MR CALCUTT'S REPORT.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume VIII, Issue 188, 6 August 1873, Page 2

MR CALCUTT'S REPORT.

Knowing the interest that attaches to everything bearing upon the question of the railway, we arranged with a gentleman in Wellington to telegraph over a summary of Mr Calcutt's report as Boon as it was laid on the table of the House. The following reached us last night : — Mr Calcutt reports that he classifies the land thus : — 150,000 acres of forest land, deducting 6000 acreg sold or leased, at £100,000. Twenty-four thousand three hundred and forty-one acres of open land, deducting 5400 acres sold or leased, at £22,314. Thirty thousand acres of light soil or shingle at £15,000. Total, £137,314. Portions of the land are so far distant from the line of railway that it would cost more than its value to make roads and bridges to connect (hem with the railway. Looking at the country as a whole from au agricultural point of view he does not consider ie adapted for the settlement and support of a large population, lie thinks that it is rich in minerals, and that upon this its prosperity must chiffly depend, but inquiry into that subject did not form part of his duty. He speaks highly of (he timber, and considers that a large revenus would at once be derived from it, but says that the land on which it grows will not be tilled within the present or the next generation. If the railway were made, two-thirds of the forest land would be increased in value, but the open land would not be materially

affected, owing to its distance from the line, except in the vicinity of the Ahaura.

Together with the above ifc may be well to publish the following extract from Mr. Writ's report : — The total; flat land may be taken afc 152,000 acres. It must be understood that the estimated qunntity of flat land docs not include all ihnt exists in the valleys named, but only that which would probably come within the limits of the land proposed to be given to the company constructing Ihe lino. It forms a small proportion of the 2,070,000 acres proposed to be given to the company, aud docs not by any means represent all the land that will be valuable. Large portions of the land that may be called hilly will, after a time, be fit for paatoral purposes, but to what extent this kind of land exists I am not prepared to say, as iv a timbered country, to estimate the lands suitable for either agricultural or paatoral purposes, is attended with difficulty and some uncertainty." Mr Wrigg then goes on to estimate the 152,000 acres above mentioned at. £2 103. per acre, giving n total of £380,000 C Respecting the minerals he says, "The extent of mineral wealth waiting collection, but which is now locked up in a raugo of" country extending, say nine and a half miles on each side of the proposed line where public land 3 exist, would be found enormous, saying nothing of the v.'ilue which the limestone, timber, and building stone must ultimately realise." It must be remembered that Mr Wrigg spent five months in the country he was Bent to examine; Mr Calcutt did his work in fourteen days.