THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 15, 1908. PACIFIC MAILS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLV, Issue 13647, 15 January 1908, Page 6

THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 15, 1908. PACIFIC MAILS.

The cessation of direct communication with San Francisco is now followed by the threatened cessation of the service between Brisbane and Vancouver, with which our New Zealand mails somewhat irregularly connect at Fiji. The situation is one which should receive the very close attention of our Government, for it is much against the interest of New Zealand to be thus cut off from a great continent containing nearly ninety millions of Englishspeaking people, and to be thus deprived of the speediest mail route to the Mother Country. While the Union Steam Ship Company is not disposed to continue the BrisbaneVancouver service at the present subsidy—which neither the Commonwealth nor Canada are inclined to increase— may be prepared to maintain the service from Sydney to Vancouver, via Auckland, for a subsidy which our New Zealand Government is able to. provide, For not only would the divergence of the service, from via Brisbane to via Auckland, place this Dominion on the main line, and thus justify our Government in more energetically supporting it, but the increased business, to be obtained by the change would strengthen any financial inducement offered. The Union Company has the vessels required to carry on a Pacific service, even though they are not as large or as fast as will be needed if the AllRed" scheme, now being discussed, comes to full fruition. For the meantime they are sufficiently good and could be replaced later, by arrangement, when a faster and better service was stipulated and paid for. The Union Company, moreover, is known to be commendably ambitious to hold its own in the development of Pacific trade ; and the New Zealand Government would certainly find it responsive were negotiations opened up with it for the purpose of restoring direct communication with the North American continent. This Dominion and the Union Company have common interests at this juncture.and it would be advisable if Sir Joseph Ward took advantage of an opportunity which may not readily recur.

As for New Zealand, it should, not be necessary to advance arguments, in the Twentieth Century, on behalf of the importance of keeping in direct touch, by modern liners, with the outer world. Forty years ago, it was perceived that the true mail route between' Old England and New, Zealand led across the Atlantic, the America Continent and the Pacific. The foresight of our pioneers opened that route to our mails and travellers, and although it has several times been closed owing to the fact .that no other country was so deeply <■ interested in the route as ourselves, we have always managed to reopen it. At the present time, we have only an unsatisfactory connecting service, via Fiji, and even this is threatened. We hope to obtain the co-operation of the United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia in establishing upon permanent and modern lines a great Appian Way, between Britain, Canada and Australasia, which would..finally solve" this : great problem of communication; but while this is under discussion we , should :do the best Ave can with the j means at handand the best that we can do is certainly to arrange that the Sydney-Vancouver boats should touch New Zealand instead of Queensland. We shall have to : pay for this, of course, but the mail routes are the highways of the world, and the advantages of being seated on the highways and not on a side-street are unmistakable. The traveller and the trader profit and i enrich the countries to which they I have easy access; even population •is increased by the greater | spread of information concern- ! ing ; . easily accessible regions ; and the swift and certain carrying of mails is a matter of the most vital importance to any civilised community. To Australia the Suez route is a practicable alternative ; but to New Zealand the. Pacific route stands magnificently' alone. Not to mention that there'is I something wrong when either Ausl tralia or New Zealand are without i direct steamers to English-speaking States upon the same ocean,, whose national and racial problems are identical with ours, and with whom we should have the friendliest and the most intimate relations.

In connection with this local question of a Pacific mail service, in its varied phases of mail carrying, trade and travel route and national maritime development, it is instructive to read how a far-sighted statesman like Mr. Roosevelt views a similar problem from the American standpoint. In his latest Presidential Message to Congress he called'" special attention to the unsatisfactory condition of our foreign mail service" and stated that "the time has come, in my judgment, to set to work to make our ocean mail service correspond more closely with our recent commercial and political development." He lays it down as maxims: That it is the duty of a first-class Power so far as practicable to carry its ocean mails under its own' flag; that the fast ocean mailships and their crews, required for such mail service, are valuable auxiliaries to the sea-power of a nation." After going on to show that the United States can well afford to improve her ocean mail service, he points out that the failure of Congress to approve the increase of subsidy to mail liners resulted in the loss of their only line to Australasia. The American Government now subsidises SO-knot mail liners " built according to naval plans, available as cruisers and manned by Americans," at the rate of lour dollars a statute mile outward ; 16-kuots or over are paid two dollars per mile. Mr. Roosevelt says that 16-knot steamers are needed to meet -the requirements of the Aug-

tralasian and other trades and asks Congress to authorise the Post-master-General to double the subsidy payable to them, making it four dollars per statute mile. We may hope that the Washington Congress will take such steps as may restore the 'Frisco connection, long so valuable to New Zealand for we cannot, have too many good roads, either on land or on sea. But the time is apparently ripe for us to take steps which will secure us a Pacific mail independently of the spasmodic determinations of the American Congress ; and one which will merge instantly into the great Imperial route considered possible by our leading British statesmen. We repeat the hope that Sir Joseph Ward may be able to arrange terms with the Union Steam Ship Company for so diverting the Vancouver service that New Zealand will be on its main route ; and we do not doubt that if such an arrangement can be arrived at it will be cordially supported by the people and Parliament of the Dominion.