THE Evening Star. SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 1869.

Evening Star, Volume VII, Issue 1988, 18 September 1869, Page 2

THE Evening Star. SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 1869.

In the course of a session, whether of the General Assembly or the Provincial Council, a vast mass of information is laid before the Legislature, which, however interesting to the community, is necessarily overlooked at the moment through the immediate pressure upon public attention of some overriding subject. Statistical information especially is apt to be overlooked and thrown aside. However clear the arrangement of a vast array of figures, they present no very inviting appear-

ance to the eye ; and in order to utilise them, and to render the information they are intended to convey clear to the mind, it commonly happens that some explanation is needed beyond the details given. Amongst this class of documents is the report of the Land and Survey Department of the Province. It was laid before the Superintendent and Provincial Council last session, and brings the statement of the work of the Department down to the 30th March last. The view it presents of the progress of settlement must, at this moment, be especially interesting on account of the classification of the land

into areas adapted to special uses, and also as tending to show, so for as useful land is concerned, what are the resources of the Province. There is a return marked F of “ Lands and their “ Classes in the Province of Otago ” In it the total area of the Province is stated to be 13,360,640 acres. Of this 9,308,600 acres are pastoral and agricultural, 2,346,240 acres are denominated “ barren,” 1,421,000 acres are covered with forest, and 284,800 acres are lakes. Of the agricultural and pastoral lands, 991,749 acres have been sold within Hundreds, 303 acres within Goldfields, and 5,566 acres under leaseholders’ covenants. A note appended to the table states that, of the land sold within Hundreds, 65,000 acers were forest and 20,000 swamp. There were remaining unsold within Hundreds 80.000 acres of agricultural land, 100.000 acres of forest, 4,000 acres of swamp, and 208,651 acres of hilly pastoral and inferior lands. In his reports the Commissioner and Chief Surveyor remarks that about 1-13 th of the whole area of the Province is alienated from the Crown ; that it “ includes “ the most extensively fertile lands ; “ yet there are numerous and dis«tant areas of considerable extent “ yet open, or to be unlocked to “ the public, such as the Mataura, “Waikaka, Pomahaka, Benger, Wai- “ kaia, Waiau, Te Anau, Wakatip, “ Strath Taieri, and other districts. “ Beyond these the surface of the “ province must be classed as purely

“ pastoral, excepting where under “ forest.” The demand for land has varied in different years. The total amount of money received as land revenue since the settlement of the province in 1859 to November, 1868, was £1,051,065 Is 10(1. The rural land sold has realised £800,352 ; the town land £87,680. The license fees for depasturing stock during the fourteen years amounted only to £16,134 Is 10d. It is singular that in 1854 the license fees amounted to L6ll 7s 10d, while in 1868 they only realised £65. No doubt this is easily explicable by reference to changes of system. In 1854, the assessment on stock only amounted to £233 7s 7d, In 1868 it realised £52,210 2s 4d, and this was less than the year before which reached £54,522 12s lOd. These two years represent the sums paid by the pastoral tenants under the new leases. The assessments now amount to ten times the sum paid under the old system, when the highest sum realised was in 1865, and then it only reached £5206, while in 1866 it had fallen to £4945. The areas of runs held under the “ Otago Waste Lands “Act,” are —“'under lease, 5,956,506 acres in 169 runs; under licence 310,500 acres in 11 runs. The land revenue of the Province lias been subjected to extraordinary variations. These are inseparable from frequent change of system. It is somewhat remarkable that in what is really of primary

consideration in every country, all legislation lias been empirical. In America, in Victoria, everywhere in fact, in modern times, men of the highest legislative capacities have failed to adopt a principle respecting the occupation of land which shall commend itself to the common sense of mankind as based on equity and utility. In land regulations, as in all other legislation, uncertainty retards development, while stability enables men to shape their arrrangements to existing circumstances. In the infancy of every settlement the land revenue must be the smallest. Thus in 1855, the total revenue amounted only to .£2,008. Seven years afterwards in 1862 it rose to £122,045, and the next year fell to .£41,300. The largest amount of revenue was reached in 1867, when it reached £168,334. This was the first year of the increased assessment on stock. Last year the amount of revenue decreased to £139,313, It may not be uninteresting to state “ the quantity of land “ that was sold under the 35th clause “ of the Waste Lauds Act, 1866,” permitting the sale of unsold land within Hundreds at 10s an acre underspecified conditions. The total area thus disposed of w?'s 83,678 acres which realised £48,021. Of lands of special value where there were more than one application, the area was 9,100 acres, amounting to £11,942, The average price per acre realised of unsold lands within Hundreds, offered at an upset price of 10b an acre, was 11s Gd per aero.

