RESULTS OF FISCAL MALADMINISTRATION 63 

 Would the great unemployed question be [so promi- 

 nent, pauperism so rampant, poor-rates so high, exces- 

 sive emigration so necessary, and widespread despon- 

 dency among our working classes so pronounced if there 

 were anything of value in this often used and much- 

 vaunted cry? " 



The reply given above is one that will be found in the 

 mouth of any tax-payer who has thought this matter out 

 in a rational manner. 



When we look about and carefully note the sad state 

 our people have been reduced to since they commenced 

 to follow after this wretched phantasm, we wonder if 

 there be a man among us who, in his heart, really be- 

 lieves that the cheap loaf is anything more than a party 

 cry raised for the purpose of catching the voter? 



Does our great array of workers who, although in 

 employment to-day, may — owing to the uncertainties 

 which enshroud the labour market question — be out of 

 work to-morrow, really believe in the efficacy of this 

 political war cry? 



British workmen of late years have taken a keen in- 

 terest in national politics, and quite right too, for they 

 have a considerable stake in the commonwealth, and it 

 is fitting that they should look after their ov/n interests. 

 They are stalwart fighters and loyal partisans, and 

 constitute in themselves a powerful division of the great 

 political army ; but quite apart from the faintest trace of 

 political bias can they honestly say, that even if the 

 cheap loaf cry were capable of conferring on the people 

 the one benefit of a cheap loaf, it has not, at the same time, 

 deprived them of quite a number of economic advantages 



