The Otago Witness. THE WEEK.

Otago Witness, Issue 2045, 4 May 1893, Page 27

The Otago Witness.

THE WEEK.

WITH WHICH IS INCOBPOBATBD THH SOUTHEBN MERCURY.

(THURSDAY, MAY 4, 1893.)

•• Nnnqnam »Und natui», »Un 4 wplontUdlxU."— Jovikai, •■ Goodnature and uood icnio mustjever join."— Fopa.

While the mails were distributing to the readers of the Witness far and wide the last words we addressed to thsm, the Premier of New Zealand, having fought his ineffectual battle wifch^ a relentless enemy, lay dying at his official home. It was a matter of regret to us, when the fatal telegram reached us, that we were then unable for another week to convey to our readers the assurance we now tender them of our sincere and respectful association with the general sorrow which the event has called forth. The extreme care which had been taken by the late Premier's friends and advisers to put the most favourable possible aspect on a desperate case had, up to the very last day, misled the public into false hopes. The shock was all the greater when, a few hours bttore the end came, it was known and confessed that he must surely die. If Mr Ballance as a public man had excited, as some loadiog statesmen (notwithstanding the disclaimers we frequently hear) unfortunately do excite, the personal antagonism of his political opponents, the almost tragic sorrow , of his death would have already turned tha hardest heart,

Our Recent Loss.

But he did not excite personal antagonism, and he.' did to a considerable extent command not only loyalty from his followers, but respect from those who could not accept his political methods and beliefs. We are able to speak with sincerity and experience of these matters, because it has been our lot to stand often in pronounced antagonism to the late Premier's policy and administration. It should be unnecessary to add that principles cannot be changed by sympathy, and that though, in the face of the sorrowful end of Mr Ballance'a political career, we cannot but deplore the fact that our appreciation of him as a statesman has its limits, we must maintain still that the country has been more honourably and unselfishly than profitably served by the dead statesman. It was onej of Mr Ballance's best points that he believed in his own policy. He was unselfishly devoted to his party, a hard worker, a kindly friend, and a courteous opponent. He was unquestionably, as a Premier should be, the best man in his Ministry. For many months after its formation he stood between some 'of his Ministers and destruction. Without a leader like Mr Ballance, the Government could not have lived long enough to teach its inferior members what they have now learned — the responsibilities, as distinguished from the mere joys, of high office. Represented under criticism by their chief, they stood upon a higher level than their own efforts could have commanded ; and we believe they would freely acknowledge the fact. 'Sir Harry Atkinson and Mr Ballance have left New Zealand mourning, as a generous people ever mourns those who, for weal or woe, have given their best energies to the service of their country.

The Reconstructed Ministry.

It was a kind of foregone conclusion until Monday afternoon that the Ministry would be temporarily reconstructed, and that Sir Robert Stout would, as soon aa he got himself elected, take the place which had been kept warm for him by Mr Seddon or the ( Oolonial Secretary. But the fates it seems had decreed otherwise. Ministers evident y felt that a slur would be cast upon them if they could not find a. Premier among themselves. It was found, too, that Sir Robert Stout was not such a favourite with the party as hei had been — nay, that there was a strong feeling against him. The present representatives of the party, it was said, had borne the heat and burden of the day. Why, then, should an outsider, who had been attending to bis private affairs, be brought in over their heads to reap the fruit of their labours 1 Perhaps they remembered what happened in 1884, when Sir Robert, after allowing his fellowLiberals to fight the long and arduous battle with the Continuous Ministry, suddenly allied himself with the Toiy interloper and seized the spoils of the victory which they had won. Be this as it may, Sir Robert appears to have been decisively rejected. We confess we cannot help feeling that, with all his defects, he would in some not unimportant respects have' made a more suitable man for the Premiership than Mr Seddon. It is impossible, however, to deny that he has far less claim to the position than the late Minister for Public Works.

Mr Seddon has shown extraordinary energy and industry, and no little talent for administration. He was emphatically the strong man in the late Ministry, and he would also have been the strong man in any Ministry that Sir Robert Stout could have formed. We have more than once had to comment very strongly on some of his actions, and the utter lack of dignity he displayed when leading the House last session will not readily be forgotten ; yet his claim to the honour which he has attained cannot be denied. We trust that he will grow to the position, as his predecessor and late chief noticeably did, though it is only too evident that he is still lamentably wanting in some of the essential qualities of a leader. Tne Treasurership in Mr Seddon's new Cabinet fell inevitably to Mr J. G. Ward, who has proved himself a man of capacity — both in trade and in administration. The management of the colonial finances is, however, a very different thing from financing an ordinary business. A great deal more is required than mere skill in dealing with figures. The Treasurer should possess the mind and aptitudes of a statesman, for the finances may be said to touch policy at every point. Mr Ward is a young man for such an office, and it must be admitted that, though he has shown himself a smart business man and a capable Pos h master-general, he has a 9 yet given no proof of statesmanship properly so called.

