New Zealand Times. (PUBLISHED DAILY.) TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 28.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXI, Issue 4894, 28 November 1876, Page 2

New Zealand Times. (PUBLISHED DAILY.) TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 28.

We have before us the text nearly complete of Sir George Grey’s recent deliverance to an audience, attracted by the reputation of the orator to the theatre at Grahamstown. He appears to have used a few days of retirement at Kawau in preparation• for this great effort, and we' are bound to admit that of the kind the speech is a masterpiece;, but it is of, very bad kind, utterly disingenuous and untruthful, set off with claptrap sentiment, and inculcating doctrines, the only practical result of which is the development of that class hatred, the seeds of which imported from the firm of Messrs. Bradbaugh and Company, his old associates in England, he has been assiduously sowing in stony places, and with the ordained result, since-his appearance as a public agitator ih New Zealand. No man of ordinary intelligence,. with; the least knowledge of the world, who' knows the early history of affairs in this colony, and who has ever had opportunity of observing the public conduct of Sir George Grey, can believe that he is now, doing anything but playing a part in which he tears passion to tatters to split the ears of the groundlings.- No one can. believe that he—an autocrat of the auto-: crats —the most tyrannical and self-willed of rulers as he has proved himself in tho :

past,—has any other purpose now than by means of the mob to regain that individual ascendancy in this colony which ho formerly derived from the Royal Commission, and which he abused for the purpose of maintaining personal government, and of depriving, as he did for so many years deprive, the people of all voice or control in the government or in the management of their own public affairs. In conducting the political party in the House of Representatives, of which he is the leader, lie has exhibited the same autooractic temper, and the same determination to have his own way, and to be guided only by his own will, which have marked his whole public life, and it_is this egoism which admits of no equality and will listen to no advice, which alienated from him the support of those who had enrolled themselves as his followers, which made them ashamed of their chief, and which left him at the close of the last session with smart Mr. Rees and young Mr. Tore as the only adherents in the House, upon whose vote and support he could always rely. There is nothing startling in this discourse, but, for the reason that we have given, that Sir George Grey has taken time to plot it afresh, the, arrangement of topics is bettor and the appeals ad captandum are more artistic than in his speech in the Auckland Theatre. The so-called representative of the Thames unbosomed himself to the minority of electors, whom he calls his constituents, with the most touching reliance upon their sympathy and gullibility, and defines their mutual relations as “■‘chief” and followers, “ whom I have to convince by reasoning that I am doing that which is right.” It is, however, a very remarkable fact that, in so much of the speech as is reported in the Southern Cross of the 20fch November, there is no word of the promised resistance to the Abolition Act, of promises which have made a prospective herb of the great Pro Consul; he no longer proposes to die in defence of Provincialism, or to spend his last shilling in establishing the fact before the legal tribunals that the passing of the Abolition . Act was ultra vires of the General Assembly of New Zealand. Not a word of all this, no doubt because the Assembly refused to find the money to enable him to pay the costs of that great suit; but we have instead beside the oratorical platitudes about the wrongs which large landholders inflict upon the human race, and the duty of every man to make the world better than he found it—nothing, except a moat untruthful account of what he attempted to do, and what he did, in his capacity as representative of the Thames, for the advancement of the interests of his district.

If Sir, George Grey had not promised to get a railway made from the Thames to Waikato, he would not have been returned as a member for that district ; and undoubtedly the steps taken by him to fulfil an . impossible engagement were as highly finished examples of the way “how not to do it” as could be imagined. It is enough to say that tljey were quite in keeping with the account of them given in the speech now before us. He was obliged to confess that he had deluded his admirers, and he relieved the unpleasantness of the situation by abusing the Government, and the capitalists, who as usual are always in his road.

