THE WEEK.

Otago Witness, Issue 1956, 20 August 1891, Page 23

THE WEEK.

" Nnnqnam allnjl natsra, tihxH laplentla dbdt."— Juv»kav. « Good n»tur» and good Mine mu«t erar iotn." pOPS,p OPS ,

The Daily Times has been suggesting, in a series of articles, that since

"Tour Money the Government and their and majority are determined to Tour i«e.» confiscate the property of the large landowners, the latter ought to be offered the chance of accepting their expulsion from the State at once; the Government taking over their land for disposal to somebody else, and letting them escape with their lives and what little money they may have left to some other and safer country. In theory, this, of course, exactly follows out what the Government and their party profess to think not merely honest, but beneficial to the country. The supposed benefit of the progressive land tax. is the affecting of this very thing— namely, to compel the large landowners to sell their land at a fair value. As the Times suggests that the value stated shall be the amount named by the Government itself, there can hardly be any dispute arising out of the price— so far, at any rate, as the Government is concerned. But we fear the Times writer takes a sanguine and rather complimentary view of the objects sought by the dominant party. One of the articles to which we are alluding says :J" Those, then, who support a crushing graduation on the plea that, whether in itself justifiable . or not, it will benefit the country by forcing the extinction of large estates, and yet would refuse reasonable facilities for accepting extinction at once, seem to us to convict themselves not only of insincerity, but of wanton and vindictive oppression. Such a refusal would, in fact, amount to a confession that what is really wanted is not the landowners' land only, but their ruin first and their land afterwards." We are afraid that that is precisely what they do want. There is not. the slightest evidence in any Ministerial speech that the good of the country is sought by the " bursting-up " policy at all. On the contrary, every little chance expression, every little indication that they allow to e3cape them on the subject, seems to say to the labour members, "We know you hate the large landowners, whatever your reason may be. Keep us in office and we will make these ' social pests ' sorry they were ever born." That, we are only too much afraid, is the spirit in which tbe Government has gone about its work. Is it not notorious throughout the country that this is so ? Does not every man tell his neighbour so? And does one, in town or country, ever hear a comment on the confiscation policy which does not imply that its primary objeot is merely vindictive, what-

ever any secondary one may be ? And so we predict failure for the suggestion of the Daily Times. The Government can keep in office by satisfying blind vindictiveness ; why, then, should it trouble to lend an ear to mere sense or equity 1

The attack upon the Railway Commissioners in the House for carrying jirßeet«»' goods too cheaply on the " Enemiei." Dunedin - Oamaru line is

really very amusing. These unfortunate officials have been abused right and left for keeping up the rates to such an extent that waggons and drays could actually in some [cases compete with the railways, while stock were driven along the roads for weeks rather than pay the cost of transport by trucks within a couple of days. It was considered, until tbe other day, to be an absolute proof of the folly and pigheadedness of the commissioners that such things could be at all. But it seems that when it comes to their carrying goods so cheap that a port represented by a member of the "Liberal" party loses the harbour dues hitherto collected from the coastal vessels, nothing is too severe to say of such an enormity. " What do they mean by not charging more 1 " is indignantly asked in the House ; as though it were the business of the State which owns, and the commissioners who manage the railways, to see that the public all along the line pays toll to the port of Oamaru, in addition to the fair cost of transporting their goods, whether they use the port or not. The Hon. W. P. Reeves, who has already earned an unenviable notoriety by referring to our oldest settlers in a large way of business in the terms hitherto reserved in respectable society ' for thieves and burglars, expressed delight at seeing "his enemies"— the Bailway Commissioners and the Union Steam Ship Company— engaged in cutting rates against each other. Such paltry attempts to curry favour with the labour unions, whom both these organisations have offended by their successful resistance of the boycott, are truly a lamentable exhibition on the part of a Minister. We imagine that few indeed will be found, even within the ranks of labour, who will not regard such a speech from sneb a quarter as every honest working man would have regarded it before labour became political at all — namely, as petty and pitiable in the extreme. Mr Reeves' speech was not made in the debate to which we are alluding — which was upon the debt of the Oamaru Harbour Board to the Post Office — but upon the bill to abolish the |commissioners, in which this same policy of theirs at Oamaru was vigorously defended by Mr Seddon ; whereupon Mr Reeves, frightened to death at the possible effect of his col league's manly attitude upon the labour members, made an abject appeal for their forgiveness, which no reader of Hansard will readily forget. Tbe commissioners by this time must be pretty well bewildered as to what the public and their various "enemies" actually do want. So far as they can yet gather, we suppose they must take their instructions to be that their rates must be so ingeniously arranged as to compete successfully with roads, but so also as under no circumstances to compete with coastal steamers.

