TOO MUCH WEALTH.

Tuapeka Times, Volume XVIII, Issue 1215, 20 January 1886, Page 5

TOO MUCH WEALTH.

There would be something comic, and even grotesque, were it not for its sad side, says Mr Thomas Hughes, in the loud wail which has been rising from all parts of Great Britain and her dependencies during the past year over the depression, stagnation — •' imminent collapse and ruin, as many doleful prophets will have it— in every branch of British trade and industry. " Why am I ruined ? What in the world is the matter with me ?" pleads John Bull, and at intervals roars, to his most trusted advisers and most successful children. '• Matter ? Why don't you see you've got too much cotton ?" replies one ; " Too much tea and sugar," cries a second ; and a third, " Too much corn ; while the most solemn and most profound of the chorus answers with severe and assured front, " Too much labor, If you want to be the hearty chap you once were, you've got to bundle out about a third of your producers.', la vain he turns on his Job's comforters with, "Why, bless my soul, didn't you tell me that all I wanted was wealth ? And now, what do you call cotton, and tea, and sugar, and corn and labor ? Ain't they wealth ? Did any fellow ever pile them up as I have been doing these last fifty years, since Father Adam's time ? And now you tell me I'm ruined because I've got too much of them all around ?"