Sir George took credit to himself, great credit, for having forced the Government to make provision for education, for gaols, and for the Lunatic Asylum at Auckland. This is what he is reported to have said:— The next point to which I gave particular attention was education ; and I think that so far all necessary provision has been made for this district. I must say, that the moment I pointed out to the Government that what they proposed to do was entirely inadequate, 1 allowed them first to. pass their'estimates, thought that was the best plan: I saw that ample provisioh had been made for all parts of the colony except this Northern part. I therefore aided in passing the Estimates in that form so as to secure for the other parts of New Zealand that liberal provision which the Government proposed to make, and then drew the atten tion of the Assembly to the fact that in this portion of New Zealand similar provision had not been made. The moment it was pointed out there was a universal feeling that justice must be done and they did exactly what X asked them to do. Therefore, if it is an unfair arrangement, I am responsible for that. But acting as your representative I took care that that was done. Then also 1 found that in the case of the gaols no proper provision was made for the classification of prisoners ; even the diet of the prisoners was not what it ought to be. The salaries of the officials also were too low to get the fitting men. There was the same inequality of expenditure between the North and the other provinces in this matter, as in the matter of education. This 1 also brought before the General Assembly, and they made as ample provision for the purpose of gaols as the funds of the colony would allow them to do. Again, I found that the Lunatic Asylums were In a deplorable condition compared with those In the South. I visited them, and satisfied myself pf the fact that they had need of that frequent change of diet which their mental state required for the purpose of restoring their health, that their clothing was defective, their exercise yards in so bad a state that in winter and in bad weather they could get no exercise at all. There was a shocking contrast between the North and the rest of New Zealand, I followed the same plan in this as in education, and I think you may be satisfied that you, through your representative, have conferred a great benefit in all these respects upon your fellow-men. Now the facts are—that from the time of the visit of the Civil Servants up to almost the last hour of the session the Government found it impossible to get information from the Superintendent of the province of Auckland as to the wants or the' financial condition of his district. Estimates had from time to time been furnished of the most meagre character, and if Sir George Grey, having withheld the required information, was quietly watching, as he describes himself, for the result of his own machinations against the interest of his own province, we can only say that the confession which he has made is in the last degree discreditable to him as a public servant. The other unsuccessful exploit for which he takes credit is his attempt to reduce or abolish the gold duty, and thus deprive the Thames of the only source of revenue to which the local governing body can look in : the future for the means of carrying out public works in the new county. This scheme is not his own, however, but is of a piece with that proposed by him in the session of 1876 for the reduction of duties on certain articles of common consumption. In the debate on-that occasion there was delivered by the honorable member for Wairarapa a speech so happy, so epigrammatically descriptive of the position of the great Pro-Consul himself, and of his fiscal proposals then in : discussion, that, in order to give it a wider circulation, we reprint it from Hansard. Mr. Andrew said : Sir, at tba risk of appearing pedantic, I will venture on a quotation from Hallam. That historian, speaking of one of the greatest of English writers, says that “ he mingled among the controversies of his time like a knight of romance among caitiff brawlers, with arms of a finer temper and worthy to be proved in a nobler field.” I confess. Sir, that on first hearing that the hon. member for Auckland City West was about to’ appear upon the arena of this house, ray anticipations were that a similar character would be exhibited among ourselves. It may be through want of taste and judgment, or from a perverted mind on my part, but I cannot conceal the fact that these anticipations have been most greviously disappointed. Sir, It seems to me that we have indeed among us a knight-errant in colonial politics, but a knight-errant with arms of inferior temper, and with little about him that is Quixotic beyond the anomalies and vagaries of his action. I will venture on another illustration. There was, a time when the early settlement of New Zealand trembled in ' the threatening presence of the natives. At that period the hon. member for Auckland City West, the then Governor, deserved well of his country by a deed of wholesome daring. Ho seized Te Rauparaha, and the natives were cowed. There was a later occasion when a British General, in command of forces as numerous and as good as those immortalized by , Xenophon, shrank from the assault , of a Maori stronghold. Sir, that hon. member, at the head of such men and resources as the colony could muster, undertook and accomplished the capture. There is a parallel to this in Roman history. Time

was that a civilisation more important than that of New Zealand, the civilisation of the world, trembled in the balance as the head and shoulders of the Gaul were topping the parapet of the Capitol. The barbarian was dashed down by Manlius, and Rome was saved. -On other occasions. In the field, the same Manlius deserved well of his country; but what was his after history? He became a courier of the populace, a panderer to the mob, an ambitious candidate , for vulgar; applause; ho forsook the principles oi his youth and of his order, principles that were making and did make Rome the first of nations; and was at last declared a traitor. Once indeed the scene and memory of his exploits saved him; but the end came, and he was, cast headlong from.the Capitol which he had saved. Sir, we live in different times: there is little fear that the hon. member for Auckland City West will expose himself, to physical punishment and disgrace; but there is a greater fall than any mechanical one—there is the fall from former glory and from a nobler self. It is with pain I confess that it appears to mo that the hon, member for Auckland City West is on the verge of such a fall—nay, that it has actually commenced. Sir, I shall vote against this Bill. It seems to me simply an appeal to the uninformed and unthinking, a bid for popularity, uncalled for, which is not in fairness necessary, and which, in the state of the finances of the country, cannot he carried out.

“ A courtier of the populace, a panderer to the mob, an ambitious candidate for vulgar applause!” Is this the Auckland idol? ; ,