The Otago Witness, WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE SOUTHERN MERCURY. (THURSDAY, OCTOBER 7, 1897.) THE WEEK.

Otago Witness, Issue 2275, 7 October 1897, Page 29

The Otago Witness, WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE SOUTHERN MERCURY. (THURSDAY, OCTOBER 7, 1897.) THE WEEK.

" Xunquam aliud natura, aliud sapientla ilixlt." — JaViuxt, "Good nature »nd. cood sense must ever joiu."— ?or».

The intrigues by which the Premier has at last managed to control the The decision of Parliament on. Mr ' Ward Case. ' Ward's case tire strongly sug-

gestive of those so successfully resorted to by him in the matter of the notorious Banking Committee of 1896. It must have beeD, however, with bitter chagrin that Mr Seddon has been compelled to realise how much the conditions have been- changed by tbe general election, and (perhaps even more) by the further- instalments of Saddonian. government to which the country has been treated since. It is true that the Premier is strong still — a strong man he will always be in a sense, whether in office or out of it — but he can no locger draw up resolutions for a committee of Parliament to pass, with the almoßt absolute certainty that a snbservient majority will pass, them, evidence or no evidence, merely Dn the authority of his name at the- foot. ' Indeed; ia the constitution of a committee be cannot to-day have his own way entirely unchecked ; and" there is even yet a distinct possibility that the committee on the one phase of the Ward scandals which for tbe time happens to be uppermost will actually deliberate with the intention of arriving at such a decision as may conserve the honour of Parliament whether such conservation happens to suit the Premier or not. Mr Ward, who had tbe singularly bad taste to. interfere and address the House while the discussion was going on. suggests the pre-

posterous compromise of continuing to be a member of Parliament without " exercising his powers and privileges'" until he has settled matters with the judge — a compro- ■ mise that if strictly carried out (which in practice could not be done) would inflict upon both constituency and member a use'leisloss and humiliation. Mr Ward's ideas, ' however, of what may be to his ultimate | advantage - politically and otherwise are ! never what' ordinary men's are, and he ia perhaps wise in bis own generation and knows what he is doing. No doubt the weakening of his hitherto defiant attitude which this suggestion marks is due to the unexpected coolness with which be has been received in Wellington by the Government party — who I in this respect only follow the lead of the i Government press — and the unpleasant dis- : covery that the first real, if not very effective, ! stand made by Mr Ssddon's subservient followers against a mandate from the' whips has been occasioned by the circumstances under which the member for Awarua is bold enough to ask for their support. The Government, of course, has* a clear majority on the committee, which Mr Seddon's action in appointing himself chairman makes virtually an overwhelming one. We wish for no decision from it which is not arrived at as ~ the clear result of the evidence ; nor, as regards Mr Ward, do we greatly care what the decision on the decidedly narrow isbuo ! placed, and properly placed, before the committee may 'prove to b». Our views of Mr Ward's present actual and proper relations to New Zealand public, life are not i confined within the limits necessarily laid j down for the committee's guidance, %cd can, : therefore, only be indirectly affected by the committee's decision.

The Minister for Lands has weakly shirked

a plain public" duty — a duty Encouraging that should be as plain to Suspicion. him as it is to other people —

