The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1901-04-04

they waste them in jealousy prevent
ing the improvement of the invalua BILE
Frisco mail?
The business which brings Mr.. J. D.
Spreckels, of the Oceanic Steamship
Company, to New Zealand, is fraught
with the most vital Importance to our
port of Auckland, and to the whole of
New Zealand. The Pacific mall service
is the great connecting link between
this colony and the mother country. 1t
places US in Immediate and direct con-
necuon with nearly 10000, 600 people of
our own race and language, and binds
US as nothing else could with the great
civilized world of which We are an out
post. When we consider the immense
waste of water which separates us
from the land of our fathers, where
still we find profitable market for our
products, and the center of our i'm
perial unity; when we remember the
slowness of the rival federal route. via
Suez. and the impossibility of any rea-
sonable competition via Canada; when
we recall the weary waiting for letters
and the weary weeks OF homeWard
travel which were compulsory upon US
before this great natural route was
brought to its present perfection; we
must feel that to New Zealand the en-
couragement and maintenance Of the
Frisco service Is an imperative and
absolute necessity. Mr.. Spreckels has
come to place before us a most reason
able and business-like proposition.
having for its purpose the satisfactory
settlement of the mail contract ques-
ton now In allegiance. He has a SINH
lar proposition to make to the Austria
liam government, but Of that we need
say little. AS the sun moves eastward
the advantages of the Frisco route
becomes less supreme. We are of
opinion that the Eastern States Of
Australia may act in a very impolitic
and short-sighted manner IL they do
not realize that even to them the
Frisco route offers incontestable adj
vantages. But the objection to feder-
alton that in many important matters
our interests and theirs are not neces-
sarily the same applies emphatically
to such question as this. Whatever
the Australians may think of the FRS
co service, to New Zealand there can
the shortest, quickest and most relia-
Bile route to London, and as such must
be supported and encouraged.
1t is creditable alike to the charac-
ter of the Oceanic Company and to our
own reputation for fair dealing that
Mr.. Spreckels does not come to make
any dictatorial demand under threat of
dire consequences. His position is
plain; his proposal is a commendable
one. The American government has
made a contract with his company
which requires that mails shall be car
ried from San Francisco to Auckland
in seventeen, and to Sydney in twenty
one days. The aim of the company is
to deliver them in sixteen and twenty
days respectively. But no such con-
tract requirements are in force for the
return run from Auckland to Frisco
l. i.
per mile is disproportionately heavy
for high pressure steamlng, and that
we cannot expect companies to burn
coal without some corresponding re-
turn. The Oceanic Company will carry
our mails northward as we'll as south
ward, but we cannot control the time
of carriage-that is to say, we cannot
depend upon the speedier time being
made-unless our government makes
an equitable arrangement in which
fast time is called for. Should there
be any hesitancy? We have offered to
US a twenty-seven days service to
London; but that is a maximum. In
reality, a twenty-six day service is
available, for the speed capacity OF the
magnificent Oceanic liners, the i'm
provements being made on the Ameri-
can trunk lines and the breaking of
records now in vogue on the Atlantic
practically insure the shorter time
WllHln tuS year. IL we compare tHlS
with the fastest federal route time OF
thirty-eight and forty days to London,
with the only slightly shorter time
ever effected by the Vancouver SER
vice, we are compelled to admit that
the Frisco route stands clear Of all
rivals, and defies all possibility of
competition. It transforms US from an
outlying dependency upon the Austria
liam services to the nearest Australia
sian colony Of Britain. The pride of
our people as we'll as It's highest COM
mercial, political and social interests
are involved in the maintenance and
interviewer with the Improvement of
this unique and enviabIe position.
What would we not have paid thirty
years ago for twenty-six days SER
vice to London? Have we lost in the
gathering Of riches that commercial
and national foresight which
opened to US the standing we now en-
joy and made it possible for us to as
pire to dominance in the South Pa