Poverty Bay Herald. PUBLISHED EVERY EVENING GISBORNE, OCTOBER 5, 1926. EMPIRE BUILDERS

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LII, Issue 17156, 5 October 1926, Page 6

Poverty Bay Herald. PUBLISHED EVERY EVENING GISBORNE, OCTOBER 5, 1926. EMPIRE BUILDERS

In, ; .Empiro week it .may not bo out of pJaeOj,t'o recall the .memory of Sir George- Grey.." trne, story' 6f The life of this'remarkable mau has not yet bora written: perhaps it never will boi written. Selected for his capacity to deal with troubles arising- in the colonial possessions of the Crown, he became Governor, with powers hardly limited except by the control of the Colonial Ollace itself, in .South Africa, Australia and Now Zealand. .His career in these positions was quite unexampled for its vigor, breadth of view, and almost, uncurbed power, by any other public servant of his own or any other day. Controlled only by the Colonial Office in London, for the most part, of his tenure of-high office without any means of steam or cable communications? with London, he was necessarily left very much to his own devices, for, often, action was called for, when instructions forbidding such action was quite unknown to the Governor, upon the seas, at the mercy of the conflicting breezes or calms near the,Line. That under such circumstances, a strong man by nature, and one, accustomed as a trained soldier, to rule arbitrarily, that Grey's life should have aroused an unparalleled bitterness before and since his death is hardly as remarkable as that such bitterness was not even deeper. In Africa and New Zealand he had run counter to early associations of the first settlers, who naturally expected that their rewards, as pioneers, should at least be equal to the sacrifices they hud made in leaving behind them all that they held most dear, in order to come ami break in what was apparently an unoccupied wilderness. It. would have been impossible for the first settlers to weigh, in equal balances, the rights.of the natives, the plighted word given to them by treaty of the Crown; and it was even more difficult still for them to see that any too early augmentation of waste lands in few hands might be a severe handicap in and to the best future, of the country, which was greatly to depend upon equality of opportunity, and the slowsett lenient of a prosperous people, of sufficient numbers, permanently settled upon the waste lands, under stable conditions which permitted of independence and at the same lime a fair reward. The Colonial Uince of those days held down the scales heavily on the side of the native peoples. The unfortunate Governor had to risk being recalled, and in a measure disgraced, or to tako steps, which often, lie secretly disliked, and which caused resentment among the settlers, who could not be appeased by instructions given from London, which could not be disclosed in justification. "We may here give the testimony of one of his unusually candid biographers, who certainly thought the excellence of a biography consisted in severe criticism of the subject. He says:—"By his energy and his wisdom, his originalities and his audacities he rose, head and shoulders, above all other Colonial Governors before him or since. lit will ever be one of the greatest figure? ii the colonial history of the Empire." Sir George Grey's triumphs, trials, and mistakes, as Governor, would not be referred to here to-day, were it not for his visions as to the Empire. Before Disraeli offered to his Queen the title of Empress of India; before he, not without vision, sought to strengthen Great Britain in the Mediterranean by the acquisition of Cyprus and a ruling share in the Suez Canal, Grey was advocating a federation of New Zealand with the islands of the South Seas. At that time neither French nor German interests had been created in the Pacific. Bishop Selwyn 's first voyage in Polynesia as a missionary of souls, and also, unacknowledged, of Empire, still fnrthoi fired the inspired vision of Grey's earlier days. Both these men shared a common friendship, and both of them were great Empire builders, possessed of the traveller's vision in a marked degree: they were both men, in whom loyalty to the Crown was bred in the very-'bone: always in their dreams they saw Great Britain the centre of world-wide dominion; if not also the centre of a wider sphere which should include the whole English-speaking-Anglo-Saxon races, ami the native races of India, Africa, and Polynesia. Grey also sketched out nearly seventy-five-years ago a plan for the federation of. nil the states of Africa; Rhodes only followed where Grey had led. The first succeeded where Grey had failed: but it is at least conceivable that Rhodes would not have .'Succeeded but for the failure in aciion of Jits gr/'ftt predecessor in vision. Men who fail, and are unduly despondent, may find some cheer in the thought that is is only such-personal failures that make the success of others possible. Cold comfort this| but it is something, for greatness, in reality, does not depend so much upon what gels 'itself done, but'.whnt eaeh ninn. according to his opportunities, and. (he ripeness of the time forhis work, attempts to do. The work of Rhodes as a practical'and successful Empire builder is well known. In his own way, lie had in him lhe seeds of a rebel 'against authority, which Tightly or wrongly were so freely attributed to Grey, and possibly was the cause that he left"to others to accomplish great things which he sawonly in vision. What is not so well known is that Rhodes, who lived so much in the'future, lived also in the past. He had had typed copies of the greater classices specially made for his own use at Oxford. Ho loved old things; ho would collect them. And

yet it was the wild things he delighted in—the lions, the zebras, the ostriehs; but the bonds thai held these wild creatures in must be unseen; although captives, they had to be so free as he could make them. And in contrast he was a lover of roses and all garden flowers of color" and beauty; and above all, he delighted in the purity of the hills, in the new world, which ho did so much to help to make, although they too, sturdy rebels, defied past time, as well as time which is vet to be. This week, which is a week for Empire trading, those great Empire builders, the, shipping companies, eau hardly be forgotten. Shipping companies are not popular; they are supposed to make marvellous profits, which, however, the quotations for their sliaros hardly confirms. They are hard working servants. The record of the Shaw, Savill Company is a great one: they have carried ourselves and our goods with wonderful regularity, and great safety for nearly threequarters of a century. The record of the New Zealand Shipping Company is not so long, but it has been as good and it has the added charm of being our own enterprise. Something should be said of this Empire building in itself. Has it been worth while? Is it worth while? What, are its objects? Where are we going'? Like past civilisations are we riding hard for a speedy fall? Who can say? But this may be said. We have not built, so far as the building has yet gone, upon the conquest or enforced submission of other powers. Xone. are lurking behind us watting for the time to come for revenge for past wrongs. Our rulers have made- no. claim to infallibility but they have endeavored to build upon foundation of right dealing and right doing to all other peoples and races. Native races have been educated and some have been absorbed, but there is no country to which the Union Jack has been carried, and remained, but what has benefited by British rule. This is a groat record for which we should be thankful, and in some degree, unashamed.