The Dunstan Times. FRIDAY, DECEMBER 6, 1872.

Dunstan Times, Issue 555, 6 December 1872, Page 2

The Dunstan Times.

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 6, 1872.

• Beneath the Rnleof Men EN'TIREf.Y just the pex is mightier than the sword.

" The Otago Waste Lands Act, 1872," ■which comes into operation on the first of January next, promises some •very useful reforms, and which, we ■ believe, will tend oons : dt>pal>lv towards furthering that much desiitxl object, " settlement of the people on the lands." Hitherto, except under the Agricultural Leasing System applicable only to the gold-fields, it was inip"s-i ; de to occupy waste lands for Bgviculturn 1 purposes, except by purchase. The present Act obviates this difficulty and givvs the same faci ity to the other industrious classes of U'e Province, as is now enjoyed on the gold fields The Act is applicable on the gold-fields as elsewhere, and may bo worked in conjunction, as a person holding one hundred acres under the Gold-ficl-ls Act, may add to tha' number up to two hundred acres acres under the new Act. Two hundred acres being the limit that one person can hohl under either. Experience lias proved that deferred payments for laud is a great inducement to settlement. It has been productive of the most beneficial results in Australia, and so far as trial, has been made in this Province, similar success has been attained. The same facilities to occupy land may now be enjuyed elsewhere thin on the gold-fields, and to persons industriously inclined and determined to makeOtago their homes, they will.fiutl nri- difficulty in carrying into effect their good intentions. We are not advocates for a general land scramble, nor do we believe that everybody should become a laud owner; there is nothing but what may be overdone, and were too many to JSfjguge in agriculture on their own -account, tha relations between employer and employee would be seriously disturbed. Under the present Act there is nothing to fear on j this head, as only one ace in ten is J cult r "atol wr.luV three

yearn, the same period being'.allowed -to fence the whole. Cottage residents would be a mostdesirable class in our agricultural districts:; it is not alt the • year round that the farmer or squatter requires labor, and when he does so lie cannot obtain it suitable to his wants. l\ot one man in every ten applying for work on a farm 'knows anything at all about the business ; when employed -he finds .the work irksome and unsuited to his taste, and is -consequently the reverse of a profitable servant, while his employer dispenses with his services the moment he can make any stilt to do so. By virtue of the present Act, persons accustomed to farm or station work, or who have a taste for this class of employment, can now occupy land in the vicinity where employment is obtainable, earning wages when wages are to be earned, and filling up their time on their own account when not otherwise employed. The deamess and inferiority of labor in Otago arises mainly from the desultory nature of most all employments, in agriculture especially it is either a feast or a famine, and we cannot expect perfection when a man is required to be a ploughman one day, and a miner or road maker an other. With the keen competition existing iu all branches of trade and the low prices for grain and other farm produce, almost a technical knowledge is required to make any business and this can only be acquired by experience, and a division of labor. When a farmer requires the assistance of others to help him in his work, he wants men used to tilling the land, tending or driving cattle, a painter or shoemaker being equally at sea upon a farm, as a barber ina shearing-shed. To advance the interests of the Province it is most desirable that every opportunity i-Lould be given to perfect the people in the nature of those employments which are and nitts't be its siapl.e for very many years to come, and this can best be attained by enabling them to found permanent homes !in suitable situations. The wandering | Arab e'ass is a colonial pe.st, the evil is more likely to increase than decrease and what is to become of the rising generation of our unsettled population it is painful to conjecture. That the new Act will work well there is little to fear, and we hope that the time will not be long-before it is applicable all over New Zealand The coti'titions are nearly similar to those of the Gold-fields Agricultural Leasing Kegu- ; lations, but in some cases mure liberal. For instance, after the first three years I occupation and payment of rent, two shillings and sixpence per acre, the Crown Grant may be obtained at a cost of seventeen shilling and sixpence per acre, or a further term of seven years may be obtained at a similar rental, the occupier becoming entitltd to the fee simple when the entire sum i of one pound five shillings per a<:re shall have been paid, in justice to occupiers of land under the Gold-fields Regulation* we think that something might be-donebyourlegisl tors to. lace them upon equally as libera a-footing by permitting a" portion of the money paid or to be paid as rent to form a part of the purchase money, and we deem the subject worthy of the attention of gentlemen representing gold-fields interests. A resume of the Act is ini-posi-ii'le here, but our readers will have uo difficulty in studying its provisions for themselves.