The Evening Star FRIDAY, DECEMBER 3, 1869.

Evening Star, Volume VII, Issue 2053, 3 December 1869, Page 2

The Evening Star FRIDAY, DECEMBER 3, 1869.

We have been so long under the impression that “ times are bad ” with us that the actual progress of the Province in settlement has not been recognised. Few people therefore will be prepared for tho revelation given to us through the statistical tables published in the Provincial Government Gazelle of Wednesday. The tables are twelve in number, and contain comparative statements of land under cultivation at different periods, of live stock, shipping, imports and exports, revenue ordinary and territorial, expenditure for 1868, land sold in different districts with the amounts received for it, areas of runs based on the Otago Waste Lands Regulations, 1866, and the classification of lands in tho Province.

From the nature of the information I much of it has been given before, and most probably the present tables have been published in anticipation of the meeting of the Provincial Council, the time of which might be too much occupied in moving for many of the returns thus laid before the public. We will not weary our readers therefore with minute description of their details, but content ourselves with taking a few facts that will be of general interest. The first that strikes the eye is the evidence of the rapid development of Otago compared with that of the Colony ns a whole. In the year 1858, the total quantity of laud under crop in New Zealand was 141,000 acres, of which 14,000 were sown with wheat, 15,500 with barley and oats, 98.000 with grass, 5,500 with potatoes, and the remainder with other crops. There is apparently an error in the record of the year in the first table giving an account of the early cultivation in Otago, or the omission of an explanatory note. We presume the date should be 1858, instead of iB6O. Assuming this to be the case, in that year the number of acres under crop in the Province was 9,363, of which about 1,800 were wheat, 3,000 barley and oats, 500 potatoes, 4,000 sown grasses, and the remainder various crops. Eleven years have passed away, and as the estimate for the whole Colony will not be taken until next year, we are without the means of accurate comparison, and the altered state of the North Island will, in all probability, give better results than would have to be noted down now. The last return of Statistics for the year 1868, published by the RegistrarGeneral, differs only slightly fro in that of 1867—the total area under crop in the latter year being 676,900 acres, which was only increased to 678,130 in 1868. The chief alteration was in the extent of land in different crops. More attention appears to be given to the cultivation of wheat, and less to barley and oats. Thus, in 1867, the returns show that in all New Zealand there were about 47,800 acres in wheat, while in 1868 there were 64,500. Oats and barley were 114,700 in 1867, against 100.400 in 1868 ; potatoes were 14.400 in 1867, against 11,500 in 1868 ; and sown grasses 473.000 in 1867, against 501,600 in 1868. There is reason to think that in the North Island agriculture has rather declined than progressed during the last twelve months, and that the chief increase has been in the Middle Island. This seems the more probable, as of the increased number of acres of wheat cultivated in 1868 above 1867, nearly one-half was in Otago. So rapid has been the advance of settlement in this Province, that, while in 1858 the area of land cultivated was only little more than 1-17 th of that of the Colony, in 1868 nearly l-4th of the whole, under crop, was in Otago; the relative numbers being New Zealand, 678,000 ; Otago, 152,500. It appears that while agriculture in all the Colony has only increased five-fold in ten years, in Otago it has increased about 161, times. Very nearly one-third of the wheat grown in the Colony is produced here. In 1868, by the Registrar-General’s return, the whole area sown with wheat in New Zealand was 64,500 acres. In barley and oats there is a fallingoff in the whole Colony of 14,000 the acreage being 100,500, against 114,700 in 1867. It would appear from this that in some provinces greaterattention has been given to the cultivation of wheat than of other cereals, fertile difference in oats in Otago is comparatively slight, the area in 1867 being 45,300 acres, and 43,400 in 1868. Ry the way we cannot imagine why from the returns published in table No. 1 has been omitted the RegistrarGeneral’s estimate for 1868 for the Colony. In our statements we have supplied that omission. Were any political end to be answered by it, such an omission might have been understood ; but as we can hardly see what log-rolling is to be effected by it, we presume it was an oversight.