has authorised the re-purchase and subdivision of landed estates. {262} Lastly, they have realised since 1890 that, for the furtherance of their aspirations, the strength of their Unions should be devoted mainly to the promotion of the representation of Labour in Parliament. The great strike of that year has been described so fully that it is unnecessary to say more than that a strong combination of labour, which had made itself master of the situation, was confronted upon the outbreak of hostilities by rapidly organised but powerful associations of employers; that the struggle, which spread over the whole Continent and New Zealand, terminated in the success of the latter, and that the workmen realised that, even had they succeeded, the victory would have been won at too heavy a cost in the misery entailed upon themselves and their families. Many of them were dissatisfied with the generalship of their leaders during the strike, and realised that the exhaustion of their funds rendered them unable to engage again in a huge industrial struggle. In the following years low prices, the financial crisis, and the consequent scarcity of employment and fall in wages, further weakened the Unions and intensified the conviction that strikes should be superseded by the ballot-box. In some Provinces, also, it was felt that the rivalry of parties had degenerated into a contest between the ins and the outs, and that progressive measures would not be passed until Labour had entered as a compact body into the arena. I have discussed in the earlier chapters the {263} history and results of Labour representation in several of the Provinces, and have shown that the Labour Party has been successful in South Australia, where it has formed an alliance with the Government, though maintaining a separate organisation, and in New South Wales, where it has held the balance of power between the Protectionists and Free Traders, but has failed utterly in Queensland, where mainly through its own fault, but partly through the astuteness of its opponents, it has occupied a position of antagonism to all the vested interests of the community. In Victoria the Labour Party acts usually with the Government, but seeks to obtain its objects by the exercise of its strength more than by friendly negotiations. In New Zealand no distinct Party was formed, but the working-men representatives threw in their lot with the Government and, by consistent support, helped to secure the imposition of graduated taxation and the enactment, among other measures, of a compulsory Conciliation and Arbitration Act, and of a large number of Industrial Statutes.