THE NORTHERN TERRITORY.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1647, 14 January 1913, Page 8

THE NORTHERN TERRITORY.

■ '_. A MENACE TO AUSTRALASIA..■ >■ . ] Sir,—To-day's cablegrams contain an item which would startlo any less apa- ] thctic" people than us of tho Southern '■ Cross. Professor Baldwin Spencer drew '. attention to the- Northern Territory occu- i piod. by less than 4000 people, with an area of 523,000; square miles,' with 340 : whites' at Port Darwin, while a few-days' sail away there were 6mall islands containing 37,000,000 of inhabitants.* . Years.ago I was nominally in charge of a "parish" which included the whole of the north-west of Australia,. and tho whole of tho Northern Territory; indeed, I was the solitary minister 1 of religion in that vast area. I travelled great distances inland accompanied, only .by a black boy, and was the first white man seen by some of the aborigines. I was then impressed with the immense possibilities and the great fertility of tho country. Except on the coast, a wonderfully healthy climate, • dry heat in the day time and much of the year quite cold at night, Well watered with springs and rivers, it is anything but the uninhabit- ] able and deserted region which so many peoplo, suppose. Eighteen months ago I visited a number of the islands in tho i region referred to by Professor Baldwin I Spencer, and would add to his statement a still further menace in.the unoccupied islands lying to tho north-east coast of Australia; perfect paradises in scenery and'in growth, a few aborigines at the most on any of them now 1 and again meoti ing a solitary white man in occupation. j Northern Queensland, .though better occui pied than North-west Australia and I tho a Northern Territory/ is still too sparsely s populated. Think of the northern half 5 of Australia as almost unoccupied, add to i it quite unoconpicd islands along, the i coast, add to that, islands within a day a or two's sail occupied by/tfiiillions, add s to that, an occurrence, at Timor within 3 a few days':' steam of ' North Australia, 3 where only several months ago a great 1 battle raged between tens of thousands s of fighters, supposed to be inspired by a 0 foreign Power. Australia knew • nothing i of this battle for somo weeks after it was 1 over. Can there be any other cohclui sion but that all \ this empty space _ afj fords a standing nienace to the continus anco of Australasia in the British Em- •, pire, the defence of , which is imperilled, a in my judgment,; by the nttempts made i- to create a navy independent of Imperial g control? While defence is necessary, !. something else is of still greater importe ance, tho filling of our empty , spaces, n When in Australia I was actively con--8 corned with the bringing of immigrants, ;s and can testify how inadequate- the nurnx beris. I would that 6ome great statcse man would arise who, regardless of party, •- could succeed in arousing Australasja to e the sense of a possible :mmc'diat6 danger, a and tho certainty of future danger, unless ir our land is filled with a virile British " race.—l am, otc, ' _ ), DAVID J. GARLAND. Ie :■ Wellington, January ,11, 1913.