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The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Volume 64

One of the Members for Wanganui

One of the Members for Wanganui.

Mr Ballance is an anomaly. Like [unclear: Abrah] Lincoln, President Garfield, Sir [unclear: Sam] Parkes, and many other colonial celebrities, Mr Ballance is a self-made man. Poor is purse and education, on his arrival in New Zealand he took for his motto "Excelsior," and displayed the most laudable self-helpful ness in turning his hand to almost anything. page 13 [unclear: commendable] perseverance he set [unclear: to] educated himself in politics, and finally [unclear: ed] a leading position in the colony. In [unclear: time,] knowing well that brains, not [unclear: es,] rule the world, Mr Ballance soon [unclear: ed] his method of earning a living. [unclear: He] to vending a variety of wares among the [unclear: s,] but finding this unprofitable, he began [unclear: pense] trashy wares in the shape of [unclear: sgem] politics and tawdry theories of [unclear: ce] in a newspaper which fell under his con[unclear: Mr] Ballance then became a cornet in the [unclear: ganui] Cavalry, but finding that even a [unclear: t] and thoroughly skilful officer like [unclear: the] Col. Whitmore knew less of war than [unclear: did] amateur, Mr Ballance, as war corres-[unclear: t] of a Wanganui paper, severely [unclear: sed] his commanding officer; so severely, [unclear: that] it led to Mr Ballance giving up [unclear: ord] for the pen.

[unclear: long] after, Mr Ballance entered the [unclear: e,] where he attracted notice by his [unclear: es.] He spoke seldom during [unclear: each] and then only on great occasions. [unclear: well] read, though self-educated, [unclear: he] spoke without the most careful deliberated each of his speeches was an oration—[unclear: resenlt] of weeks of careful preparation, [unclear: soon] brought him fame, and [unclear: gave] a position that could not be over-[unclear: d] by any leader of a party; he was powerful that he had a right to any [unclear: cy] in a Ministry. His future [unclear: seemed] prosperous, and his many friends were [unclear: t] that he would be the legitimate suc-[unclear: r] of Stafford and Vogel. Then came the [unclear: ing] folly of Mr Ballance's life, fol-[unclear: by] folly after folly. In their hour of ut-[unclear: need], admitted, as he had been, to their [unclear: il,] and on the eve of a no-[unclear: confidence] he most astonishingly changed his [unclear: s] and took the opposite side. [unclear: This] a severe shock to his warmest friends; [unclear: it] was rewarded at once by Sir [unclear: George] offering this political Judas [unclear: Iscariot] Keeper ship of the colonial bag. A life [unclear: tical] honesty and [unclear: straightforwardness] have expiated his former deception, [unclear: he] might even yet have lived it down [unclear: ined] a higher post; but the old inbred [unclear: bleness] re-appeared. The amateur [unclear: ly] officer anonymously writing down his [unclear: ander]-in-Chief, when changed into a [unclear: onal] politician, did not scruple to stig-[unclear: e,] or at all events, did not check a [unclear: paper] which be had control, from [unclear: stigmatizing] political leader, Sir George Grey, as a [unclear: l] shrinking to his island home in the [unclear: hour] peril Sir George Gey, after many and [unclear: ful] inquiries, convinced himself, rightly or [unclear: gly] that his lieutenant had written this; and, flaming with justifiable wrath, showed his bitter hatred; but the insensate Ballance, the Colonial Treasurer, no more dreamt of sending in his resignation than did, years before, the cornet of the Wanganui Horse. Grey, unable, like Whitmore, to summon a court-martial, rang the bell for a policeman to eject Mr Ballance from the Cabinet chamber. The man who had fought fierce savages in Western Australia, and unflinchingly faced appalling dangers, was not the man to calmly brook his subordinate's attacks, and introduced this method of dismissing a colleague for which no precedent can be found in May or Tod. Now Mr Ballance has lost all political influence in the House, and no leader would for a moment dream of offering him a portfolio. In our political history no greater paradox can be discovered than Mr Ballance's career; even De Morgan never unearthed a more marvellous. Ballance had worked his way upward so far, against so many difficulties and drawbacks, had achieved so much, and seemed capable of achieving so much more, that he might reasonably have aspired, after the lapse of a few years to the Premiership and a K.C.M.G. All this bright future, for which he had struggled so hard, and for which he had endured so much, he utterly destroyed by two of the grossest pieces of folly which any man could have committed. He gained nothing by them—on the contrary, he lost everything. The public cannot understand, they can only greatly wonder, and be full of pity.