Gallery of Eminent Australasians.

No. IV.

The Hon. Robert Stout,

Premier of New Zealand.

"O small beginnings, ye are great and strong, Based on a faithful heart and weariless brain; Ye yield the future fair, and conquer wrong, Ve earn the crown and wear it not in vain."

—J. R. Lowell.

"In a troubled state we must do as in foul weather upon a river, not to think to cut directly through, for the boat may be filled with water; but rise and fall as the waves do; and give way as much as we conveniently can."

—Selden.

Continuing our pen and pencil sketches of statesmen of note in the Australasian Colonies, we have this month to direct the attention of our readers to the gentleman who last September took up the reins of Government in New Zealand—Mr. Robert Stout.

In giving a brief sketch of Mr. Stout's past life, we may first remark that the history of his career is simply the history of a man who early in life goes out into the world, and by dint of hard study, steady application, and a firm determination to overcome all obstacles, attains in the prime of life to a leading position both as a lawyer and as a statesman.

Mr. Stout is a native of the most northern part of the British dominions, having been born in the year 1845, at Lerwick, in the Shetland Islands, where his father was a merchant and anded proprietor. He was educated at the parish school of Lerwick, which at that time was considered one of the first seven schools of the North of Scotland, the master being a cultured classical, scholar. At the age of thirteen he became a pupil-teacher in this school, and served through the full term, passing the various examinations with more than ordinary credit; Being in fact one of a very few specially mentioned it the Privy Council Reports in 1861 While at school, the subject of our sketch had begun to display some of the qualities for which he is distinguished, and which have stood him in good stead throughout his adult life—untiring industry—an unlimited capacity for hard work—and an unswerving honesty of purpose. In addition to the ordinary subjects taught at the parish school, he had, either as scholar or pupil-teacher, obtained a good knowledge of Mathematics, for which he had manifested a special aptitude and also of Latin and French, as well as a tincture of Greek.

As may be supposed, the Shetland Islands, shut off, as they are, from the rest of the world by stormy seas and fiercely-running currents, did not offer much, scope for the exercise of the page 162 faculties of a man like Mr. Stout, whose natural disposition made him impatient of restraint, and discontented until he had scaled the highest point within the horizon of his views. Accordingly in 1863, when his term of pupil-teachership had expired, he began to look about him for some wider field in which to try his fortune. At this time much attention was attracted by New Zealand, as well by the disastrous wars in which the colonists were engaged with the Maoris, as by the lucrative goldfields which had shortly before been discovered throughout Otago. After a little consideration young Stout determined to betake himself to what was looked upon, at least in the remote part of Her Majesty's dominions in which he was brought up, as almost unknown land; and left his home at the close of 1863, passing through Scotland and England on his way to Dunedin, where he arrived early in 1864. Before leaving home he had made himself master of land-surveying, and had got special certificates on passing an examination in the theory and practice of it, and it was his intention to have followed in his adopted home the profession of a land-surveyor. After his arrival in Dunedin, however, he found that there was no opening in this profession; but he soon obtained an appointment in the Dunedin Grammar School as second master. Afterwards he became second master in the North Dunedin district school, which position he held until the close of 1867, having during this time gained a good reputation as a teacher. While thus engaged, Mr. Stout was chiefly instrumental in founding the Otago Schoolmasters' Association, with branches in different parts of that colony, which has now developed into the Otago Educational Institute. In 1868, he commenced the study of Law at Dunedin, and in July, 1871, the two branches of the profession being amalgamated in New Zealand, was admitted a barrister and solicitor of the Supreme Court, having passed the examinations prescribed for barristers.

The first session after the University of Otago was opened, in 1871, he attended the courses of lectures in Mental and Moral Science, and obtained the first prize for essays in these subjects; and also stood first in the Political Economy class next session. He was subsequently Law Lecturer in the University for three sessions (1873, 1874, 1875), but resigned this position on being elected a member of the House of Representatives in 1875.

Immediately after admission into his profession he went into partnership with Mr. Sievwright, a countryman of his, who had been practising in Dunedin for a year of two previously as a solicitor. Mr. Stout's professional reputation was won almost uno ictu. Hegained laurels in his first criminal case, and he soon became noted both as a successful pleader and as a sound lawyer, being particularly effective in addressing juries.

