has been communicated to Sir Joseph Ward, the Postmaster-General, and it is not ■ anticipated that any difficulty will be experienced in arriving at an understanding in , regard to the contingency indicated by the president of the Oceanic Steamship Company. The colony is indebted to Mr. Spreckels for his final acceptance of the contract so grudgingly and arbitrarily resolved upon by Parliament. • - From the commencement of negotiations the Oceanic Company has shown a generous and conciliatory AS x spirit which compares to our colonial discredit with ' the unreasoning and unbusinesslike opposition of the . Southern faction. In waiving wellgrounded claims to more equitable treatment and in agreeing to every-

thing demanded of him excepting such minor conditions as antagonised his contracts with the American Government, Mr. Spreckels has shown a broad-minded determination • to avoid the rupture which inter-

ested parties sedulously endeavoured t(5 create. It is to be hoped that our

Parliament will not fall into the

Boer mistake of considering a conciliatory attitude to be necessary proof of fear. We have had a very

narrow escape of losing the unrivalled 'Frisco service at the very time when the heavy American subsidies and the prospects of tourist ■ . business combined to make it more '' 'effective than eves 1 . The rate of

v seven shillings and sixpence per j... 'pound, which the Oceanic Company has . agreed to accept, makes this service not merely the fastest and most reliable, but actually much the 4%, ' cheapest between the colony and "London. This being so we may reaV-?.- 1 ; sonably expect that the PostmasterGeneral will avoid discriminating against the 'Frisco route in the forwarding of mails and will also instruct reluctant officials to send thereby ail. letters which it will carry to London in time to overtake the slower anil more expensive Federal delivery. If this is done.

and it is only fair business dealing that it should be done, the contract '■ payments would easily reach the ; (V very low maximum of twenty thou|'v .sand pounds which was fixed. This !j act,of justice is within the power of 71 .tile Post Office Department, . would • . save the colony money, and would 'i]' help to remove the sense of unjust treatment which the 'Frisco comgg§r pany can' hardly help feeling. The colony made a false step in the

Sr: matter, but a. fresh Parliament will , reconsider the whole question, and in the meantime we should endeavour to remove all unworthy grounds for friction. For the 'Frisco service is. not only invaluable and inimitable as a mail roitte and of increasing importance as a commercial route, but must- be the one upon which our main tourist travel will speedily depend. It is not a little thing to such a colony as ours thatmagnificent modern liners are at last running to our islands in connection with the great trans-conti-

nental railway lines growing in ■ popularity with British travellers - ' and in still more direct connection {u'Y'.' with the . eighty million Englishspeaking people who form one of ' 'the greatest and richest and most observant nations of the world. New Zealand is sending an Eighth

Contingent of mounted troopers to V: ' South Africa, being the only Australasian colony so far to respond to the. call for more men. The newspapers in New Sou th Wales and Victoria are urging the sending of another Australian contingent, but Ministers have declined the responsibility. New Zealand's Eighth Contingent is y to consist of 1000 men. The conditions under which the contingent is to be despatched will be seen elsewhere. Applications are coming in from all parts of the colony, and there is no doubt that the number of men eager to go will far exceed the requirements, and that the Defence ? Department will be able to select a strong contingent of well-qualified men. The. Auckland quota is to be 140 men, and already 315 men and 24 officers have volunteered. The uneasiness which prevailed at the time the last mail left with regard to the wholesale dismissal of men from' the North Island Main Trunk railway and other public works has not altogether died down. -It is rather difficult to ascertain how many men have been dismissed, owing to the reticence of the Public Works officials, but the best information available shows that of about 600 employed on the northern end of the Main Trunk railway about a-half or more have been discharged. No satisfactory reason has been given for the dismissals, .which is being ;much discussed in Auckland on account of' the effect of the progress of the railway works and the establishment of railway communication between Auckland and Wellington. The Premier, the Minister for Public Works and the Minister fo,r Railways'have all spoken on the subject. They deny the suggestion that the Treasury is short of cash, and , indicate that work will be 'actively resumed in winter, but give no reason for the present curtailment of work. At present a considerable number of the men are unemployed, but an additional 200 will be wanted for the

