Our Wellington Letter.

Opunake Times, Volume VIII, Issue 372, 5 April 1898, Page 2

Our Wellington Letter.

Wellington, March 80. SOMETHING IN THE WIND.

In that great hive known as the Departmental Buildings there was considerable buzzing to-day. Both bees and drones wagged their heads, and in reply to enquiries as to the cause, became mysterious, and would tell nothing more than that in a few days the public would be told all about it. The only items of interest which leaked out was that the Hon. HallJones was to visit Australia at once. The news gave rise to surmises among the newsvendors. Some argued that secret cables relative to the Eastern question had been sent by the War Department, and that Mr Jones was being sent to consult with the military authorities of Australia as to our first line of defence. This theory was very properly dismissed when it was shown that the Hon. Thompson was our War Miniver, and the man to whom the colony would look for protection when the hour of danger came. Then a pressman suggested that the real reason of Mr Jones’ trip was that he, as Minister of Public Works, was eager to push on with the £60,000 additions to Parliament House, and having engaged every bricklayer he could lay his hands on in the colony and disorganised private contracts, he now intends to personally canvass Australia for more. Five years ago Mr Seddon and another Liberal Liberal M.H.R. became apostles who preached the gospel of high wages in the colony, and induced an assortment of burglars and spielers to cast in their lot with us. Another reason put forward for the Ministerial visit is that Mr Jones is being sent out of the road whilst the reconstruction of the Cabinet is being composed, and his instructions are to keep a strict record of his expenses, so as to compare with Mr Seddon’s £5lB bill of last year, and he is warned against purchasing any ’possums. However, the possibilities of what may eventuate from the Jonesian descent on Australia are boundless, and may be left to the future.

The Premier’s journey North with Lord Ranfurly is ostensibly to attend the great native meeting at Huntly ; but Mr Seddon has chosen to make it a stumping campaign, aud speaks at Hastings to-night. This is an unprecedented course to adopt. When a Governor travels the country accompanied by a Minister it is understood that nothing in the way of a political speech shall be made or any partizan spirit displayed. The Governor, in his vice-regal capacity, rules all the people, and it is the height of discourtesy for any Minister to depart from a very proper custom. Lord Ranfurly is not likely to stand on his dignity on such a point of etiquette, but had such a thing been attempted with, say, Sir Arthur Gordon or Sir William Jervois they would have ceased to travel in company with any Minister guilty of such a breach of etiquette. However, when the parties arrive at the Maori gathering they will meet with true native hospitality. A local paper, the correspondent of which

viewed the scone, furnishes exhaustive information of the preparations. The food supply on the ground is stated as being remarkable. “ Tons upon tons of potatoes, 50 bullocks for slaughtering, pigs ad libitum, and any quantity of tough-looking and highly-odorifer-ous shark.” This -is variety indeed, and Premier Seddon having qualified as an epicure at the Hotel Cecil will no doubt inform the Maori cooks that they are miles ahead of the French chefs in the swell London establishment. The special reporter continues ; “On Wednesday night there was a great ball, and at a meeting held tor the purpose of considering the visit of the Premier and providing for the cost of entertainment, some £7B was subscribed.” Now this sum may appear to the natives to be enough, when the bullocks and pigs and sharks were thrown in, to supply a feast for a king. But when it comes to feasting with Mr Seddon it is to be feared the hat will have to go round again. Eleven Premiers cost the British taxpayers £7OOO to feed for ten days; the modest £7B of the guileless Maoris would not have provided them in sodawater and toothpicks. Let us hope that the fair round proportions of our only statesman will not be diminished by the sufferings before him this week. A FORTUNATE GITY. A few years ago the Liberal Ministry was distinctly hostile to Wellington, and refrained from doing any more than was absolutely necessary in the way of public works. But we have changed all that, thanks to the never ceasing demands of the Trades Union, at whose frown Mr Seddon trembles. We have a printing offise big enough and containing plant enough to do all the State printing for Federated, Australia with the Fijis thrown in; we have had the biggest wooden building in the world made bigger by an addition of 30 feet to its width ; we have had a new brick police station which grew with great deliberation, brick by brick, which for months attracted the attention of passers-by on account of the extreme care the co-operative workers took that they should not over-exert them-, selves ; we have had the Te Aro railway and its necessary stations; all these things have become evidences of the ability of the co-ops. to carry through jobs, although they cost from 40 to 50 per cent more than they ought. To keep these toilers in good heart we have now the Parliament House job, to cost £60,000, and hinder the enterprise of private individuals on building intent. Further, we now hear that another plank in the “policy 1 ” is the continuation of the railway to Island Bay. The excuse for this is that forts are to be built there, and that it is neeessary to connect forts with the city. Ridiculous as this project is, and the cost will be enormous and in no way a reproductive work, it will go down with the masses and attract the vagrant population from all quarters to Wellington. They will of course become free and independent electors and be ready for the next election, and with this addition to the Liberal supporters Mr Seddou hopes to win the three Wellington seats, That is. the programme; and as he has promised a quarter of a million to Canterbury for irrigation, and half a million for the Westland railway, he must do something for other districts to prevent jealousy. Auckland will probably be gratified to hear that Government contemplates utilising the water power of the Waikato River for developing electrical energy for gold fields machinery. Hawke’s Bay, being strictly a Conservative district, will have to be content with having a few big estates burst up. Nelson has had its gaol shut up, and the prisoners removed to Hokitika, but all the members between Blenheim and Hokitika being true Liberals, a few miles more of the Westland railway may be put in hand. Anything spent in that direction is mere waste. I know the country intimately, and am satisfied that if there were a Liverpool at each end of it and a Manchester in the middle that it would not earn axle grease, because of the enormous cost of construction down the Buffer River and continualexpensive maintenance. It does not say much for the democracy when the people will listen to and applaud a mao who varies his speeches to suit the district he happens to be in ; and really as long as people are fools enough to be gammoned in this way, it seems quarrelling with the laws of nature to say no one ought to gammon them. The trouble is that the fools have not to pay-the price of their folly. They leave that to those who tried to put on the break.