Local Intelligence.

Lyttelton Times, Volume VI, Issue 434, 31 December 1856, Page 6

Local Intelligence.

Roads on Banks' Pje>- insula.—A new line of road from Pigeon Bay to Akaroa has been recently marked out by Mr. Davie, of the Survey Department. Contracts

have been taken to open it ten feet wide through Ihe forest, as far as My. Dobson's cleared lino, before the end of April, at latest. The river is crossed twice only, instead of fourteen times, as by the original track. There arc to be foot bridges at the crossings, and proper approaches cut for fording on horseback. The line keeps on the western side of the valley from Mr. Hay's. After leaving the forest on the flat, it ascends the Fern Ridge immediately west of Ihe Fein Hill now used. Follow"----ing this ridge on a remarkably easy gradient, it crosses the Akaroa dividing range by the first low saddle west of the stony peak over which the old track passes, and joins Air. Dobson's cleared line about ten minutes easy walk above Uiq ( Red Board. Some 300 or 350 feet of ascent are avoided by Mr. Davie's line. The contract for clearing and opening the remainder of the road to German Bay from the Head of Akaroa Harbour has, we are informed, not jet been taken. Negotiations will have to be made with owners of certain freeholds through which the best line would be carried. The work to be clone ought not, we hear, to cost much beyond £50.

Aicakoa. —Mr. Hamilton, commissioned by the General Government to act for the Native Land Purchase Department, arrived on the Bth instant, and on the 10th concluded a bargain with the Maories for the surrender to the Crown of the portion of the Peninsula as yet unsold by them. Three Reserves, of four hundred acres each, at Onuku, Wainui, and Wairewa, arc retained by the Maories. The boundaries were agreed to on inspection; the frontage and side lines have since been cut and marked out in concurrence with the natives by Mr. Hamilton and Mr. Davie. No opposition from the aboriginal owners of the tract of country ceded by them need in future be apprehended by purchasers from the Crown,. The Wairewa (Little River) valley is saidj to be one of the longest on the Peninsula, and to include a large quantity of available forest land. A road line cut through to Barry or Kai Bay, would be of great service. It would cross the dividing range of Akaroa Harbour at an elevation of about 1,300 feet, by a line of country presenting no serious difficulty beyond that of being heavily timbered. It would save some 1,000 feet or more of ascent by the present Saddle Hill track, and reduce by some miles the distance from Akaroa to Christchurch, via Little River, the WaioraLake, and the western foot of the Peninsular Hills.