THE MAKERS OF AUSTRALIA.

Otago Witness, Issue 2884, 30 June 1909, Page 87

THE MAKERS OF AUSTRALIA.

.»■ , . THE LIFE OF SIR GEORGE GEEY. "Life of Sir George Grey, Governor, High 'Commissioner, and Premier." An historical biography by 1 James Collier, foimerlv assistant to Herbert Spencer. Messrs Whiteombs and Tombs (Ltd), ChristchiU'ch, Wellington, and Dunedin. j That it should be considered there is ! room ( for another biography ol the great j pro-consaJ is a striking tribute to' the surprising personality of Sit Georgev Grej^. The - author in , his preface sxplains that, while Mr- Rees's biography Is commendable, coming fresh in great pa-rt- from the hps of Sir George Grey, it cannot claim to be impartial- It is Grey's presentation of his own case — with his facts, his sentiments, and hi;* vindication of . himself. Professoi Henderson's f 'Life and Times of Sir George Grey" "is declared judicial and impartial, but Has none of the freshI nesr chat came to Mr R-ees from personal ! knowledge of and personal intercourse with Sir George- -Grey.- Rueden's "History of New Zealand," though indispensable for a full understanding of the two long periods of Grey's Governorship, is also dedajred not to be impartial. To these works Mr Collier acknowledges "has mdebtedoess. As for himself, lie points out that in publishing his "Bibliography of NW Zealand" he minutely esamined and briefly described . all that were' accessible of 1200 'books, reviews, magazines, etc., a large number of them relating to Grey. They have been of use in throwing light on various parts of his career. In - addition the author derived much information from personal intercourse with the- illustrious Governor. It was during this mtercours*3 that Mr Collier thinks Tie was favoured with the key wh.:ch unlocked many secrets, and "he who had long been an enigma to N his colonial contemporaries and a problem to his intimates had given uo his secret. .The heart of has mystery had been plucked ; out. The riddle of tr-e scornful sphinx i had been read." So at least it appeared to

