The Evening Mail. FRIDAY, AUGUST 10, 1877.

Oamaru Mail, Volume II, Issue 399, 10 August 1877, Page 2

The Evening Mail. FRIDAY, AUGUST 10, 1877.

A telegram from our Dnnedin special correspondent announced that the main trunk line of railway will be opened for traffic right through from North Canterbury to Invercargill in less than eleven months from now. This will be good news for those who live contiguous to the railway line between Moeraki and Dnnedin, inasmuch as it will give them the choice of two markets within a comparatively easy distance, and afford them, we presume, cheap carriage of their produce wheresoever they desire to send it. Except that the completion of the unfinished links iu the iron band will tend to knit the Colony together commercially, assist to engender a Colonial spirit, and confer some direct benefit upon the settlers living in the vicinicy of the line, we see no particular reason for becoming overjoyed at the announcement of Mr. Okmond that the Government would pledge themselves to have the lines cornpitted by the end of June next. That the railway will not be productive of anything like the good results anticipated when our railway system was commenced, there can be no doubt. The line is so constructed that it skirts the coast, and is of no benefit to those who live in the

interior, except in a very wide sense. The line from Oamaru to ISTaseby would be a very different thing. It would break the bonds of isolation to which our interior settlers are so subjected—an isolation, so thoroughly perfect, t!;at it stultifies their efforts whilst it it produces an indirect loss to the whole Colony. This is the line that would open up the cream of the agricultural lands of the Middle Island, and transform the magnificent grain-lands of the Interior into oup vast territory of waving corn. If we understand the telegraphic parliamentary neu-s aright, the railway skirmishing is commensing in earnest, and the sooner parties throw off their disguises, make themselves known to each other, and have the question of branch railways settled upon some equitable basis, the better. The proposal of the Government to insist that the proprietors of lands through which the said branch lines passed should guarantee working expenses, is no solution of the difficulty. The princ-'ple is wrong that would exempt the land-holders on the StrathTaieri route from, this stipulation simply because there might be rather more Government land on that route than on the other. The s:x per cent, guarantee should have closed the mouths of all objectors, but it was not to be supposed that opposition would be stifled whilst such a subterfuge as that used in the case of the Strath-Taieri route was within reach. Various and funny have been the objections to our line. The breakwater has stood the test of severe criticism, which threatened its doom far more than wind or wave, and the snow has melted, even in midwinter from the Maerewhenua Pass. But the vivid imaginations of the few politicians that shattered our Breakwater and placed perpetual and impassable snow on the Pass are quite capable of calling into existence other objections to our line, which will, of course, hold good until they meet with the fate of their predecessors. We do not object to legitimate comment, but we abhor the want of principle in Colonial politicians that would lead them to sacrifice anything so that they might gain their object. The idea, which appears to have emanated from Mr. Macandkew, regarding a line from Maerewhenua towards the Mackenzie Country is by no means a bad one ; but it is not really in opposition to the proposed line from Oamaru to Naseby. A glance at the map will show that, whilst one penetrates directly west, the other would travel in a north-westerly direction. The l<;st feature about this proposal is that it would open up the Hekataramea Country, than which none could be found better adapted for agriculture in the Colony. But the idea of pitting a line towards the Mackenzie Country against that proposed from Oamaru to Naseby is non sensical. A great proportion of the land that would be opened up by the

former is necessarily pastoral, and can

scarcely be used for any other purpose, whilst the latter would enable the utilisation for grain growing of land such as is seldom seen even in this Colony. What if it is in the hands of private individuals, if they are willing to guarantee six per cent, on the cost of construction ? The object of the Government should be to locate people on land where sheep now hold full sway, and the construction of the Oamaru-Naseby line would enable this to be done. The fact is, to pit these two routes against each other is just as absurd as it is possible for anything to be. One would be quite foreign to the other, and would serve an entirely different object. It must not be supposed that we object to the construction of the line towards the Mackenzie Country. For colonial reasons—if for no other —the more thoroughly the country is opened up the better. But we must oppose the idea of pretending to serve the settlors on the route between Oamaru and Naseby by the making of such a line. As we stated at the commencement of the present railway agitation, we believe that a loop line from Invercargill to Timaru, diving into the heart

of the Otago Provincial district, will before long be constructed ; but in the meantime we must be satisfied with those lines that will pay working expenses, such as the Oamaru-Naseby, and the proposed Hekataramea. We shall be glad to see both meeting with favour; but we must have the line to Naseby at all costs.