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Lyttelton Times, Volume VII, Issue 462, 8 April 1857, Page 9

per acre (prompt payment) was determined on. That price has not yet been tried more than a twelvemonth, and even if there were no experience in its favour, I should still, for the reasons I have given, be indisposed to change. But I ' think the experience of the brief time during ! which £2 has been the established price may be safely appealed to in ■ its support. The sales of land,without being in any way forced, have been free and continuous ever since. Nor is there at present any indication of falling off. And should there be no falling off, the estimated produce from this source during the coming year is £10,000. But what appears to me to be the most satisfactory fact connected with those sales is this—that the large majority of them have been made to persons of the working classes and to bona fide settlers and cultivators of the soil. It may be fairly asked, how much of this land would have found its way into their hands had the price been materially lower P It is matter of notoriety that, within two or three days of the present regulations coming into operation, some large capitalists arrived here for the purpose of making extensive speculative purchases, even outside the original Canterbury, block, and at a, distance from the cultivated districts. How much land worth having would have been left inside, and especially in the neighbourhood of your towns, had the cheap land policy prevailed, I leave you to conjecture. But there are al&o extensive interests to be considered in this question of price. On the firm belief that it was definitely settled a very large amount of capital has been embarked in pastoral pursuits ; and I think the faith of the legislature and the Government is pledged to its protection—that is, protection to this extent — that the order of things under which that capital was invested and the stockowners induced to enter on their separate enterprises should not be liable to frequent change. But I am disposed to maintain that regard for our own interests, no less than good faith towards others, should prompt us to resist any alteration in the price of land. The produce of our pastoral districts now constitutes a most important item in our commerce. Whilst agritulture is at present languishing, and its prospects are much clouded, the pastoral interest is happily flourishing as much as could reasonably be desired. Already, wool is our main export, the clip of 1856 being valued at £70.000; and in a few years it will acquire a magnitude that will abundantly justify all which legislation has done towards encouraging its growth." JSTor is.this all. While the pastoral interest is contributing to the progress of the country, .as every interest dpps which materially increases its export trade, it is also yielding largely to our territorial revenue. Within a year, or two the rents derivable frpm that source will be alone sufficient, not only to pay the large contribution annually required from this province towards the extinguishment of the New Zealand Company's debt, but will leave a considerable balance available for the use of the province.' The present price of land, Gentlemen, constitutes the main, almost the pnly protection of the pastoi'al interest; and I ask you seriously to reflect whether it is expedient to withdraw it—whether it is wiTse to kill the goose for the golden .egg, and interrupt this steady and satisfactory progress .for the sake of a sudden influx of money into the Treasury, which our resources in labour may not permit us profitably to expend, and the possession of which might tempt us to extravagance. My own conviction is that it would not. Another subject on which I desire to say a few more words is our form of Government. There are some persons who regard the present mode of administering the affairs of the province as too cumbersome and too pretentious, and who talk of conducting the Government after the model of a corporate town in England, of which a Mayor, Aldermen, and Council are the presiding geniuses. Never having been a member of one of those .select societies, I am perhaps unable to appreciate properly the advantages of such a mode of Government. It is,' however, not long since that the jobbeiy, peculation, and corruption, which had grown out of the old corporate system in England, led to a sweeping measure pf reform, by which the whole of those model Governments, excepting that- of London, were swejit away. And now it.appeals that the days of the corporation of London itself are numbered. Experience, therefore, does not appear to justify the preference shown for corporation rule, and, personally, J can feel but little attachment to a system ,