'Mr Collier. Seeing much, of Grey af tear- ' wards, especially hi public- scenes, he found uo difficulty, lie says, in aj>p.lyin.g his discovery, and at its "Open^ sesame!'* the unbarred gatsi flew apart. Every utterance became significant an-d every action charge-d with meaning. The work, we : ars told, was written from that point of I view, and if not always or often obtruded j jit is everywhere implied. Sir George i | Giey's chaiticter is thus summed up by Mr j Collier : — "He was of the same lineage- os j Julius Csesar, Frederick, and Napoleon, if i not of the same stature. And yet, who knows? Th-ase mighty hunters of men ' were made great by their surroundings. J Had they been planted down in a British colony 60 years a-go, they would have slrown no greater faculties than Grey displayed ;. an I had Grey been placed in the | wider environment of- Canada or India, or b-aen e>et to govern a kingdom or an Empire, he might have revealed himself one !of the colossd of mankind. . . . He ' lived on into an nge when powers or limi- '. tations that he lacked were needed, and j his special attributes were an offence. He j , was then a . living anachronism, and his life a tragedy." . With tha lea-ding events of Sir George I GTey's; career our readers are fairly familiar" Mr Collier's autobiography-^ valu- . able, inasmuch as he has carefully (too v carefully, perhaps) given versions—where there are two — of various events, but be. appears to rather favour the,version which does not redound co much to Grey's credit as the one given by Mr" Eees. He give;, is it were, the evidence, but fails- to sum up or give the reader a lead no io the value of the- evidence adduced. As to the explorations iiv West ' e,m Australia of Lieutenant Grey, a-s he I then was, the impression left is that the -, expeditions were unmanaged and the ie!- ! port-s untrustworthj . As resident at AlI bury- and as Governor of South, Australia, Grey's work as a philologist, anthropologist ". and savant bas impressed the author, but I'the credit appears to be Tather grudgingly- ! given. Grey's ' woi'k during hie first term ' a<s Governoar of New Zealand is dealt with jat considerable- length. As to the* disj agreements* with the New Zealand Company and ttae Otago and- Canterbury Assoi ciations, £he author finds that the auto- " crat was iealaits of the Jmperia in imperio . wl^ich these corporations represented. The biographer ann-ears unable- in places to make up his mind as to whether , the Constitution of New Zealand 1 was i Grey's handiwork. With regard to the ! Kaffir rifino- while G-rev was High Qpmmissioner in Sp-uth Africa. Mr • Collier writes : — "Tavo very different versions ',i the events have been gi4 r en. On one side thsre is th-e picturesque and pc-etical narrative of Mi* Rasa, probably inspired fey Giey, and told jn&t as Grey was in The habit of telLing it On the other hand, iv« have the far balder and more prosaic, but posaiblv more exact, narrative of Professor Hend'Si'son. who presumabiv derived ■his iact.l from the copies of Grey's de-snatch-e^ tn tba Government -irehives at Capetown. The discrepancies between (he two at first sierlit transcend the discor.dawieft atnons: the Eornan legends that whetted t-he .irasfenuity ofNiebuhT. or those that baffle the liarmoni'ser* of the Pentateuch or. the- „ Gospels. Examined more closely, they 'are s«en to be mutually complsroentaTv. i« Hv itself imperfect Pird incomniete. Either states wV-at the other omits, and vi^e versa. The' two. ■ taken to wether, contain the whole trnth." . The most serioiTS irestanc^ of Mr Collier's . vaocilatkm. amounting .in t-liia cose to positive iniup+iioe. is tt> be found in Tiis- , arciunt of G^rv's action in connection with the Ir-^Hn '■outin^. Grey to thr *»nd of hi? lif-a claimed to iiave saved . India by divertine to that country the trooT'3 Avhich r">ll-°d at when on the wav to Cb'Ti'v. Thiis r-laim is oh-ir-•actei'ii'-ed hv 3VTr Collier 3« "••> rti->iv> hallnfination." er "a t'ssne of ha]li'/ > iTK>tions. " , Hs goes further, and says :—"lt: — "It \« diffil cu.lt to conceive that a' sane nurd can

