The Lyttelton Times. Saturday, February 7th.

Lyttelton Times, Volume VII, Issue 445, 7 February 1857, Page 6

The Lyttelton Times. Saturday, February 7th.

No circumstances could make us so alive to the necessity of settling the question of .postal communication quickly as those which have attended the carriage of our mails from Australia during the lew months past. The mail which last came to u<- fiom Kurope was brought by the Marco Polo to Melbourne, and left England on 'September 4. The Tintree, carrying the nvii! of the 19lh September, the Royal Charter, the Donald McKny. tlif Oneida and the Simla. with the mails of September -and October, and down to the l"2th November, had all arrived in Melbourne at.the. time of.. our last advices, and we have received and published tlie news they brought; so 11-at,I 1-at, in fact, our news from England is two months and a half later than the mail. Merchandise shipped for this port after the departure of a mall has arrived here before it. even in ships not coming direct, borne. &i' the mail packets abovementioned. it is true, made, long passages, the Tiptree and the Donald McKay, for instance ; but it is the tardy and uncertain mode of enniage between' Australia and New Zealand which has really isnpf'ded the transmission of our letter-lings. We have had the news brought lo us quickly enough. Tin*re never was such rapidity of communication between England and New Zealand ; but the regular in ul did not come in that way. We used to calculate upon receiving our letters and papers by the fiist vessel, large or small, coming to us from the port at which the mail had arrived, so far on its way. But we have lately had vessels from every possible quarter, and none of them have had tlie desired bags. Ships from Ensrland direct do not bring our letters because they are sent by way of Melbourne. Vessels from Melbourne do not bring them because ■ they, are sent, by way of Sydney. Vessels from Sydney have not gut them, because they are sent by way of Auckland. And, last of all. vessels from Auckland have not got them, for no reason on earth that we know of, unless, peihaps, because the Auckland post-ofiic'3 believes, with its superiors, that *" the longest way round is the shortest way there."' The hope of quick and certain, because unbroken, mail service* for New Zealand pppears to be in the Panama route, which again engages the aHi nlion of a well-known English Company. We publish to-day the iiiu-rative of the steps taken at hoina in the mailer. So far as we can see. setting aside some curious figure* which we find in the report by which the directors prove their probable profits, the route is one infinitely better for New Zealand than that , western one with its numerous links, at the

very tail-end of which we are with great difficulty trying to hook ourselves on. As to inter-provincial communication, , enough has lately been saicLto exhaust the subject. The great point to insist upon is its greater frequency, as we pointed out on Wednesday. Of the three schemes propo-' sed which w then reviewed, two are evi-. dently objectionable, amongst other reasons, because sufficient time is not allowed for the. dips contemplated. The difficulty lies in the fact that all the ports cannot be visited by an ordinary steamer within one month, the lime which elapses between two Knslish' mails. The scheme which at first siyht appearsnot to be defective onthishead is that of the Go\ eminent, because in it. each trip is calculated to occupy two months, including the voyage to Sydney. It. provides, however, only a monthly communication between the provinces, ialu-s all mails and merchandise round by Auckland, and requires two larar steamers for the purpose, as, indeed, do the other propo.-als. We cannot think that two provincial steamer* would be much more expensive to the country, or spoil the' profits of tr.ide more than a second large boat ; and they would secure us the advantage of fortnightly communication, and be more suited to, ihe shallow harbours.