In 1876 an important event in his domestic life occurred, he having, towards the close of that year, married Miss Logan, a daughter of an old Dunedin settler and officer of the Provincial Government.

For some years past Mr. Stout's ser-vices have been in request in most important cases, from Wellington to Invercargill. His name appears constantly in the Court of Appeal Reports, and his opinion is sought as advising counsel by solicitors and clients in all parts of the colony. With his growing fame the business of the firm expanded, and, more accommodation being necessary, new offices were built, which are acknowledged by visitors to Dunedin to be the handsomest in the Australasian colonies.

We turn now from Mr. Stout's professional to his public, and especially his political career. We were about to say that his first appearance before the public was when he contested Caversham for a seat in the Provincial Council of Otago in 1872; but before that date he had read papers before the Otago Schoolmasters' Association, and had evinced considerable interest in the management of the Dunedin Athenæum, having been appointed a committeeman in 1868, and having been elected on the committee for several years afterwards. In 1872 he was elected to a seat in the Provincial Council of Otago, and in the following page 163 year accepted the office of Provincial Solicitor in the Executive of which Mr. Donald Reid was the head. Mr. Stout's connection with the Ministry is suggestive, since Mr. Reid's name has been associated, as a member of the Provincial Council, as a member of the House of Representatives, and as a Minister, with the settlement of the people on the land, and the framing of liberal land laws.

In 1875 Mr. Stout was elected a member of the House of Representatives. In that year the act was passed for the abolition of Provincial Governments, and for making Wellington the centre of legislative and executive power. Mr. Stout had hotly opposed the passing of this measure, and as it was not to come into operation till 1876, a general election took place in that year, the issue of which was "Abolition versus Provincialism." Dunedin returned three Provincialists—Messrs. Macandrew, Stout, and Larnach, in the order named; but the cause of Provincialism was lost. In 1877, on the defeat of the Atkinson Ministry, Sir George Grey, who had two years before left his island home to enter the arena of politics, took office, and the accession of Mr. Stout to the Grey Ministry in 1878—as Attorney-General—met with the unanimous approval of the country. He was forced to resign, however, in June, 1879, owing to the urgent demands of private business, occasioned through the serious illness of his partner.

Mr. Stout has always prided himself on his radical principles, and while standing loyally by his party since he first entered political life, has always been found on the extreme left of that party. Being intensely democratic by nature and training, he has great belief in agitation, and in awakening the people to political life, and he has often stood alone in advocating views which many have sneered at as impracticable fads, but more than one of which he has had the satisfaction of seeing carried out with more or less completeness. On the platform, and in the newspapers and magazines, in his place in Parliament, and as a private citizen, he has fought in the ranks of the temperance I reformers. Time after time he tried to get bills passed through Parliament applying the principle of local option to the sale of alcoholic liquors, and the principle was at length acknowledged by the Licensing Act of 1880, passed during his retirement from politics. At the election of licensing commissioners under the Act last year, he was returned in each of the four wards of the city in the temperance interest.

Mr. Stout's views on the land question are well known and pronounced. He has incurred much ill-will by his persistent opposition to the accumulation of tracts of land in the hands of large landowners, whether companies or individuals, and he has always been in the van-among those who desired the settlement of small farmers throughout the country. His name has occasionally been associated with land-nationalisation, but we believe we are correct in saying that he regards it as impracticable in application, and would not go further than retaining the yet unsold pastoral lands of the Colony.

When in the House of Representatives in 1877, he was on the Waste Lands Committee at the time that the Land Act of 1877 was considered, and had charge of the bill in its passage through the House. In 1882, he was appointed, by the Atkinson Ministry, a member of the Land Board of Otago; and, at his instigation, the Board instituted a series of investigations, not yet finished, which revealed the existence of a serious blot on the working of the Land Acts, viz., what has been termed "dummyism." Mr. Stout took part in the investigation with energy and with determination, and he and his colleagues on the Board, who supported him, became, for a while, the idols of the public.

