The Oamaru Mail. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE NEW ZEALAND AGRICULTURIST. MONDAY, JANUARY 26, 1880.

Oamaru Mail, Volume IV, Issue 1178, 26 January 1880, Page 2

The Oamaru Mail. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE NEW ZEALAND AGRICULTURIST. MONDAY, JANUARY 26, 1880.

It is matter for congratulation that the dispute that arose out of the preparations for settling the Waimate Plains 13 on the eve of settlement. Under the unwaveringly determined attitude of the Government, the defiance by the natives of all constituted authority has disappeared, and a few more months at most will, provided the Commission appointed to investigate the native claims out of which the trouble arose act with the wisdom and disinterestedness which the circumstances demand, see the back broken of this phase of the native difficulty. The late Government was severely censured for contemplating the concentration of the Armed Constabulary in the disaffected districts of the West Coast. Humora of their intention to do so existed before they had fully made up their minds as to the wisest course to adopt, so anxious were their detractors to advance another instance of the unwisdom of the men who held the places that they coveted. But, once having attained to power, they do not scruple to announce in a most unmistakeable manner that they were guilty of something worse than misrepresentation, or that they are following in this, as in almost everything else, in the mistaken tracks of the framers of an unsound and most disastrous policy. No fewer than 800 armed constabulary have been stationed in the We3t Coast since the Hall Government acceded to power, and 1000 Volunteers are in the background as reinforcements should they be required. No more considerate and Christian-like attitude could have been been devised, and the Hall Government did well to adopt this item as well as many other items of a policy that emanated from that corpus vile, the Grey Government. A continuation of the policy that the mainspring of the present Government -used to approve of, would have maintained Te Whiti's power, and raised up another ''prophet" after him. The vigorous and yet considerate treatment that is being meted out to the natives will beget their increased respect for constituted authority, and will prove to them that there is a greater power in the land than 'J e Whiti. Politicians and the press of the Colony should unite to bring about this result.