THE RELIEF OF MANGAWEKA.

New Zealand Mail, 25 June 1902, Page 42

THE RELIEF OF MANGAWEKA.

Manga veka has been relieved. To the settlers of Mangaweka and district that brief announcement must mean almost as much as similar news to a beleaguered and famine-stricken town in case of war. This idea may seem hyperbolical to the uninitiated, but it is hardly an exaggeration. People iip the cities growl about high prices and lack of transit facilities, but they are, indeed, well off in comparison with the back-blocks settler, who has to pay £2 Ws to 10s per ton for the cartage of his supplies from the nearest raTlvvay station to the nearest township. How much better off they are than the settler who has to carry his goods on pack-horses from the township of his holding along a bush track knee-deep in ' mud and slush I Let city dwellers remember that there • are hundreds of pioneers in districts like those of Mangaweka and Taihape, whose wives and families are often shqt up amidst their miserable surroundings for'' five months of the year without a sight of as much civilisation as there is in the vicinity. They can then imagine how much the friendly whistle of a railway engine resembles to these people, the music of the guns of a relieving army ivr vr beleaguered garrison. Mr Fisher, M.H.R., in the course of a speech at Mangaweka on the 17th, paid an eloquent and graceful tribute to the indomitable pluck and tho daring intrepidity of those who had carved their way into these forest fastnesses to build homes and to promote settlement. It is to be hoped that.this may be only the first of many notes of praise and sympathy sounded by a city representative on behalf of “this noble band of workers who are carrying on the true work of colonisation.” But, as Mr Hogg indicated, rather than expressed, in the course of his subsequent address, the-settlers want more than words of praise and sympathy to cheer them along their arduous way. They are frequently in need of a helping hand from the representatives of the people. Being far spread and inarticulate themselves, they yearn to have their wants voiced and their sentiments expressed. They know that.public money is often frittered away in frivolities in the towns which they have helped to contribute to the State, and which might more profitably have been expended upon roads and bridges; hut though, occasionally, individuals amongst them contrive to make their voices heard above the din of huzzas and the popping of champagne corks, their champions are few and far between, and it is only on occasions such as above referred to that there are. indications of that rapprochement which ought to characterise the relations of tli© town and country 1 ) whoso true interests, after all, are one and indivisible. Such events as the opening of the Makohine viaduct- and tho extension of the railway to Mangawoka aro of colonial importance, and of great puhlio moment, and those who were privileged to take part in them may reasonably feel a thrill of pride in the retrospect.