Auckland Electric Tramway works ; whenever the Christmas and New Year holidays are over. - The first wool sale of- the season, under the'auspices of the Auckland , , Woolbrokers' Association, was held •at the salerooms, Albert-street, on December 3. The three auctioneering firms interested submitted cataV Ite'.:;it

logues embracing in all 4306 bales, and although a considerable .proportion was disposed of the prices realised were low, an-a the competition for the various lots by no; means I brisk. Though prepared to an extent by the results of sales in Southern centres for low prices,, the. farmers in many instances. did not apparently. anticipate that the, decline would be as marked as was the case when compared with last year's salds —prices were then decidedly low— and had consequently placed reserves on their clips above the valuation of buyers. Striking an average of the various classes of fleeces brought under the hammer, the decline was about lid per lb all round, halfbred wools being from -id to |d lower than last year, while the.better class crossbreds showed a : jailing away of Id to Ud, and medium and coarse crossbreds a drop of about 2d. Halfbred wools ranged from 4|d to 6d per lb, the finer crossbreds from 3|d to 4id, the medium and coarse crossbreds from 2yd >to 3|d, and Lincolns fi;om 2-J-d to 3d. The Inspector of New Zealand Fisheries (Mr. L. F. Ay son) has been engaged for over a week taking" evidence at Auckland and Thames with respect to the effect of trawling in the Hauraki Gulf. The line fishermen, amateur, and professional, in the Auckland district have raised the old question, which -has been fought over and over again before fisheries commissions in England and Scotland, whether • trawling diminishes the fish supply. Their petitions to Parliament led to Mr. Ayson being appointed «to take evidence on the question and report the result of his inquiries. The evidence taken has been rather conflicting, -and Mr. Ayson will have some difficulty, in arriving at a decision which will be fair, to all parties and ensure the continuance of our fish supply. There is one trawler employed regularly- in the gulf and line fishermen are almost unanimous in contending' that since it ' started operations some two or three years ago it has been very difficult to get fish in the gulf. They hold that the trawl kills the young »fishy, and is thus seriously threatening the f.sh supply and urge that the remedy is to prohibit trawling within the gulf. The owner of the trawler tells an altogether different story, and is to some extent supported by other witnesses. He holds, that there is no decrease in the fish supply and that as a matter of fact the effect of trawling is to increase the supply rather than diminish it inasmuch as the trawl shifts the spawn into deeper water where natural enemies are fewer. Mr. Aysoh's report on the subject-will be awaited with interest. ■ , i

A cabled announcement that arrangements have been made to form a powerful British company for the development of our enormous ironsand deposits recalls public attention to one of the most fascinating of .our colonial industrial adventures. . From beyond Hokianga in the North to StewartIsland in the South are strewn countless millions of tons of a magnetic ironsand long shown to be capable of producing the finest of steels. " In the immediate neighbourhood of, Auckland City, westward of Waiuku, these ironsands are miles in width, and the supply of the hitherto intractable material is as practically inexhaustible on a hundred west-coast beaches as it is at Taranaki. The iron is plentifully present, but under the old system of .working the semi-molten rands clogged the furnaces and refused to run. Steel could be obtained of a very superior quality, but at a cost which made an industry impossible. In May, 1898, however, the Esteve Steel Company, of London, obtained twenty tons, of Taranaki sand for experimental purposes. A year later they reported to our Agent-General that they were able to produce with ease a high-class crucible steel at a price considerably below that of ordinary crucible steel and offered to sell their process to our Government "subject to satisfactory proofs on the company's part." He further offered to guarantee .that they could obtain a given pig-iron, analytically superior to the best Swedish, in the blast "furnace. . Last year the Government offered a bonus of £l per ton on the first 20,000 tons of marketable .iron or steel produced by any company formed with a capital of not less than £200,000. There is, therefore, much more present inducement in the ironsand industry than there was when our pioneer smelters attacked the problem with inadequate appliances, insufficient knowledge and the prospect of a thousand pounds bonus. The ultimate value to New Zealand of the successful establishment of iron and steel works to deal with our wonderful ironsand deposits cannot possibly be estimated. During the five years ending March, 1900, we imported over 280,000 tons of iron and steel, of which nearly 85,000 tons was to Government orders. If we could produce even, half of this internally it would mean an industry not inferior in importance to our gold mining, with the added advantage that it is capable of indefinite expansion and of becoming the basis of the greatest mechanical development. "While it would be unwise to build upon success before it is actually achieved, it may be fairly claimed that. modern technical science appears to have reached a stage when success is quite possible. This being so it can only be a question of time before our ironsands are exploited and our career as an ironworking people begun. It is not a mere dream to anticipate that our West Coast will some day be studded with thriving manufacturing towns and that instead of seeking outside markets for our agricultural produce we shall be ourselves consuming the bulk of our own foodstuffs and shipping iron and steel in innumerable forms to less bounteously endowed countries. , .• •

Auckland is to have a new theatre, which • it is expected will be ready for. occupation in about 12 months' time. The site is in Queen-street,

where three-quarters of an acre of ground has been secured behind and alongside the Metropolitan Hotel. The venture is in the hands of a local syndicate, who intend erecting a building at a cost of £20,000, to contain a row of . shops' facing Queen-street, suites of offices, a commercial travellers' club, additions to the Metropolitan Hotel and a wide avenue or arcade running from Queen-street to the theatre at the back. The theatre is to be modelled on the Princess Theatre, Melbourne, and will have seating accommodation for 1700 people.