DEATH OF MR BRYDONE.

Otago Witness, Issue 2623, 22 June 1904, Page 20

DEATH OF MR BRYDONE.

By the death, not wholly unexpected, of Mr Thomas Brydone, which occurred in London on Friday last, the community suffers the loss of a- colonist of whom it may be said, not merely in the conventional way but in all sincerity, that it can ill afford to lose him. We^have not the slightest desire to underrate the importance of the ser,vice rendered by statesmen in the important work of nation-building in newlysettled lands, but few persons probably .will be found to dispute the soundness of the proposition that more permanently valuable even than the service performed ljy statesmen is that performed by the masters of industry who devote their energies to the early utilisation of the 'natural resources of the country of their adoption, and who thus lay the foundations upon which its material progress rests. And among many names that Jiave bqen honoured in New Zealand for ,the benefits that the colony has derived from the sagacious and successful development of the agricultural and pas- . toral industries of the colony, there is certainly none entitled to be held in greater respect than that of Thomas 33rydone. The service he - rendered in connection with the establishment of the frozen meat industry is alone sufficient to connect his name enduringly with the industrial history of New Zealand, and to cause his memory to be held in lasting esteem in the Australasian colonies. The proposals for the carriage of meat in a frozen condition from the grazing countries in the Southern to the distributing centres in the Northern Hemisphere may have been, and no doubt were, carefully considered in the United Jlingdom before they were Carried into practical effect; but, so far as New Zealand is concerned, the credit ■of having founded the frozen meat trade belonged, as all impartial witnesses agreed, to Mr Brydone. A few years ago, on the eve of his leaving the colony upon a visit to the Mother Country, a graphic picture was drawn of how, at a time prior to the establishment of the industry, Mr Brydone, " in the face of enormous odds, stood almost alone in the breach, and preached the value of a, movement which would relieve the congested flocks of this country and feed the starving millions of the Old Land," and we were reminded that the benefit of the efforts Mr Brydone then put forth had ever since been experienced in New Zealand. There is, indeed, no colonial industry that, in respect of its expansion, parallels or even Approaches that with which Mr Brydone's name must be ever associated. An industry which is responsible for onefifth of ihe total exports of a colony that has the most varied resources — an industry which in point of importance ranks second only to the wool-growing j industry, and which has doubled the extent of its exports in six years, and, though it now sends avray meat to the j yalue of over three millions, continues steadily to expand — is, it must be acknowledged, a factor of the highest .consequence in promoting and maintaining our prosperity. Mr Brydone's services to the community did not by any means end, however, with his exertions in connection with the establishment of the frozen meat industry. The fact Is that he was a man of rare foresight, considerable courage, and exceptional Enterprise, and the success that attended the operations <# the company with Iwhich he was asaSflftited was admittedly j 'due in large measure to the exercise of t the combination of qualities he possessed. TJhat he could net have accomplished all that he di 6 "fcnless he had secured the hearty co-operation of the directors on whose behalf he was acting *s3s 3 of

course, manifest, but it would be ungenerous if the public Avere not to recognise the influence of Mr Brydone's active mind and strong common sense in the maintenance by the New Zealand and Australian Land Company of the highest standard of excellence in its herds and flocks, in its constant adherence to the principle that only the best was serviceable in the methods and appliances it adopted in the management of its estate?, in the practical example it set in the establishment of dairy factories on modern lines, 'and in various other ways in which its policy has been productive of benefit to the colony. The members of the agricultural, pastoral, and commercial community in Otago will feel in Mr Brydone's death all the sense of a deep personal loss, but New Zealand itself is sensibly the poorer through the removal of a colonist who did so much to promote the development of its resources and industries.