by virtually confessing that he is frightened to tell the truth abonfc the Advances to Settlers office for fear of punishment at the hands of the Opposition and of the country. He cannot, of coarse, have hoped for any success for bis flimsy pretence about Mr Lewia's'inqairy being an attempt to get at the private business of the clients of the office. It could only have been resorted to because, though he was naturally unwilling to tell the truth, be 'was equally afraid of the consequences of saying frankly " I won't tell you." _Mr Lewis's question related to matters already public property through the medium bt the Bankruptcy Gazette, a publication which deals solely in figures, and has no more care or soul for party points than a Babbage's calculating engine. It had been stated in the ordinary summary of certain debts and assets that in one case an asset advanced, upon by the Advances to Settlers office was of a real value considerably lees than the advance, and that in another it was only a little more than the advance — this last being a case in which, according to the act}, the advance should have been limited to half the valua -of the security. An ex-member of Parliament; who 'in his time followed ihe Government, is, ifc may be added, involved in one of theße matters. ' It is to be noticed' that these two instances hav^Teaked out in a purely accidental way. They are not the result of any examination into the affairs of the Advances department, or of any general parliamentary inquisition ; they have simply come to light through the private action of the beneficiaries themselves or their representatives. If, then, within two years of the establishment of the system, ouch things as these manage to squeeze themselves into light in spito of the determined concealment of the Minister, is it at all in accordance with the doctrine of chances that a real examination would not bring to light many others ? These two proved cases are not, of course, the only ones in which suspicions have been excited ; and the corclusion is almost inevitable that they are not the only ones in which such suspicions might be amply justified. Mr Lewis merely asked, not for any information at all about the affairs of the advances — all he wanted to know about these, was in bis hands already at- the instance of the advances themselves — bat for particulars of the official action which resulted in such a disastrous bungle. The Minister was afraid to give such particulars, and took refuge in the suggestion that to answer the question, would be to reveal private business. His action, together with the uneasy eagerness of the Premier to take advantage of the forms of the House in order to help in blocking this very pertinent inquiry, will tend to, support the widespread public belief that in this department, as in so many others, public money .is being virtually used to purchase political support. If the head of the department wants to establish its innocence of practices of the kind, he has certainly the strangest way of going about it.

No time will be lost in providing Dnnedin

with a third member in place

The of Mr Fish. Within a fortCity Election, night our new representative,

whoever he may prove to be, will have taken his _ place in Wellington, seconding either Mr Soobie Mackenzie or Mr Millar, as the case may be, but in either case unfortunately not turning the scale one way or the other ; for Dunedin, as at present represented, has neutralised its own vote_ for all party purposes, though fortunately the debating power the city has provided is not so evenly arranged. The , developments of the contest on the Government side should prove decidedly interesting. Mr Hutchison, it has long been understood, has somehow dropped out of the val Sable favour of the Premier, and although' one of the officially-nominated candidates at the last general election, he probably had good cause of complaint at the decided lukewarmneßs with which the Government accepted and supported his candidature. It was even said at the time that a whisper had gone round from headquarters, after Mr Scobie Mackenzie's progress in the campaign had disorganised the previously complacent and con fident camp, to the effect that the party could in case of necewitydo without Mr Hutchison — a signal instance of the ingratitude which is so often the reward of party services. The subsequent selection of Mr Pinkerton for the consolation prize, to the exclusion of bis veteran colleague, served to emphasise the

line taken in electioneering matters a 'month or two before. The suggestion is now made that Mr Hutchison, not having "even yet been received into favour, is stepping into the arena on the present occasion against the Government candidate in order to square up matters with Mr Pinker toD, and once more do battle side .by side with that astute and exceedingly fortunate representative of the people. So far as we can see the suggestion is supported by no tangible evidence. As an old public man, a former representative, and a candidate not overwhelmingly defeated at the last poll, Mr Hutchison has an undeniable right to seek election on the present occasion, though we are precluded by political principle from wishing him success. His claims far transcend those of the gentleman actually selected to carry the Government colours. On .the other side we have a most welcome, exemplification of the subordinating of private ambition to public expediency. Mr A. O. Begg, who* occupied an honourable . position as a. defeated candidate last December, had every right to the support of the party for another trial, and he straightway volunteered to do battle once mere. The exceptional degree, however, in which Mr Sligo has attracted to himself the confidence and good opinion of his fellow citizens made him a mark for. the determined attentions of many - who bad resolved that he should not be any longer allowed to remain apart from public affairs if they could help, it ; and recognising the decided concentration ofrparty Hopes upon that gentleman, Mr BeggwithouK herifcation waived his own claims and /joined heartily in' the movement. Mr Charles Haynes, though both his claims and his chances were perhaps* somewhat less, gave them up with equal promptitude for what they were worth, and deserves hardly less credit than Mr Begg. On the side of the opponents of the Government, therefore, a clear issue will be paced before the electors of Dnnedin. It remains to be seen wbefcher^Mr Ssddon .will make the attempt to take certain obviou*, if not particularly creditable, gtepg -to secure a similar advantage on his own side also.

