Ka Leo o ka Lahui, Volume II, Number 194, 15 May 1891 — THE MINISTER AND PALI ROAD. [ARTICLE]

THE MINISTER AND PALI ROAD.

It lias been a watter of surprise ar>d general comment, that so far no stei»s liave been taken tf> bet?in the inueh prayed for and uueh needed PaJi Road. It is now well known that the reason for the delay is, that the Minister of the Interior has a pet roadbuilder, a Mr. Meyer; who haB been empl«yed building roads in Kona, Ilawaii. Oa account of the unequalled engineering skill displayed by the road builder, and the necessily of preserving «11 the

etrategie points for" njilitary piirposes in,the building of tlie Puii Hoad the work has been neces sari! v delayed until Mr. Mever roturnt d'from Kona. Who this Mr. Meyer is we have been unable to learn beyond being a stranger in the cou"ntry, and possibly a relation of the Minister; but this we do know, that the Minister has added another well-earne(f thorn to his martyr'B crown. There is no the fact, that the empioyment of eomparative dtrangers iij preference to numbers of able and competent kamaainas, has not added any to the already lustreles.s oilieial character in whieh the present Minister is generally esteftmed in this eommunity. The refusal of this prodigy in road building, to employ na tives of the country as laborers, places the* MiniBter of the Interior in the same rank, with the Hawaiians, as the great Hawaiian philanthropist, Mr. Garter,—the latter by advocnting a burial to a living grave at the Leper Settlement9f all thc Hawaiians, and the former by refusing to give them employment and thus starve the " damned kanaka" to death, and in this manner ridding this rich inheritance, as a Joshua and a Caleb, of the already eondemned uncircupncised Philistines. We felt some misgivings in Mr. Spencer's reappointment to his present position, fearing the octopus influenee of his friend as it appeared to guide him, that for his credit itwas better for hi mhe were out. By the admission of his colleagues and by his own acts, and thc»se whom he appoints, we are sorry that our pet minister was not politieally assassinated and his pohiieal-lifc sealed when at the pinnae'e of its glory, with a martyred death, and on the political casket containing the last of a nohle political career, as an epitaph, the following: Shrunk to thie little rifēasnre, The onee glorious Charlea liee low.