ALEXANDRA.

Dunstan Times, Issue 1114, 7 September 1883, Page 3

ALEXANDRA.

[Com municat ed. ] There was some considerable excitement here on Monday last, over the opposed application, in the Warden’s Court, of Mr Hugh Croeaan, for the right to occupy, for agricultural purposes, certain land at Bald Hill Flat, adjoining his freehold, but which is reserved for mining purposes. The objectors to the application were the miners, whose argument was that as the ground, in question, was the only piece available for settlement in the event of an increase of the mining population, and which they hold to be quite within the bounds of possibility when the quartz reefs on the slope of the Old Man Range are fairly under full swing. Their argument against the land being even occupied was so strongly put and no less strongly supported that the Warden was compelled perforce to refuse the application, and the miners once more chuckle over their victory, and as a matter of course tho would-be settler is considerably chagrined at his defeat. When I say the miners once more chuckle. It is to be tqsdeistood that this is not the first time that au effort has been made to get the bar removed that keeps this particular piece of land locked up. There must be two to' an argument, and a case must lie weak indeed if it does not raise two parties. Well this application has raised two parties, and the supporters of it, while conceding that the Warden had no alternative but to refuse, yet hold that the application was a perfectly legitimate one, and that the opponents went considerably ont of their road in pressing so strongly their objections, because the object of Mr Crossan was not to alienate the land and lock it up in his own right for ever, but merely to utilize the surface until such time it was required for a squatting ground forthe miners that are to come. There. are some people who say that the real object of the objectors was not that it should not be settled on and utilised, but that Mr Crossan should not get It; it being required for either themselves or their friends; Now, if this should prove to be the case it is to be hoped that when the proper time arrives Mr Crossan will put on the war paint and go straight for the trespassers. There are no two questions but that the mining interest must in every possible way be protected; but when the miners in their eagerness to protect themselves permit themselves to do an act of in justice, as in this instance 1 believe they have ; they must not only be told of it, but a check and curb must be pat on them. A Miner,