A Blank Day.—There was no business transacted at the Resident Magistrate s Court to-day. The Northern Mail.—Our files from the North by the Rangitira, reached us too late to be of use this afternoon. There is nothing important. The Superintendent, We hear that his honor the Superintendent addresses his constituents at Balclutha on

Friday evening next. On Dit.— That Mr T. K. Weldon, Commissioner of Police for the Province of Southland has been appointed to succeed Mr Branigan. The latter gentleman is expected to come to Dunedin shortly for the purpose of handing over the department to his successor. Gaol Return. —The following is the state of Her Majesty’s gaol, Dunedin, for the week ending Sept. 18 :—Awaiting trial, 2 man, 1 women; under remand, 0 man, 0 women ; penal servitude, 2(5 men, 0 women ; hard labor, 56 men, 9 women; imprisonment, 0 men, 0 women ; in default of bail, 0 men, 0 women ; debtors, 5 men, 0 women ; total. 89 men, 10 women. Received during the week, 9 men, 4 women; discharged, 10 men, 5 women. Princess Theatre. —Mr Talbot played Othello last evening to a house crowded in every part; the performance

being for his benefit. Ihe tragedy has not been so well played for many a long day ; it was well cast, and carefully put on the stage. Wc are inclined to rank Mr Talbot’s performance of the high-minded Moor with the best of his impersonations. The peculiar traits of Othello’s character—his fiery openness, magnanimity, artless, credulous withal, boundless in confidence, ardent in affection, inflexible in resolution, and obdurate in revenge —were admirably pourtrayed by Mr Talbot. The address to the seignors was delivered with marked eloquence, and in the third scene of the third act, where Othello incites lago to give him proof of the unfaithfulness of Desdemona, Mr Talbot gave unmistakeable evidence of his high declamatory powers Those passionate demands for something that might either confirm the suspicions that have been engendered in his

mind, or set them at rest, were capitally given. This was undoubtedly the best part of the performance. Mr Raynev was lago ; and tlie part of the ancient could not have been placed in better hands. We do not hesitate to say that it is one of the finest efforts Mr Rayner has made since he has been here. From first to last, he kept vividly before his audience those qualities by which lago was enabled to compass his deep revenge, viz., cool malignity and subtlety of design. He fairly divided the triumphs of the evening with Mr Talbot, both actors being called before the curtain to receive the enthusiastical approval of the audience at the end of nearly every act. The part of Desdemona was well played by Mrs Jackson ; and Miss Mathews made a good Emila. Messrs Woolfe and Joyce filled the respective parts of Cassio and Brabantio. The performances concluded with the farce of “ A Regular Fix, ” in which Mr Bartlett was thoroughly at home as Hugh de Brass. To-night a Shakesperian treat is promised. The noble tragedy of “ King Kear,” and the comedy of “ Katherine and Petruchio,” will be played. Such a programme ought to draw a crowded house.

Ministerial Explanations. —We understand that the Hod. Mr F. Dillon Bell proposes to address a public meeting in Christchurch previous to bis departure for England. While passing down from Wellington to Dunedin last week, he intimated his desire to meet the people of Canterbury and explain the acts of the Ministry during the term they have office. A requ ;sition was at once signed expressing gratification with the purpose, and asking him to name his own time. An answer will probably be received by the next steamer. —Lyttelton Times.

What are the Dunedinites about ? —This is the question asked by the Bruce Standard in an article dealing with the Hundreds Regulations BillFrom the farMataura, and from all the country districts south, and some uovth of Dunedin, a unanimous protest has been uttered. From the Goldfield* also no uncertain sound has been heard. Dunedin, the capital, alone is silent. Dunedin, the excitable, has given no siun of its previous political vitality. Not long ago its citizens could hold large meetings and send absurd telegrams to the Legislative Assembly when the crisis was not half so important, when the question under discussion was “like the dust in the balance ” to this Act, How is this ? Do the citizens for a moment suppose that this Act will not affect them ? Do the shop-keepers, the professional men, the tradesmen, the workmen, really imagine they can exist and progress, if they set themselves in opposition to the country ? Can this setting at defiance the wishes of the country settlers really aid them in prosperity ? Jf the Land Law remains as this Act lias made it, there can be no immigration, no future settlement, except at an enormous sacrifice to the Province ; and if there be no immigration and no settlement Dunedin must suffer. This question does not half so materially affect the country as the town. To see Dunedin citizens sitting {quiet, contemplative, apathetic, and careless uttering such phrases as the poet uses —