If the Nile expedition can successfully hold Berber in the event of a The* Nile serious movement by the Expedition. Khalifa's forces against that

place, the Khartoum tyranny is already doomed, and its prophet may read the writing on the wall. This important river post, the occupation of which by Sir Herbert Kitchener's advance guard' was announced within the last two or ' three week*, ia the nearest point on the Nile to our~garrison town of Suakin on the Bed Sea, and its possession, assuming it to be permanently secure, entirely changes the whole aspect of the undertaking to ' which England has set her band in the valley of the Nile. It is now barely two months since the successful capture of Abu Hamed, the point at which the strategic desert railway from Wady Haifa has been aimed (bat which, when thab daring feat of military engineering was begun, was a stronghold of the Mahdist dervishes), placed in our hands the possibility of land transit by fail for all war material from, the harbour of Alexandria to the point where the Nile becomes a straight road to Khartoum. This immense reduction of the difficulties of the expedition has. now been followed by a still more important aid in the facilities offered by the capture of Barber for co- operating with transport ships unloading in the port of Suakin. It will be remembered that a Saakin-Barber railway was actually begun in the' bad old times of the Gordon Belief Expedition, but abandoned, as Khartoum and the Nile Valley itself were abandoned, when Gordons-d eath seemed to bring Egyptian hold on the Soudan to an untimely and disastrous end. That railway was intended as an aid to the seizure of Berber by our foree — an aid, fortunately, not now required. The expedition is now so placed that., if strong enough at the front, it need give itself next to no concern about its links of communication with an already duplicated military bsse. The Empire can rarely have possessed a better band of servants than Sir Herbert Kitchener and his gallant staff of officers — two of the most promising of whom, it is' mournful to add, sealed. with their lives the brilliant achievement which placed Berber in/ the hands of the Khedive and his protectors. The time of ultimate settlement with the Khalifa may be six months hence, or a year ; but within ' the latter space of time at the outside the Egyptian flag will wave, as Lord Cromer pledged himself last year that it should wave, over the battlements- of Khartoum. ■'

"We sincerely hope that all sides ■in Parliament will . combine to insist upon tbe immediate payment by the colony of Sir Walter Buller's costs in the Horowhenua case. We really find it difficult to believe that the Government seriously intends to repudiate a just debt by taking advantage of some legal quibble about the Public Trustee having no funds. We have hopes that the action of the Government so far is in reality a kind of joke — though a joke which involves the common honesty of the State is rather an unpleasant kind of pleasantry. The country was involved in this litigation quite unwarrantably, but even that has little to do with, the present position. The State lost — as a matter of fact its case collapied utterly before the Ministerial counsel opened his mouth— sand now the defendant,- who for two | years has been suffering under baseless slanders uttered behind the cover of privilege, and has only just been triumphantly vindicated by at last getting' his case into court, is told that owing to some contemptible technicality about the derivation of the Public Trustee's funds the, country is going to deliberately defraud him of his costs. If this is a joke it has already gone far enough. • In a few days more it will not be* distinguishable from a common theft.

The Surveyor-general, Mr Percy Smith, who is an enthusiast in Maoii ethnology, has bean traciog back our aboriginal population to its native haunts, and thinks he has found them in various Pacific islands lying beyond Karatonga, which was made a stage in their journey here. The Maori tradition points to some place called Hawaiki as the land of the origin of the. race, and much ingenuity has been expended among experts -in the placing

of this legendary sp6t, with the result that by this time quite a large proportion of the more considerable Pacific islands have atona period or other been under suspicion qf going* under a modern alias, and being really the " wanted " Hawaiki. Mr Smith's conclusions are at present stated in somewhat nebulous form, but fuller particulars are promised. As boob as they are available we shall doubtless hear from Mr B. Treg«ar on the matter, his unique contributions to the '• New ' Zealand Philosophical Transactions" on "The Aryan Maori" being for the first .time in danger of serious pulverisation. ' The question is interesting from a scientific point of view; but, we confess. ., that the point which at present most forcibly strikes upon our notice is the practical certainty, which must be held established; that at ons time hordes of savage emigrants were nott afraid to put straight tout to sea from various scattered islets of the great Pacific Ocean in the oanoes of which specimens may still be seen in the North Island, and travel ■hundreds, perhaps thousands, of miles with- „ out compasses, and with only such provisions as a canoe may carry, in search of another islet whereon to make their homes. When that fact ia seriously realised and thought , out, one cannot but bo struck with amazement that such enterprises should ever 'have j been conceived at all by the eavsge mind ; much more that they should^ hava beta successfully carried out. The provision .; difficulty, both during the voyage and after landing, must have .been immense. Later, of course, we know that these ancestral Maoris struck on the best of all- possible, means of adjusting the relations of the food supply to the consumers^ But they can hardly .have begun to eat each other quite so soon as that.

