is working was given some months ago in the Australian edition of the Review of Reviews. So far, 9015 claims had been registered, and only 2875 granted; and it is clear that the colony will easily bear the cost of the pension scheme out of its ordinary revenue, especially as Mr Seddon—always lucky in his finance—expects this year to have a surplus of £500,000. The task of deciding on applications for pensions greatly adds to the labours of the stipendiary magistrates of the colony, and not seldom tries their sensibilities. A procession of white-headed, semi-blind, tottering men and women passes before them—made up of applicants for a pension of £18 per year, or for some fraction of it. The magistrate has to inquire sternly into the moral character of the applicants; to ask some saintly old woman if she has ever been in gaol; to demand of some decent white-haired veteran how often he has been drunk, and whether he ever deserted his wife. The process of securing a pension, in brief, is a sort of secular and human version of the Day of Judgment. In some parts of New Zealand the daily papers draw a veil of kindly silence over the proceedings, and do not report the names of the applicants. The effect of the Bill, however, has been to bring to the surface all the poverty-smitten old age of the colony; all the human wrecks—friendless and penniless—who find themselves in need of charity. The feelings of compassion kindled by the spectacle certainly tell in favour of the scheme, and Mr Seddon, it is said, when the general election comes, will probably reap a political harvest from the Bill.
Note.—See Appendix D; and compare New South Wales proposals, Appendix E.