There are no new members in the reconstructed Ministry, and the principal portfolios, with the exception of the Trdasurership, remain in the old hands. It is not likely that the reconstruction will mateiially affect the fortunes of the party in the meantime, but disintegration sets in sooner or later in every case, and the change in the leadership may possibly prove the beginning of the end. But it is hazardous to prophesy.

Sir John Hall.

Apart from the touching circumstances of the late Premier's removal from among us and the disappearance of his name from the arena of politics for ever, the intimation by Sir John Hall of his final retirement into private life would possess the greatest significance. Sir John Hall has had more to do with the building up of New Zealand than Mr Ballance ; but his work was done in times when men valued less in their public work the stimulation of popular applause, It is a rather sad reflection that we hear so little nowadays of the labours of the statesmen whose generation is so, fast passing away. The life of the colony has after all not been a long one ; it is a pity that its memory should bo shorter still. No doubt in these days of increasing etorm and stress there is le3s and less time in which to keep fresh in our minds, by reading and reflection, the history of our short but eventful past. Yet we continue to be genuinely shocked if our children, at the age of 12 or 14, fail to exhibit a fair working acquaintance with the careers of Julius Caesar and William the Conqueror, and we expect them to be able to answer a question or two about the death of Thomas a Secket and the wars of Edward the Black Prince. It is useless to preach onsuoh a subject; bat there 3eems to be room for a passing regret.

Sir John Hall's career ha 3 been in every way honourable to him. The last occasion on which he took charge of the colony's affairs was one of the most critical in our history. The Grey Government had brought us within measurable distance of repudiation during its last months of office, and the Hall Ministry on taking office found that the Treasury was empty and a heavy half-yearly payment of interest imminently due in London. It is admitted on all hanas that our credit was saved, not perhaps by phenomenal statesmanship, but by the exercise of qaalities which belong only to the higher order of public men. Like so many of our public men, Sir John Hall has suffered from serious ill-health for many years — his malady being of a kind peculiarly apfc to result from overwork and overstrain, and one of the penalties which most men pay who seek, as Sir John Hall always did, to attend to the minutest details while performing the sufficiently onerous duties of chief engineer. ■While personally still popular with all sides of the House, the retiring statesman is just now under the political ban which affects all prosperous landholders in a large way, and thare may be some who on that account will decline to profess regret at his disappearance from the political arena. From that arena, nevertheless, he will by almost universal consent retire with honour and distinction.

Magnificent, but not Business.

We are afraid that if the people of Otago do not want to have this province classed, in regard to Port finance, with the Napier and New Plymouth order of things, they will have to keep an eye upon the proceedings of the Otago Dock Trust. There are few things upon which New Zealanders almost everywhere are so theoretically unanimous as upon the necesssity of atoning for our past sins in the matter of reckless harbour expenditure, and religiously vowing not to do so any more. But the stern earnestness which alone makes such wise resolutions effectual is apt, as we iiil know, to be reserved for our neighbours' proposals, while special circumstances are always to be unearthed to excuse an exception in our own. A variety of circumstances — among them the pronounced reluctance of moneyed people to see the secuiities offered by the Otago Dock Trust in the light in which that body represented them— have hitherto combined to operate as a cold douche upon the somewhat risky enthusiasm of the members. Some of these gentlemen burn to associate their names with something big and booming. The sober and steady business management of a moderate going concern affords no scope for the kind of " enterprise " that leadß to Napier breakwaters and Lyttelton big docks. To be the spenders of a big sum of public money on an everlasting work presents fascinations of a totally different class to minds of the more unstable and irresponsible order. Mr Earnshaw, for instance, thinks nothing of saying that the Government must provide endowments — which is only another way of announcing that the taxpayer must provide cash — for whatever the gentlemen who compose the Dock Trust may choose to say they want to do in the way of providing a huge work at Port Chalmers for the accommodation of vessels which, there is every reason to believe, neither desire the proposed accommodation nor would avail themselves of it if provided. Severe repression is the only remedial means for a tendency which betrays the Vogelian spirit without the directive and reassuring element of the Vogelian brain. A few figures from an article recently published by the Daily Times will sufficiently characterise the present disquieting activity of certain members of the Dock Trust. Speaking of the big dock at Lyttelton the Times says: — "The large dock there has proved itself a veritable white elephant, and is worked at an enormous loss. Up to December 1887 the total loss for five years was upwards of £30,000. The total dues for docking paid by the Nevr Zealand Shipping Company, whose headquarters are in Ohristchurcb, amounted for five years to only £581. fcince that time the net revenue for 1889 to 1892 was £148, £248, £1063, and £501 respectively; the annual cost of interest on construction being £6825." This is the kind of encouragement under which the wise men of the Otago Dock Trust — not, of coarse, all of them— are setting to work to boom the " necessity " for a new dock I As the French parodist would say, " C'est onagnifique, mais oe nest pas le Hz."

