New Zealand Colonist. FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 18, 1842.

New Zealand Colonist and Port Nicholson Advertiser, Volume I, Issue 32, 18 November 1842, Page 2

New Zealand Colonist. FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 18, 1842.

The recent accounts .from Nelson are less favourable than we could have hoped. There appears to have been an inadequate amount of capital in the first instance, and this deficiency has not been as yet supplied. The Company’s Agent there appears to be doing all in his power to support the community, but it is impossible that he can sustain the whole burthen of the settlement. There are complaints made, we believe, with regard to the quality of the land, which are scarcely reasonable. It is too much to expect that a soil which has been for several years nourishing a vigorous growth of fern, should suddenly, with no other preparation than burning off the stalks, and scratching the surface with a plough, produce a luxuriant crop of wheat. No farmer in the world could reasonably expect such a result. He would know that the ground required to be freed from the roots of the fern, because the wheat, which is an imported plant, could not sustain the competition of the indigenous product which had so long maintained possession of the soil. But of this, at least, we are fully assured, that wherever there is sufficient power in the soil to support fern of from six to seven feet in height, there when the ground is properly cleaned and prepared, crops of grain of corresponding luxuriance may be anticipated. Nothing is more dangerous than apparent facility. The very circumstance, that fern land can be ploughed and sown after a mere burning, will have led to a waste of capital, and will produce a discouragement even more injurious. Any one, however, who will select land with judgment, and proceed as he would do in a similar case in England, may confidently rely upon the result. The position of Nelson, however, shows that something f ‘more than the mere sale of land and conveyance of emigrants, is requisite to the establishment of a colony upon the Wakefield system. If every person who landed had his own small allotment upon which he might locate

himself; of if the emigrants were left to disperse therpsejyes over the country, squatting wherever they found a place suited to their purpose, then but little capital woul<jlbe required —no more, in fact, than might suffice to maintain them until their first crop was raised. This sum would be quite inconsiderable in most parts of New Zealand, because of the general abundance .of pigs ana potatoes; upon which such emigrants would subsist. But the Wakefield system, the main object of which, as regards the colony, is to provide for the transference to a new country of an old community, requires a very large supply of capital. In such a. community, a considerable proportion of the laborers arc employed in works which do not yield any immediate return, and but few, comparatively, in producing food. Those who are engaged in agriculture, do not immediately, nor probably for a year or two, raise much beyond what i 3 required for their own subsistence; and, consequently, all the rest of the community must be supported out of capital. This result, so obvious to us who are on the spot, appears to have been overlooked by parties in England; and we can hardly escape suffering in some degree from the result of theinomission.

In addition to the circumstance above adverted to, which is involved in the very principle upon which the Colony is founded, there are others arising out of the manner in which, in our case at least, the details have been carried out. It was nearly a year from the landing of the first body of emigrants in this place, before any country land was offered for selection and it will be three years from that period before the, whole of the preliminary surveys have been completed. During the whole of this period, settlers have been compelled to employ themselves unproductively, so far as the Colony is concerned; and no inconsiderable amount of capital, which was appropriated, and would havejjbeen applied to agriculture, has been spent in the mere maintenance of its possessors, or employed in methods which add in no degree to the aggregate wealth of the Settlement. , If at any subsequent period, the Zealand Company should decide upon forming a new settlement, wherever it may be, we trust that they will let their surveying expedition precede by at least a year the first body of emigrants, so that this source of loss may be in future avoided.

We doubt, however, the expediency of forming any further settlement in these islands upon the principles adopted in this place and in Nelson. There are already in the Company’s Settlements about three thousand acres of town land, with a population of less than 10,000. Taking only four persons to a family, this is more than one acre to every family, and upon many acres several families are congregated. We may, in fact, affirm, that six times our present population would not suffice to cause, the occupation of all the town land, without allowing one person for the 'country land. From such a state of things nothing but disappointment can result to the owners of town land, to leave out of consideration for the moment the inevitable injury to the Colony, from the withdrawing so large a proportion as always will remain in town, from those pursuits upon which alone the prosperity of a colony can be securely based. The subject is too extensive to be comprised within the limits of a single article; but we shall return to it at an early date.