A WARNING.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 10306, 13 March 1895, Page 7

A WARNING.

TO THE EDITOR

Sik, —As the following extract from a letter of the St. John's (N.F.) correspondent of the London Times is so applicable to this colony, your insertion of. it will oblige.—l am, &c,

Dunedin, March 11.

LINDUM.

The fact is—and every intelligent resident knows it—that Newfoundland has been living beyond her means for years. For the past 10 years there has been an annual deficit, met by raising loans and adding to the public debt. At the same time we have been constructing a railway through the island W0 miles in length, so that for a colony of 200,000 we have now to face the tremendous burden of 14,000,000d01., or 70dol. per head, the interest on which alone will be over 40[),000dol. annually. The civil service, too, has been shamefully extravagant. We have twice as many officials as wo require, and they are paid twice as much as they are worth, and the necessities of the several political parties have compelled them to squander vast sums annually to secure votes. While everything went well, and the political and commercial machinery ran without jar or hindrance, the peopla wore satisfied—they lived in a fool's paradise ; but now that both machines are

" smashed " to pieces, the scales have failed from their eyes, they realise their true condition, the contemplation of it frightana them, and they turn to mother Epglaad to Bave them from themselves.