Cause and Effect.

Australian banks still continue to come down, and if it were possible for a moment to neglect the serious nature of the financial position there would be an element of the comic' in the monstrous announcements of successive institutions that they are " temporarily suspending with a view to reconstruction." If the "reconstruction " of b'aDks were a branch of carpentry there would ba another boom in the building trade on the other side.

It must surely bs a surprise to most people in this colony to find, from the record of. failures alone, how enormously out of proportion to the true resources of Australia in their present state of development were the agencies for distributing borrowed capital among the people. We do not at the moment kuow where to find anybody who can tell us how many banks have failed in Australia within the last three years ; bub it appears that there will be no difficulty whatever presently in remembering the names of those which survived. The public is showing not only good sense but shrewd judgment in remaining as confident as before that among those latter names will be found all that specially interest us over here ; but we should not like to say that there will be many to add to them.

Sir Saul Samue 1 , we notice, has informed the London World in his capacity as Agentgeneral for New South Wales that "the reckless writing in the English press that has been persisted in for years has produced the present crisis." He adds that he is " confident that credit will soon revive," on which point his opportunities for forming a judgment are no better than otherpeople's ; but dealing with his attempt to attribute the financial straits of the Australian colonies to the " reckless writing in the English press," we can only say that it would be very pleasant and soothing if such a thing Qould be believed, We should be inclined to

suggest that, on the contrary, had people who were mad with boom fever condescended to pay a little more attention to the warnings of the prese, not only in England but much nearer home as well, instead of systematically scouting every questioning voice as that of a traitor or a croaker, there would have been a good deal less depression and disaster to deplore now.

Blue Blood.

There is a kind of snobbery wnich assumes that dakes, duchesses, and such like belong to an order of Nature to which ordinary humanity may not aspire, and which should be approached with due reverence by mere mortals who are sufficiently favoured to be enabled to approach it at all. This is an objectionable kind of snobbery enough, but it has the excuse of remote antiquity, and of affinity to the universal conditions of all human races, from the lowest savagery to the loftiest kind of civilisation. There is another kind of snobbery, however, which, although the direct antithesis of the other, is no whit less offensive. It is that which attributes to the British aristocracy, merely because it i 9 the British aristocracy, a code of morality and ethics approaching that of a Wbitechapel rookery, and which accordingly rejoices loudly in any reverse which any member of the "hupper suckles" happens to meet with. There may be a very grave development of this last description of snobbery when a British court, by way of showing its independence, deals out to one of the nobility measures which would be unduly harsh if inflicted on a costermonger. Lastly, if nobility is to be taken into account at all, any appearance of distinguishing between the real " blue blood " (a vi!e expression for which the nobility itself is responsible) and the interlopers into the sacred circle is apt to be aa undesirable a form of snobbery as any.

The case of the Duchess of Sutherland has created some considerable interest— first, because she is a duchess, and secondly, we do not doubt, because she is "Duchess Blair " and has a history. This astute but not very high-principled dame has incurred, for reasons that everybody knows, the undying hatred of one of the bluest-blooded families in the Kingdom — principally because (the phrase is brief and sufficiently comprehensive) she is Duchess Blair. In spite of, or more likely because of, the aristocratic tantrums of his high-born relations, the late Duke has enriched her at their expense. Lawsuits, threatened to be a I'outrance, were at once commencad, and injunctions against meddling with this, that, and the other in her own house were taken^ out against the Duchess pending the trial of the validity of the Duke's will. The Duchess infringed the letter of these injunctions so far as to burn some communication from the late Duke which she says she considered private — relating, it is alleged, to some kitchen flirtation or other which had created a row in the lower regions. We know a good many estimable citizens and citizenesses who would have done the same thing — and so do all who may read this note. Yet Sir Francis Jeune, making himself the agent (or incurring the suspicion of doing so) of the prosecuting relations, sentences the poor woman to six weeks in gaol — a sentence which, we venture to say, if recorded for such an offence against any respectable woman in this city, would raise, quite justifiably, a storm of public indignation. The business looks unpleasantly like a theatrical display on the part of the judge. If he sentenced her to imprisonment because she was a duchess, the act was an ugly one ; if because she was jjucbess Blair, so much the worse. It is difficult to believe that such a sentence was really allotted merely because of the actual offence alleged by the high-born relations and well-paid lawyers.