have •entertained sudi delusions. . . Megalomania nad permanently distorted the v bailaiica of his mind. . . Grey had no more- to- do with the divers-ion "than the man in- the moon," After this strong language the author lamely "takes it all ba-ck," and concludes the chapter thus: — "'Evidence is deficient on the one side, and altogether lacking on the other. In a matter -n which there ought to tva thousands of witnesses still living we are unable positively to say that the transports complied with -the requests of Grey or obeyed the orders of Elgin. Grey's contention, which looks like the delusion of a distempered brain, is . at least very agreeable."'- Mr Collier's account of Garey's recall from* Cape Colony is not so clear as it might have been made by a fuller investigation of the circumstances winch art' set forth in the -"Life of Lord Norton." Grey went back triumphant to South Africa, and then served a second term, as Governor of New Zealand, sent here to bring to a. dose the Maori wais. MiCollier dsak all but too briefly vpth Grey's subsequent advent' in jSew Zealand politic, his career as superintendent of Auckland, axtd' his Premiership of the colony/He makes- a statement regarding an agrs«meht proposed which is not generally known. This was that Gr'py should l>eobme chief commissioner in ,_ the King" 'Country. The proposal, it is paid.;dazzled' him for a space.- But when h's ?< found vhe was to be sandwiched between two aiesisiant oommisioners he refused the position,, and thenceforth acted as ii he' had been deliberately humiliated. , We regard Mr Collier's work in manyrespects most valuaul'9. He is a skilful and clever -writer : hut- we do net believe lie thoroughly understands Grey's manysided character,. The biographer considers GrfeVs Radicalism was no recantation, of Toryism. It had » physical basis. - The> germinating impulse came front withour. "Estrangement from the governing class was its motive. It was a radicalism of revolt. The rebellious passions — outragedpride, hatred, revengue, thwarted ambition — supplied ife^ nutriment. . . The of liis career 'is the evolution of- .&> rebe 7 . We perceive the genesis of the rebel *in his flight from school. ' He broke away from the ai'my to head an exploring expsditionl He started on & second exploration witlf,6ut waiting tie afcoAtjon of the Secretary) 'of Sjate,. and ecueetwaptly without knowing- it had btfiik mm&va.wn._ - In South. Australia the aufoornt was manuring, and' the future rebel in -training. There ha draw; bills on' the Imperial -Government aftet he knew that hi£ predecessor's 1 , billshad been dishonoured. ... During. 1 his .first term .in. "Stevr Zealand:- when he> refused to give- effect to the political constitution f ashioaed, in the Colonial • Office, Ihr rebel flung his first .bold, and yet hv terms respectful, defiance. In South.. Africa*, 1 wlien he put the Fingoes . and the German Legion on full, pay ~ agaicst the instructions. of the War Office, when ho -continued his enlightened administration of British Kafram in spite of the reduc-' tiom of the necessary English parliamentary vote, when-h-3 diverted to Calcutta* the British txoups touching at the-CapeV when he sent out troops, horses, and specie- to ' India during the mo tiny, when he re-enrolled the German Legion and despatched it to Bombay, and' when he promoted the federation o£ South Africa in a manner opposed to- the instructions of the Colonial Office, his rebellion was full blown. . Grey was thus a rebel all Ins days. .- . . Be had a rebel's fate. . . . In his abandonment and implacable^ xage tire old Governor, spurned by the Colonial Office and scouted by the colony he had so lon* . ruled, harboured' tj-easonable designs against fl-je Imperial Government. On a memorable occasion, to a- fiinule auditor, on the midnightstreets, with earnest accents that betrayed: not a ' trace of insincerity, for a space or two hours he propounded " a project of </ military rising; by means of which, he wou.ld gain command of the British army and take posssssion of all tb? agencie« of government.' . . . The scheme waa so cojnpcehensive and coherent, so minute and detailed,- tbat it must have been a subject pf thouefht with him through months, • and nerhaps years. It was consistent with his public utterances. " Thee» who remember Sir George will recall, the* delight he took in what is vulgarly known as "puiline- the leg" of a too Credulous listener. We are afraid Mr Collier was subjected to this process. We prefer the Grey limned by anothei biographer. Professor .Headersor -irho in a recen-fc lecture in Adelaide paid:— Sir George Grey was always the apostle of what he described as "equality *of opportunity." I To his mind Sir George was one of the most consistent of men and statesmen. People could not distinguish between autocratic temperament and democratic convictions. They were continually confusing the two.' Men might be autocratic in temper and at the same time have views exceedingly radical. That was the case with Sir George Grey. He could not work with other people in office. The- spirit of constitutional government v-^ not in him, and Sir Georsre Grey remained true to the policy of radical ImperiaK&m. Professor Henderson focussed in a few illuminating sentences the v political creed of Sir George Grey— his lifelong conviction of the value of selfgovernment, his effort to secure representation' of the people in Parliament, bis. genuine and practical interest in education, the, , deep-rooted ■ religious and humanitarian, .-motives, -underlying - Impolicy and- bis whole-souled enthusiasm, for the British Emphfe: Sir: George fought almost" desperately for^self-fovern-ment in the colonies, and made it clear that self-government did not mean separation.^ He siw-that there were- problems which could only "be solve' 3by men on the spot. He urged that self-government, granted to- the~fullesfc extent, was not on'.y essential to the neV Imperialism, bnfc the very corner stone of Empire. He believed there could be felf-governing nations within the. Empire, and yet for the Empire to exist. In his work in South

AnsfcraKa^ New Zealand, and South Africa Sir George G-rey displayed extraordinary penetration and foresight. His career as an Imperial officer ended abruptly after a memorable and heroic . struggle for self-government. He lived j in an age of transition, and Imperial j Ministers had no alternative but to get rid of him. But the future was on his side, and self-government was low a sine qua non of Imperial unity. -While we have criticised Mr Collier's work we recognise in it a valuable contribution to colonial literature, and »ye congratulate the author and the publishers on the work, which "is neatly printed.