South Canterbury Times. WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 1892.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 6750, 3 February 1892, Page 2

South Canterbury Times. WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 1892.

The police inquiry into the Pahiatua poisoning case resulted in nothing but a cock-and-bull story about a man in the dark and a cloth turned back on a dish of lamb. It is not at all unlikely that there was a man in the dark. Many a swagger might be tempted to call at a house where a marriage feast',was on, and, finding no one about the rear of the house, to help himself to a few slices of cold lamb without an “If you please.” Much more reasonable appears to be the suggestion of the Manawatu Daily Times , published in the neighbourhood of the disaster. This paper says ; “ This afternoon our reporter noticed a keg marked * arsenic ’ in the railway goods shed, from which the deadly powder was issuing in noticeable quantities, and it at once struck him that the Pahiatua poisoning affair may have been caused by arsenic which had escaped in some such manner, and become mixed with dour, salt, or other articles of consumption. May not the poison have been contained in some biscuits which were probably all eaten at the marriage feast ? The recent poisoning case at Mangahao, where a farmer partook of some biscuits, and in consequence was attacked with all the symptoms of arsenical poisoning, appears to bear out this theory. The railway authorities should csrtainly insist upon having the dangerous poison securely packed before undertaking its carriage. ” The caution to the railway is much more needed, we believe, by the steamship carriers, as in the holds of the steamers all kinds of goods are mingled in much more higglety-pigglety fashion than they can possibly be in railway trucks. A few years ago, many of our readers may remember, a large line of, salt we think it was, was condemned at Wellington, because it had been adulterated in a ship’s hold with leakage from packages of arsenic or some other swift poison. So late as yesterday, we are informed, a bag of sugar discharged from a steamer here, was found to be wetted by leakage from a package of sheep-dip, which usually contains arsenic. This might not have been noticed when it was, and in a little time the bag would have dried, and the slight stain left on bag and sugar would have been attributed to water, though it is possible the sugar had absorbed poison enough to kill another wedding party. A stringent law is needed against the careless mingling of poisonous merchandise with food stuffs that now goes on without check.

Dr Bakewell, of Auckland, gives a novel reason why the Labour Bills, approved by the unions, should be passed, and passed as they are sent up by the organised workers. Hitherto, he says, the wageearners have been treated like children, legislated for and legislated against mostly against ; never allowed to manage their own affairs; and constantly told they did not know what was good for them. Pass their Bills. What if they prove to be injurious to some extent? Has it not been the fate of many measures passed by Legislatures in which the wageearners had no vote, to do more harm than good ? If the Labour Bills do harm, the first to feel it will be the labourers, and they will have them altered or repealed in double-quick time.

Is it not amusing that while the London advisers of the colonies have been preaching against further raising of loans for a period of years, the Australian colonies are taking their advice and ignoring it at the same time. They will not borrow on loan, to be repaid never, but on bills repayable in a couple of years they are borrowing an amount which in loans would have been condemned as most extravagant. And apparently their London advisers are so dumbfounded by this bold move that they have but very general criticisms to offer upon it, or complaints that it is not a fair move, as so much of former loan stocks remains yet unplaced in the market. It appears to be quite easy to get money on these Treasury Bills, a different class of money holders being able to invest in short-dated securities, who could not invest in prac icaliy interminable loans. But what will happen when the two years have expired ? It will bo simply impossible to repay all the millions that Australia is now raising for two years only. The whole must be added to the permanent debt by means of fresh loans, and it will be of no use for the advice gratis people to object—the colonies will have got the money.