Mb T. E. Taylob, ia hig indiscrimate charges against the police, committed the fatal mistake, from a tactical point of. view, of going so fax that nobody will believe him at all unless he himself goes to the trouble of proving his allegations— if he can. That is the sensible view to take, of so violent a diatribe, and we are content to ' take it ourselvei. Me Taylor has his remedy if injustice is done him. Tha" country has already before it a sufficiently discreditable instance of how characters can ■ be safely taken away from behind the shelter of parliamentary j privilege — even to the extent of declaring that the man who hat " bested," you in some affair " ought to b» in gaol "—'and how hard it is for the person so attacked to get hit accuser out into the open and confound him there. Mr, Taylor might very well, while he was about it, have taken some ■• kind of appreciatory notice of what is called the King Country raid — au excellent piece of policing for which the Government; ; and their agents alike deserve every % credit. It ia evident that a most undesirable condition of affairs had bean established in the Maori headquarters as regards the Bale of grog, and' quite a guild of. providor'es had* sprung up whose business — and a very profitable bueinosg too— Was to corru.pt the sober 'and encourage the intemperate.'* The -native mind is impressed always by a touch of the r dramatic, and in tho .enterprise of the t lifeinsuring sergeant and bis merry men winded more tban a touch v of.it.< It is not fair to. take the' success of an undertaking of- this kind as a matter of course ; tt* ought to be recognissd that a very 'gooa "piece of -work has been skilfully and courageously done.,. The extent of the mischief previously achieved is shown not only by tha amount of grog-selling actually laid bare, but by the general mobbing of Huiaki, the informer, when he got back to camp. These King natives behaved as if one of the dearest privileges of their isolation had been rudely infringed. No .doubt it had; and co much more to the credit of the skilful and determined officers who have dissipated its sanctity.

How auyena is to get at the real truth of matters in connection with the Raratonga squabble we feel at a loss to suggest. The chiefs, according to tbe .latest news, are making no end of a row about the doings of the British Resident. They want someone, they say, who will teach them to be juet ana good and bear with them in ''their ignorance of foreign customs — things which it seems Mr If. J. Mobs has failed to do, very naturally we should imagine. Another' and counter-petition, signed by the " Parliament," declares the British Resident to be everything that , he ought to be; 'and 'as nothing tbe Parliament pan do- is effective without Mr Moss's approving signature, the members ought, to jliave a fair " jdea* jwhafc they ara writing about! The official'literature of Riratonga is, among its" most; bounteous productions. „ Among other ,thiii'g3, it affords onr own , Government Printing ' Office a very considerable .. amount of work every^ year, and the troubles of poor Mr Moss and the records of the burden of empire which' lie on his weary shoulders form quiteJlterary oases in tbe dreary deaerfc of Blue Book fodder which that institution deals out to its victims about this time of year. From the parliamentary papers of tbe present, session we observe that the revenue of tb,e group for tbe year ending June 1896 was £1428, and the "expenditure £1441, but any serious apprehensions as to the deficit of £13 are allayed by the fact that previous^ | balances more £han cover ir. The natives in all the islands number about 10,000, and their official equipment app6are to be on a surprisingly complete and elaborate scale. That Mr 'Moss will remain at the head of itin spite of the present rumpus, and that withont any such Royal Commission as he himself is asking for, may be taken for granted. Imperial representatives are not removed from isolated spheres of action on charges of failing to teach their dusky dependents how to be good and' just. Mr Moss,' moreover, when known in this colony,- may have bad his faults, but they certainly did not lie in the direction of truculence.and tyranny. His reoord in his present curious position appears to be quite a satisfactory one. ' :

An influentially-promoted company, has, been formed in Wellington for the supply of pure milk and other products to the, city.

Charles Hoodlesi has been committed for trial at Auckland on a charge of attempting to intimidato Tempie Hill by discharging a' guru 'Accused^ when asked if he had anything to say, replied, •'I only want to say I w»s";drnnW »nd ~dqas. know anything about it' 1 ' J -; '- ;-%..•