Many of the Acts to be found in the statute books, from 1875 to 1879, were due to Mr Stout's initiation. He obtained for Dunedin the High School site, the Museum site; and the Town Hall site. The working men have to thank him for the Trades Union Act; and the. Administration Act, which, following Victoria, does away with the distinction between real and personal estate so far as succession is concerned, passed in 1878, and re-enacted in 1879 with slight amendments, is due to him.

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He has always taken a lively interest in education. He was a member of the Education Board of Otago, from 1873 to 1876, a member of the High School Board of Governors during 1877 and 1878, and has several times been a member of the Dunedin School Committee. His hand may be "traced in the Education Act of 1877, the secular system of education instituted by which has always been warmly sup-ported by him, and he is at the present time Minister of Education.

At the general election in July last year, Mr. Stout again appeared before the electors. He had not been idle, however, in the interval between 1879 and 1884. He edited from 1880 to 1883 a radical and agnostic paper published at Dunedin, and also occasionally contributed articles to the Melbourne Review. Indeed he had been contributing to the press articles and leaders almost constantly since 1870. He also appeared at intervals on the platform, lecturing on political, religious, and temperance subjects.

The political crisis which took place in New Zealand last winter is well-known throughout Australia, and will not soon be forgotten in New Zealand.

First came the defeat of Major Atkinson's Ministry; then the appeal to the country, when Mr. Stout was elected by a large majority; then the resignation of the Atkinson Ministry, after the unfavourable decision of the constituencies; then for more than a month, chaos; until at length the waters became still, the foam dissolved, and the Ministry now in office was allowed to carry on the business of the country without interruption.

Sir Julius Vogel, well-known in New Zealand politics twelve or fourteen years ago, had arrived in the Colony a few months before the election, and some surprise was occasioned when it became known that Mr. Stout sup-ported his candidature. He was re-turned; and when Parliament met it was found that there were really four parties, Sir Julius having a following in addition to the other recognised leaders in the last Parliament. It is unnecessary to give an account of the various attempts made to form a stable Ministry. What was tantamount to a coalition was ultimately formed by Sir J. Vogel and Mr. Stout. Mr. Stout has been subjected to much adverse criticism for this alliance, seeing that on some questions he and Sir Julius held opinions considerably divergent. He is not, however, a politician who pins his colours to certain doctrines, neglecting meanwhile to take advantage of opportunities which may come in his way for carrying them out. He is not a rigid doctrinaire, who would pursue to its end a "theoretic scheme of policy that admits of no pliability for contingencies." The true statesman is he who knows when to compromise, as well as when to hold fast to his doctrines. He believed in the principle of party Government. He saw that the best security for party Government was that the people should have confidence in the Minis-try for the time being. The people had declared their want of confidence in the Atkinson Ministry, but that party was still more powerful than any one of the other parties. He put aside all minor differences and joined Sir J. Vogel in a coalition.

Last session the Government professedly confined itself to administrative questions, leaving large questions of policy for future consideration. Whether the Ministry will live an average life remains to be seen. In these colonies, where it is difficult to draw a hard and fast line, making two such parties as Liberals and Conservatives, opposite sides may work together on many questions without much friction.

One thing, however, the formation of this Ministry has done. It has given time and opportunity, in which we may expect that the heterogeneous elements, of which the House was composed when it met, may be consolidated into parties on distinct party lines. And, for the efficient carrying on both of the work of legislation and of administration, this is no slight benefit.

In conclusion we may remark that the Ministry has given indications that it will support and encourage the industries of the country by sound and legitimate means. Mr. Stout has always taken an interest in native industries, having been President of page 165 the Committee of the Industrial Exhibition held in Dunedin in 1881, and taken a large share in its promotion.

There can be no doubt, that Mr. Stout exercises, and will, in the years to come, exercise great influence in the Parliament of New Zealand. We cannot say that this influence is due to the predominance of any one quality. It is no doubt due as well to his determination, energy, and far-seeing policy, as to his power as a debater. Mr. Stout is not a born orator. He is eloquent, yet has only a moderate command of language. The rank which he has obtained as one of the best public speakers in New Zealand, has been obtained probably as much by practice, as from any inborn quality. His power over his audience is mainly attributable to his intense earnestness, and his great depth of feeling.

"Tenax."