The Star. TUESDAY, DECEMBER 20, 1881.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 4263, 20 December 1881, Page 2

The Star. TUESDAY, DECEMBER 20, 1881.

In Thosb Civilised Countbibb whose - people have the privilege of governing themselves, ose of the most important faotora in State affairs is Publio Opinion. This somewhat ill-defined and shadowy powor is reoognised to be the lever by which nations oan bo moved, rulers unsettled, and cabinets established or overthrown. Hence a favourable Publio Opinion has come to be eagerly sought after by persons plaoed in high positions. Ab ' it is not always to be found it has sometimes ' to be created. Experts deolare that ite manufaoture is the easiest thing in the world, - when you know how to set about it. The Hall Ministry would certainly seem to possess this knowledge, and sinoo | their advent to power—or perhaps we i should rather say, to place— they have rer duced the manufaoture of Publio Opinion to [ a fine art, or, at any rate, have raised it into 1 the position of a local industry. Within the • Oolony the task has beon simple enough, t The PreßS of New Zoaland is unhappily for i the most part under the direct control of the . capitalists, and the latter of oourse utilise it 2 for the support of their pet Government. - Nor as regards Australia has any very great | trouble to be taken. The leading newspaper* | there are oarefully fed with information _ diluted with Hall spirit, and their artioleß - flavoured in oonsequence with the same, are 1 with equal oare reprinted in the numeroue 1 Ministerial organs here. The whole process ie , quite plain and simple. The editor, let us say, of a Government paper in New Zealand, is the correspondent of a widely-read Australian I journal. He writes, periodically, letters to . this, filled with praise of his Wellington J patrons and denunciation of their politioal l opponents. The well-informed Australian . journal, taking all this for gospel, proceeds s to comment, thereon, to the glorification of • Mesirs Bryce, Bolleston and 00., and the ' confounding of the other side. On the looki out for these comments stands tho expectant ; editor — correspondent in New Zealand. 1 Seizing on them he reprints them in hia own '_ publication, and probably extols them in hie . leading columns as an instance of the unl biassed judgment- of those lookers on who ' are proverbially supposed to sco most of the ' game, j Thus the wheel goes round, and this, unless • we are greatly mistaken, is at the bottom of ' most of those familiar paragraphs headed. " The Australasian, in commor.ting on the • state of politioal parties in Now Zealand, says ' &0., &o." Thore is, howevor, au antidoto tothis as far as Australian criticism goes, mas,- , much as the people of New Zealand as a rule care rather less than nothing at all for it. This may be right or it may bo wrong, but it is the fact. When, howover, the name of England is brought in, tho uffair is different. We do think a great deal of what one of the great London dailies or weeklies obooßßß to say about us. Yot that thoir Olympian ' thunders are ofton not one whit more worthy of regard than tho flashes of their Australian brethren, a Bingle recent example will sufEoe to show. In the Daily News of Oct. 27, appears a long telegram on Now Zoaland affairs, sont through Beuter'a Agercy, and, therefore, presumably impartial. Yet had it come from - the pen of the Hon Mr Bryco himself, it could not have put the Ministerial sido of the caso more prettily. It rehearsed thp orimes and aggressions of the Natives, and the gonorosity and clemency of the Government. It told of tho alarm that was felt at the attitude of Te Whiti's followers,, and doscribed tho efforts of tho Cabinet to bring thorn to reason. The Bubstanoe of the famous Proclamation was given in a couple of tho most innocent,, peaceful, long-suffering looking sentences in tho language. Then came tho ueual finaleabout publio opinion in the Oolony everywhere strongly supporting tho aotion of the Govornment. Tho telegram olosod with the bare announcement that Sir Arthur Gordon had returned from Fiji to tho Oolony. Had Router's agents described this last event from a point of view as fairly Opposition as their standpoint for Parihaka affairs had been Ministerial, what an amplification thoro would have been of tho aeoount of Sir Arthur's return. A porusal of this telegram enables ub to comprehend tho cablo mosßOgo about tho Daily News applauding Mr Bryco's Nativo policy, and to cstimato thut applause at its propor worth.