The special tax on absentees^ a goal that many foolish and a few The worthy politicians have been liberal trying to reach for years; loyAop. an ci now they have got it.

In the present state of public opinion it commends itself to everyone who does not think things out— in other words, to the large majority of the people. There is the usual superficial appearance of fairness about it which carries so many other absurdities on a triumphal passage to the Statute Book, and so sweetly serves the personal profit of so many so-called Liberals, in this paradise of the professional class legislator, The whole thing will some of these days be seen in its true light, but meantime all the mischief will have been done. The capital of these absentees will go to the place where they are presentees — wherever that may be— and things will be expected to boom along prosperously in consequence — just as they were expected to boom along when Protection was the popular rage, and with about as much -justifipation. Four or five years ago Protection was going to save the country in three rounds, as it were, and now it is forgotten. Liberalism, as now understood, would seem to be fairly defined as the art of giving an unhappy people a cleverly-selected succession of toys to play with— the cheaper andigatadier and more ticklishly tinkling the better (as is the case with all toys), and the public should always be carefully watched so that as soon as it evinces "a disposition to scrape away the tinsel, or lick off the flaring red paint, or pick out the stuffing, as the case may be, the deft hand of the practised Liberal may be ready to put the article on the shelf and reach down the next plaything. We have got as far as picking the pockets of the farmer and the miner to please the city manufacturer (or rather his employes) ; we have had our fling at the wicked perpetual lessees, who want to get their freehold ; we haye just done smashing up the pioneer settlers of the country ; we are nearly through with destroying the pastora} industry and throwing the whoje bujk of the taxation of the country p.n the shoulders of the farmers; and we are now 113 full cry after the absentees. B.ut we shajl not catch them. They are not here, though their money is ; and does anybody \n his senses suppose that the unprincipled legislation that is being humbly brought in day after day at the bidding of the city unions who "run" the so-palled Government, is of a character to bring them here to their money ? Instead of that, it will send their money to where they are themselves ; and how is the country going to benefit by that? If we cannot have both a man and his money, as we should like, what sense on earth is there .in refusing to have his money, or punishing him for sending it here ? We ca> not see that a single respectable argument has been hit upon by those who advocate the tax on absentees. We are very sorry that there should be any absentees. We do not know who they are, but whoever they are (if, as we suppose, they are respectable, or at any rate only criminal in the sense that all landowners are criminals in these days) we are sorry they have preferred, to

live out of New Zealand, which was a very fine country to live in until the other day. New Zealand, it appears, does not want capital. It only wants labour, of the kind one spells with a big L. There are at present no absentee labourers — but there will be a good many by the time the Government have done acting as liveried footmen for their present masters. No doubt it is a good place, with plenty of pay and pickings ; but it will end in their being discharged without a character as soon as New Zealand is herself again.

The anqmalies in taxation which we pointed out last week have not been Another oift affected by the subsequent to tii* passage of the Taxation Bill Banks nnd through committee, except loan companiw. in one important particular. We showed in the brief remarks we devoted to the question that while a landowner worth only £20,060 may be taxed by the Government scheme at the rate of 6s lOd in the pound, the mortgagee, bank, or loan company, from whom he has borrowed £30,000 on his property of £50,000, is taxed only at Is 5d in the pound. That was true at the time. But the Government has since found that even Is 5d in the pound is too much for the poor banks and- loan companies to pay. One would have thought that when borrowers were being taxed at rates which simply meant inevitable ruin to most of them — rates which run up actually to the point at which a borrower's entire income, or even double his entire income, is claimed by the tax gatherer— the rate of Is 5d in the pound which is what mortgagees at 6 per cent, have been paying for years under the property tax, was not too much to expect from them. One would have thought, moreover, that even if banks and loan oompanies had aclaim at all upon the country for being made a present of a huge remission in the taxation they have cheerfully paid for years past, it would have been enough to take off —as the Government began by doing — all they pay upon their cash, bullion, office fixings, unremunerative loans, and all that kind of thing. Thousands upon thousands of pounds of taxation are remitted to banks and loan companies in that way by the new scheme. But it seems that even this is not enough. We overstated the proposed taxation of bonds and loan companies last week by 40 per cent. We said they would pay Is 5d in the pound, and as the scheme stood then, we were right. But now they are only to pay Is in the pound. In other words, the Premier and his majority have insisted on striking out banks a*nd money-lenders from the list of those liable to the land tax on mortgages, and have brought them instead under the income tax; which of course reduces their already far too lenient relative taxation down to a shilling in the pound. Members of the Opposition seem to have been utterly astounded at the humble submission of the Ministry to the interests of banks and loan companies, whose dividends will be increased swimmingly from their already big figure by these wholesale benefactors, while honest settlers are struggling with the sweat on their brows to make both ends meet.

