The Feilding Star. TUESDAY, DEC. 1, 1885. Wellington Woollen Factory

Feilding Star, Volume VII, Issue 74, 1 December 1885, Page 2

The Feilding Star. TUESDAY, DEC. 1, 1885. Wellington Woollen Factory

The laying of the corner-stone of the building for the Wellington Woollen Manufacturing Company, which was done with great ceremony on Saturday last, is an event which is likely to be fraught with the most potent influences over the welfare of this district. The reasons we have for this belief are that the farmers who are now settled on the Manchester Block and adjacent lands will be able to raise on their several farms small flocks of well-bred sheep, the wool and increase of which will, with ordinary prudence and good management, return good cash value for their outlay and labor. The wool may be sold ofE the sheep's back direct to the manufacturer. There will be neither the middlemen's profit nor ship's freight to be deducted. The only charge will be the railway freight to Wellington. It is notorious that much of the land here would, if paddocked, carry ten sheep to the acre all the year round, andjthe greater portion could, in a few years' time, be brought up to the same average. The time of the opening of this factory will also be^most opportune. The Small Farm Settlements which are now being formed within a few miles of us will receive a new impetus from the knowledge given to the people who have undertaken the task of forming them, that by the time they have anything to sell, the railway will be open to Wellington to convey it to a cash market. They will naturally consider wool as the most profitable, while the least expensive article to produce. The natural increase of a small flock, added to the cash received for the wool, would more than pay the cost, of working the farm for the year. The Hon. Mr Stout, in his speech at the ceremony of laying the corner- stone of the building, said— " By every industiial enterprise that was started, they called into being more farmers, and more small farmers. Their farming would increase with the increase of their manufactures. He hoped there was no person in the colony who would feel there was any disparity between agriculture and manufacturing, enterprise. The one must help and. assist the Qther." > Mr Stout, did not think there, would be

any undue competition between the various mills of the colony, and in this we are prepared to agree with him in part. The Auckland people are not likely to lag behind Wellington very long, and by the time the North Island railway taps the fertile lands of the West Coaßt, that city will probably have a woollen factory to compete with Wellington for our produce, to the manifest advantage of the producer. But to Wellington must be given the credit of inaugurating this new era in the history of the North Island. Her enterprise in undertaking the creation of the Wellington-Manawatu Railway will meet ample reward in a very few years, to an extent which we believe even the most*farseeing and sanguine promoters were utterly ignorant. One powerful factor in the prosperity of this railway will be the newly established factory, which which will not only attract freights by its own consumption of raw material, but will cause an enormous return of freights from Wellington for the consumption of the farmers engaged in the production of such raw material. We believe the turn of the tide has come, and "there is a tide in the affairs of" countries, as well as "men, which taken at the flood, leads on to fortune." A happy day has at length dawned upon New Zealand when the clouds of doubt and uncertainty which have obscured the sky for so long are giving place to the promise of a glorious day.