The Evening Mail. WEDNESDAY, JUNE 27, 1877

Oamaru Mail, Volume I, Issue 367, 27 June 1877, Page 2

The Evening Mail. WEDNESDAY, JUNE 27, 1877

The Rip-van-Winkles of the City of Du::odin have at length been stirred into life by the action of the Oamaruites. The Chamber of Commerce of the metropohs has met, and some of its members have indulged in recrimination and invective over the discussion of their uncompleted railways, and had it not been for the superior sense of a few of those present at the conference, there would have been a linguistic warfare. As it was, charges of negligence to keep the matter at issue prominently forward were rife. Compliments of this nature were freely reciprocated, and partook very much of the character of the depredating schoolboy's defence :—" Please sir, it wasn't me, sir; it was the boy round the corner.'' We hope that those gentlemen of strong Centralistic proclivities will now see that there is nothing to be gained and everything to be lost by clinging to a corrupt Government, and neglecting to second—nay, opposing—the struggles of their representatives for justice. They must have felt exceedingly small the other evening to find themselves mingling with the advocates of local self-government in making common cause against the Government—their friends. It was certainly an awkward and undignified position ; but they acted very properly. They have been leaning upon a rotten stick, and have found themselves floundering in the mud. We hope that the lesson will be profitable to these " thick and thin " adherents of the Government, and that they will now see that their friendship and confidence have been misplaced. At this conference the question of the interior railway was, to some extent, discussed. As might have been anticipated, nearly every speaker went into ecstasies over the advantages that the Strath-Taieri route would possess over any other : the country that would be opened up, and the comparatively small cost of the line by that route. The "wish was father to the thought." We venture to assert that only a few of these gentlemen have ever been through the country that the proposed routes would open up ; and if they had, their opinions would be worth just as much aa they are now. Tbeir ideas of distance are exceedingly foggy, and

indeed, the only conclusion we can arrive at from reading their speeches is that the line must go to Dunedin from the interior direct, and that it would never do to allow it to touch at Oamaru at any price. We say now what we have asserted from the commencement, and the opinion was expressed by some of the more sensible at the conference the other evening—that the question of route should be lpft with the engineer, who we trust will be in a position to act disinterestedly in the matter without bringing down upon his head the thunders of our metropolitan merchants' displeasure. Despite the extraordinary display of forcible argument, we think that Parliament will take a common sense view of the question, and that Oamaru is not likely to be deprived of connection by an iron band with the interior, to gratify the sordid appetites of the Dunedin merchants, who, of course, only look to their own interests in the matter. It is premature for the people of Dunedin to begin already to enlarge upon the advantages of their port. Numerous mud banks have yet to be transformed into a thing of that name, and if the super-excellence of their accommodation for shipping is the only argument they can use to entitle them to direct connection with the interior, we fear that blighted hopes will elongate many a visage.