If all the bankers and loan company agents had formed a union and affiliated with the Trades and Labour Council we could have understood the slavish eagerness of the Government to bring further grist to the mill of these institutions, and to give a joyful helping hand at twisting the screw upon their debtors. -\ But as they have not, so far as we know, been as yet admitted into the sacred fold of unionism, we can only express our amazement at the spectacle of the Government unctuously fetching and carrying for banks and loan companies with all the obsequiousness which they have hitherto reserved exclusively for union stokers and maritime cooks, and conclude — as we concluded last week— that this is Liberal Government, with a bank solicitor as Attorneygeneral,

The investigations into the alleged corruption in high circles in Canada a nytk's ar e assuming a decidedly ugly N««t. i oo k. The last accounts

seem to indicate that Sir Hector Langevin, K.0.M.G., C.8., LL.D., and Q. 0., Minister of Public Works for the Dominion, will be thrown over by his colleagues, and will have to accept a similar fate to that of Sir William Gordon Cumming. Sir Hector Langevin, while denying that he took bribes from contractors in return for lucrative contracts under the Public Works department, admits having asked a certain contractor to provide him with his election expenses, "he being at the time without money." We should hope that if the admission was made as it is cabled, little time will be wasted over further inquiries so far as the question of retaining the Minister in his public offices is concerned. If anybody is interested in knowing the exact measure of Sir Hector Langevin's guilt, or if further inquiry promises to efEeot the detection of other culprits, it may be worth while to go on. But we confess that, to an ordinary mind, and in relation to the ordinary sense of right and wrong, a Minister of Public Works who deliberately invites a contractor having pecuniary relations with his department to provide the means of keeping the Minister in Iris place should be summarily deposed, whatever greater or less irregularities he may be found to have committed. Sir Hector Langevin has been in public life in Canada for 30 or 40 years, and previously thereto he had filled the position of mayor of the capital city. He has been a Queen's Counsel since 1864, and his other honours have been legion. His present position as Minister of Public Works he has held with slight intermission for ovei 20 years. His exposure, if we are to accept it as proved, is therefore a political scandal of the first magnitude ; but it is impossible to palter with conduct of this sort. The Government to which he belongs have accepted without opposition a motion declaring the conduot of which he stands' accused to be " opposed to the common weal," which is sufficiently mild language, and intended, no doubt, to let the detected statesman fall as softly as possible. But if the general turn-up which seems to be going on in Canadian Government circles since the death. 4of Sir John M'Donald should.

eventuate as it at present seems likely to do, there will be no such easy escape for anj one inplicated. Mr Ghapleau (also, by the way, a Q.O. and a LL.D.) who is Secretary j [of State for Canada, is said to be as bad as his colleague, only he has "collared" the public accounts which would convict him. The Premier and the Public Works Minister of the province of Quebec (one of the'subordinate Governments) are apparently "in the swim " with the members of the Queen's Privy Council for Canada ; and the Postmaster-general wants badly to have a few rounds with a member "outside." Even the memory of the late Premier does not escape reflection. Perhaps, therefore, the Canadians are doing right in trying to see the thing out to the bitter end.

According to various reports ot eye-witnesses, the sea serpent has been An ow honouring the east coast of Aequ»intan«e. the N orth Island with a visit.

We do not remember to have previously heard of the mysterious and distinguished stranger in thsse parts — the department of mystery and marvel essential to every well-regulated country having hitherto been supplied by the periodical appearances of " taniwhas " in Lake Taupo and the Waikato river. Taniwhas are a species of vertebrate animals not yet classified by zoologists, the reason — simple, but sufficient — being that they have not yet caught one I