What need for action yet ? We are happy now; We feel no la k. What cause is there for haste? Are wo not happy ? Is not that enough ?•

is strangely anomalous. Wecannot understand the cause, and are unable to comprehend the reason, of this Dunedin somnolent apathy? It is hopeless to divine it. We, however, tell the Dunedinites that they are working their own ruin, and that the reckoning day will come, and that in a manner, perhaps, little expected by them. The L 60,000 of pastoral rents cannot do much to sustain them, and this neglect of the future wellbeing of agriculture and agricultural set dement will affect their pockets, and through that means, we hope, their ideas, far sooner than they look for. If the towns are not to protest against injustice ; if they are to remain passive in this great land question agitation, then farewell to their future prosperity ! ” Gold at Lake Brunner.—The West Coast Times of Monday last contains the following From reliable information received in town last night, we learn that a rush, likely to assume some importance, has taken place to gullies, the other side of Lake Brunner. Parties came into the Greenstone on Saturday night, and gave glowing accounts of success in prospecting. In every gully, and many were tried, gold was got in payable quantities. The only difficulty is that caused by the want of attack, and we believe that such representations have been made

to the (Jouuty uaairman mat tne aimcuny will be done away with. The following which relates to the above, is an extract from a private letter received yesterday from Hokitika, by a gentle.nan in Christchurch : “ Some important discoveries of gold have been made at Lake Brunner, on your side of the range. Parties arc going there. There is a goo 1 track as far as Greenstone ; then a wretched track for forty long, weary, miles, and then seven miles across the lakes, full of slush ami bog. If the Lake diggings go ahead, the shortest and best road to them is the Christchurch road, and the distance from the mi in road to the lake would be easily made, the country being level the whole o! the way, or at least the best part of it. - Lyttelton Times. The Superintendent and the Hundreds Regulations Bill —The following letter addressed to the chairman of the public meeting held at Balclutha to consider the above measure is published in the Brace Standard : —“ Superintendent’s Office, Dunedin. 4th Sept. I $69. Sir—l have the honor to acknowledge the receipt this day of your letter of 26th ult., annexing copy of resolution passed by a meeting at Balclutha, of which you were chairman, to the effect that “ the course I have followed in supporting the Otago Regulations Bill has forfeited the confidence of my constituents, and that I ought to retire from the representation of the district. In reply 1 have to request that you will be good enough to acquaint the parties to the resolution that they appear to me to be at sea as regards the objects and effects of the Bill in question—a Bill, the principle of which was supported by the whole of the Otago members without exception. I cannot for one moment suppose that the resolution conveys the sentiments of the majority of the Clutha electors, believing,

as I do, that my friends there have more stability of character and of feeling —a greater appreciation of fair play, than to condemn, unheard, one who has for years served them faithfully to the best of his ability, and at no small personal sacrifice. There is a good old Latin maxim, Audi alteram pertem, which, as you are aware, being interpreted, means, “hear the other side, and which I am persuaded pervades the hulk of the electors of Clutha. Were it otherwise, I for one should not covet the honor of representing them in the New Zealand Parliament, or anywhere else. So soon as other more pressing engagements will admit, I hope to do myself the honor of meeting my constituents in the Clutha district, and of giving them au account of my stewardship as their representative in the General Assembly. In the meantime, I venture to hope that they will give me credit for having supported such measures as I conceived to be most conducive to the general welfare ; the misrepresentations ignorant or wilful, or both—and the constant abuse of a portion of the local press to the contrary thereof notwithstanding.—l have, &c., J. Macandrew.” ToKOMAimito Farmers’ Club.—At the annual meeting of the Club on Monday last, the Committee brought up a report, from which we make the following extracts : —“ The show of stock and dairy produce, held on the 10th December last year, was, jn the opinion of your Committee, more successful than either of the previous two. The number of entries showed a decrease. In 1867 there were 274, and last year 266; yet the very great improvement visible in the class of cattle was encouraging. In dairy produce there were 132 entries—a larger number than was ever made before, while greater care, skill, and attention had evidently been given to the preparation of this kind of farm produce. Your Committee

regret that they cannot to the same extent congratulate the Club upon the of the grain and seed show, held on the 27th May last. However, in this exhibition there were points of improvement worthy of note, and more particularly they would indicate the spirited competition for the silver cup, presented by Mr Peter M'Gill, at which there were samples of wheat shown that would have been creditable to any district, and to societies of larger pretensions than your Club. Your Committee, in conclusion, cannot but express their 'regret that no action has been taken, either by the Provincial Government or the different Agricultural Societies of the Province, to establish a regular central market for the sale of grain, seeds, &c. This subject they would respectfully suggest as being worthy of patient and practical consideration by the Club ; and if they were assured that the co-operation of other societies in conjunction with assistance from the Government could be secured your Committee would retire from their labours under the pleasant belief that to their successors would fall the interesting duty of assisting to initiate this very impor-