IMMIGRATION.

Evening Star, Issue 3446, 9 March 1874, Page 3

IMMIGRATION.

To the Editor. STR,~ It will not be questioned that one of the chief desiderata in the selection of emigrants ought to be quality rather than quantity, character than numbers. And when a Colony can offer to its immigrants so many advantages in the shape of congenial climate, rich and fertile tracts of land, wealthy mineral resources, and high wages, it is of essential importance that it should secure for its soil, workshops, and mines, productive, industrious, temperate, intelligent, and skilful laborers. Nor is it of less moment that the imported laborer should really have that amount of physical health and vigor, that stamina which contributes so materially to his own prosperity and to that of the country he has adopted. J . There is abundance of room in the Colony for real sons of industry—hewers of wood and drawers of water—but the Colony neither solicits nor desires people of the idle intemperate, ignorant, useless, and especially of the unhealthy stamp. We can do very well without such. We prefer seeing comfortable homes, hippy and healthy faces, to well filled gaols and crowded hospitals educational establishments, extensive libra’ lies and museums, to expensive asylums, Workhouses, and reformatories.

We are interested in the new comers, we hope to see them a benefit to our society, and nbt a burden and a scourge, and we do expect that they will amply repay the expense of their migration here. Still, in tvhatever system pursued, let whatever discrimination be exercised, as Human beings are it is impossible to import all the best material, we must receive both 'good, bad, find indifferent, and it behoves ns to see that we do not get an undue perhentagfi of the latter classes. My note book affords evidence of the material we receive, other things a copy of the official list of immigrants who were despatched to this country in one ship; it also gives a list of their ages, birth places, and occupations; appended to the names are notes that were kindly given to me by my friend, the doctor of the ship, as to their physical health and yigor, also some information from the immi--Br®°^ia themselves, gathered in various wavs, , Th ® result of an analysis of the above may -be a tolerable approximative evidence of the other shipload*; of immigrants we

receive as regards their ages, sexes, and their physical vigor, though in personal conduct they were below par, and therefore scarcely fair to apply to others. The port of departure was Loudon, the immigrants had been gathered from the outskirts of London, the large provincial towns of England, and a few had come from Dublin. Tbeir number was nearly 100. Of these 78 '4 per cent, were in the married compartment, and the remainder in the single male and female compartment, i f the married couples 20 '4 per cent, were males, and the same number females, the remaining 37 6 per cent, children, which belonged to 16 per cent, of the married couples ; 4 54 per cent, having no children. Of the children 17-2 per cent, were males and 20 4 per cent, females. The smallest number of children m eaeh family was one, the largest seven, ine ages of the adults varied from twentyone to forty-three ; the children varied from one month to twelve years; the greater proportion were between six months and two years. Some of the adults had understated I their age, but instances are rare where false I ages are assumed for the purpose of coming within the prescribed limits. e An analysis of their occupations furnishes some curious results and affords food for reflection. Thus in this ship, out of 20.4 per cent, representing married men, no less than half of them had stated themselves to be skilled artizans or special laborers of trades to which they did not belong. With their wives and children, they made a sum of 32 9 per cent, of the total immigrants aboard, n other words, Government had assisted P°_ r ceQ k of a shipload o! immigrants whobel. ngcd to or were dependent on unskilful labor. It is unnecessary to mention ij. a 18 ’ the : olio wing were their stated vocations, thus—erigineer, blacksmith, tinsmith, painter, baker, and farm laborers; and the claimans for these trades were in reality, respectively, old pensiouers, a marine, a Custom house messenger a lithographic prater and others of no real j i jheir jissmanJ trades they were tried, wanting, and the majority ultimately became pick and shovel men, though most of them were unfitted m physique for such work. It was curious to notice how very many dubbed themselves farm laborers, whose soft hands. pa .® faces, and outward appearence altogether belied their, statements, had they not voluntarily confused their real trades The Remaining males of the married compartment were really such a,s could depend on constant employment, the employers themselves having stated that thpyWe fair and average workmep for the Colonies. With reference to skilled labor, the following has generally been the reply given in different of the Colony by different employers of labor m various trades Query—" Do you find the class of workmen here equal to what you find at Home ?” Answer—“ W e l no ; we do get some really first-class hands’ but the majority are below what we have seen at Home. ” It is this inferior immigrant that furnishes the class commonly known as “sea lawyers,” who, by their habits and language, interfere with the comfort and health of the respectable majority of the immigrants. They obstruct the surgeon and the officers, they are pests to all afloat, and when they arrive are neither respected nor fraternized with by the. honest and > espectable members of the laboring 1 Tb ? P h y slaal anl vigor of the parents and children were not altogether what one would like to like to see in those who have to form the backbone and parent stock of the Colony Among the married couplee aud their children in this ship, 11-5 pgr cent had that unfortunate hereditary taint commonly called scrofula or struma, to a well-marked extent • •!. ln u? d -r er^ cfciras of ib * aDd one suecumbed to it. There were also 30 4 per cent who had it to a moderate degree : the remaimng 58 per cent were of a moderately ; healthy type, tnough no\ the strong robust, i persons wes would desire: Fortunately, the ; doctor informs me, no epidemic hr «ke out o n this ship, else he would have looked for his death among the tainted number It is a curious fact, hut one never the 1 ess ; true, that there is an impr. ssicn abroad, and especially among those affected, that if a consumptive can get a voyage to \ew Zealand, he or she will recover, from this distressing and tatal complaint, and instances are neither few and far between in which consumptive families have been advised by their medical men to emigrate to New Zealand, and some «t these families have formed our immigrants.

A nyone conversant with the tables of mortabty and crime at Rome will not forget that there are many indirect relations in connection with the importation of indifferent material into this Colony, which should occupy the consideration of those at the head ol our immigration system, 1 he single menin the above ship were model immigrants in point of health and physical vigor, and most of them proved to be decent workmen. One. however, deserted this Colony for a neighboring one, by the first steamer he could get for the-purpose; he was well able to pay das voyage, and is not the only one that abuses the generosity of the Government Many of the single women did not turn put to bp good domestics, and those Introduced under the nominated system were not desirable in point of age, health, or onaraoter. The personal conduct of im. migrants, the characters of the captains surgeons, and other officers must be reserved for a future letter. I am pleased to observe that you do not join m with the wholesale denunciations ma le against the Agent-General, and I do not say this in mockery, as many might suspect after reading this and my previous letters. I d© not desire to Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer. And without sneering, teach the rest to sneer! It is one thing for easy-cushioned philoso. phers to say this should have been done and that was neglected : it is quite ano her thing to have to do it. Were Dr Featherston all that his detractors would have mm to be, he would require to be more wondrous than the fabulous Briareus eyes at the extremity of every digit—and the accommodating substance of the common polype, so that he could be everywhere and do everything at the same time ; but being only mortal, be is limited by infirmities like the rest of his fellow-creatures, and deserves their pity and assistance rather than their scolds. ‘ Were those magistrates, clergymen, and medical men Who sign the credentials of our immigrants at Home to let their con sciences have more sway in the matter, the unfit and worthless would be sifted out, and the good honest workman would be proud of his tellow emigrants. More real good is likely to accrue from the mission of such men as Mr Holloway, uneducated though he be; he is essentially a working-man, and knows intimately the onaracters and the grade of skill of those he recommends, and what material he introduces may be guaranteed. We trust Hr Featheraton will send a few more men out in other branches of labor ol a like nature.-I am, &c., t, .. ~ , Observer. Dunedin, March 9.