Sea serpents, on the other hand, contrary to the belief of many people, are perfectly well known to students of natural science. They are common in the Indian Ocean, and even in the Pacific and Australian seas they are not unknown. Very nasty customers, too, they are — for they are all very venomous, having diabolical poison fangs. They live in droves, swimming mostly on the surface with their nostrils above it, and feeding on fishes. These " hydrophidse," however, or water snakes, are quite little fellows compared to " the " sea serpent of history or tradition. The> are 4ft or sft long in general, whereas their big brother has often been credited with being 400 ft or 500f fc. Sir James Hector, we observe, pooh poohs the idea of a sea serpent having been sighted from the deck of the Botomahana, and suggests the combination of an old tree trunk and a lively imagination as probably explaining the tale. So it may ; but it may as well be mentioned at the same time that there is no real or positive reason why sea monsters of an unfamiliar type, either reptilian or of the fish class, may not exist in the sea and occasionally render themselves visible. No doubt there have been plenty of 11 travellers' tales " of a very ludicrous kind told about monstrous sea serpents; but on the other hand there have been many such assertions which cannot be by any means so easily disposed of. Norwegian stories of its appearance off the coast of that country (of which there are many records) may perhaps be dismissed as lather hazy; but there are many circumstantial statements by responsible English and American sailors of clearly-observed appearances of gigantic sea snakes. The record most often quoted is that of the captain of H.M.S. Daedalus, the officers and crew of which ship observed (in 1848) what Captain M'Quhae, in his report to the Admirality, describes as " an enormous serpent, with head and shoulders kept about 4ft constantly above the surface of the sea." Lieutenant Drummond fully confirmed the report, and agreed with his chief that its rate of travel was about 12 miles an hour. The 30 odd years which have elapsed since the Daedalus reports threw everycne into a state of excitement have added many sea-, serpent stories to our literature, but, unhappily, not a single specimen of the creature to our museums. The attitude of science towards the whole subject may at present be described as one of benevolent neutrality. It is very undesirable to ridicule and assail anyone who may chance to promulgate a sea-serpent story, for the fear of such treatment may lead to the suppression of interesting facts — as, indeed, it seems to have done in the case of one at any rate of the recent observers, or supposed observers, in the newly - named Tasman Sea.

Our exports still keep at the high figures which they had reached last x our year, and, indeed, slightly inExports. crease, notwithstanding the

bad grain season. If that had been an ordinary one the figures would have been still higher than they are. Eliminating specie, as usual, the somparative returns stand as follow : — 1891. 1890. Maroh quarter ...£3,777,237 «3,783,459 June quarter ... 2,314,974 2,242.283 Six months ... £6,092 211 £6,025,741 The increase for the June quarter is £72,692, and for tbe six months, £66,470. The main item of the quarter's increase is in gold (£412,146-£207,003). This was partly to have been expected, because tbe anticipated removal of the export duty rendered the March quarter shipments unusually small. It is gratifying to observe that, taking the two quarters together, there is a very great improvement on last year. ! The figures for 1890 were £411,807, and for 189-1 £558,365 ; increase, £146,558. It must, however, be borne in mind tnat the decrease in the December quarter was £177,438, and this to some extent was no doubt also caused by the withholding of shipments in, anticipa- 1 tion of the remission of the dvity, though Drobably only for the last month of the year. The improved yields at Eeef ton and Auckland and the not inconsiderable returns from dredging and hydraulic mining in Ofcago account for a part of the recovery, but there is still room for improvement. The other principal increases for the quarter are in frozen meats (£35,672), wool (£16,998), sheepskins (£10,176;, butter (£9778) — a very gratifying item, but only a beginning— and kauri gum (£16,338). The largest decreases, on the other hand, were in agricuitural products, chiefly wheat (£122,805) and phormium (£50,351). There were, besides, small decreases under the heads timber, cheese, live stock, tallow, rabbitskins, and leather, and rather an important decline of £13,600 in miscellaneous manufactures. It is remarkable bow, notwithstanding these fluctuations,

improvement in one class of export makes up for a falling off in another, the variety in our commodities being very considerable.

The imports do not respond to the exports, as might fairly have been expected— those for the June quarter being only £1,144,271, against £1,258,273 for the corresponding quarter of 1890. It is undeniable that there is a want of new enterprise, caused no doubt partly by tbe labour troubles of last summer and partly by the uncertainties connected with the possible effects of fiscal changes. Time may restore public confidence, but until it is restored we cannot look for much improvement. We are, however, better off than by all accounts they are in Australia, and the one great desideratum now is a plentiful rainfall • in those districts north and west of Dunedin, which for three years have had a most inadequate supply. This, followed by a favourable harvest, would give matters a brighter look. But it is a fact significant of our varied resources that, rainfall or no rainfall, our total exports go on increasing in value.