The Australian Drought.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXX, Issue 51, 18 December 1902, Page 18

The Australian Drought.

Mr. Seddon's kindly offer to supply Australia with fodder and seeds at cheap rates ha 9 been rejected with thanks, and with assurances that the recent beneficent rains will shortly enable the continent to meet its own wants. The incident is creditable to both parties ; to New Zealand, because of the present high prices of such articles 1 , and to Australia because of the indication of sturdy self-reliance that never acknowledges defeat. It xnuat bo admitted that men who can retain their hopefulness and self-reliance under such depressing conditions as have prevailed in Australia for the last two or three years, must be made of sterling stuff. Perhaps their confidence is largely due to their experience of the extraordinary recuperative nature of the soil. Its fertility has not been destroyed ; it has merely been stored up, and under the life-giving rains, will, according to all previous records, restore the average of production in a season or two. In many parts of this Colony there seems a superabundance of moisture. Over large areas in Australia the farmers would esteem themselves fortunate if as much rain fell in a season as falls in some parts of this Colony in 24 hours. And yet they seem to prosper, as men of energy do in any part of the world, even amidst the most forbidding surroundings. For example, in the extreme north of Scotland out-door rural employment is impossible for four or five months in the year. The farmer has to earn a year's subsistence in a few months. Transplant these men to the arid wilds of Australia and they become vigorous and sturdy colonists. The Irishman, not enervated by the genial and balmy air of his native isle, leads the way in settling the most untoward parts of the earth, and finds in the conditions of colonial independence and cosmopolitanism that outlet for his talents too often denied him at home. Such men do not think themselves degraded by accepting help from their own immediate kin. The Queensland farmer or the settler in the Victorian mallee will sturdily ask_his Government to give him free transit for his starving stock to greener pastures than his own, or accept seed for the next season on terms of long payment. But he would spurn help from outside sources, just as a brother would accept help from one of his own family but would scorn assistance from strangers if it at all savored of charity. It would be ungracious to suppose that any commercial considerations lay behind the refusal to accept help. A New South Wales Minister recently angrily refused to remit duties on produce because it would teaefit a certain ring. Happily, no such suspicion attaches to the rejection of Mr. Seddon's offer.