NEW ZEALAND SPECTATOR AND Cook's Strait Guardian. Wednesday, August 31, 1853.

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume IX, Issue 843, 31 August 1853, Page 2

NEW ZEALAND SPECTATOR AND Cook's Strait Guardian. Wednesday, August 31, 1853.

The last number of the Lyltelion Times (August 20) tries to show that Sir George Grey's Land Regulations have really conferred no benefit on any class but on speculators in land, that cheap land is a delusion, and that there is nothing like a sufficient price, "by which the public lands should be preserved unlocked for i the real use of the greatest number." In other words, while all the other Provinces of New Zealand have received the reduction in the price of land as one of the greatest boons that could be conferred on the colony, while at Auckland land sales under the Governor's Land Regulations have been made to averylargeamount,thos& who agree with the Lyttelton Times in. thinking that £3 an acre is a good price, regard with aversion the reduction in the price of land, and try to persuade themselves that no good can come of it* But we cannot suppose this to be the general opinion of the Canterbury settlers; a very little reflection on the subject must have convinced them by this time that few or no purchasers will be found for land at £3 an acre, when. land of an equal quality is to be had in older and more advanced settlements at ten shillings an acre. Some reference too is made to Mr. Justice Stephen and his law, but these are matters which very few ever trouble themselres

about, and we dare say Mr. Stephen hiniself would not have occasion to regret that his injunction and the proceedings connected with it could he as completely forgotten, as they have practically become a dead letter, since no one places the slightest faith in the legality of Mr. Justice Stephen's decision in that matter. A short time will show the practical working of the system, the trial of a year or two will afford such proofs as will not fail to convince the most sceptical that the reduction in the price of land will operate more than any other cause in promoting the prosperity of New Zealand. Unless a land revenue can be raised by the sale of land, there can be no funds for immigration or internal improvement, for any assistance to be derived from direct taxation for this latter purpose will be of comparatively little use to the means to be derived from the land fund, when we have shaken off the incubus of the New Zealand Company, — when a final investigation is made into the Company's nffairs and all questions between that that body and the colonists are settled on an equitable footing. And after all, those who argue for a sufficient price, that is for some price ranging from one pound to three pounds should be reminded that they have always stated this price to include not only the price of the land but of other things, which should render the colony attractive. At Nelson steam and education were to be provided ; at Canterbury a Church fund, education, roads, and other advantages. In each case under the sufficient price the money has been paid by the land purchaser, and has been misappropriated by those to whom it has been paid. The land purchaser did not get from the Company or the Association what he paid for. Now, the whole question is brought within the narrowest limits, the purchaser, pays for his land and gets his Grant and this completes the transaction. He is now more likely to obtain from the land funds for internal improvements than he was before — he is no longer called upon to pay for what he does not get. Something is said by the Lyttelton Times about the Land Regulations opening a door to jobbing and corruption, but while we are by no means prepared to admit this assumption, we must at the same time be permitted to observe that the sufficient price does not appear to have been a panacea for these evils, so far as the past career of the New Zealand Company or of the Canterbury Association affords us any means for judging. — ♦

The following amusing criticism from the Australian and New Zealand Gazette, on " the eternal croak" of the Otago Witness, shews the effect which the rabid and constant abuse of Sir George Grey by that paper, and others of a similar stamp, has out of the colony. No one, in the face of the facts which prove the progress of the colony under his administration, gives the slightest credence to these " croakers ;" and the only effect their croaking produces is to create a thorough disgust of it in the minds of impartial persons, and a determination not to pay the slightest attention, to any thing they may say : — " We have received Otago and Canterbury intelligence to a late period. Nothing more, however, has transpired relative to the discovery of gold at Auckland, or of copper at Nelson ; the only new discovery being that of the editor of the Otago Witness, who has found out that the colony canuot possibly continue any longer if Sir George Grey remains as Governor ; from which we gather that the next batch of Otago papers will bring intelligence that the colony has ceased to exist ; the Otago editor being " the last man," when " all mortal shape: have ended in gloom." Intending emigrants to Otago will, nevertheless, find a thriving colony on their arrival, despite the predictions of the Otago Witness. The editor, as we recently showed, is at his wits' end for news , and it is quite clear that if " his friends will not supply him with any" — as he himself phrases it — he must make some, of which manufacture the above is a sample. We wish to Heaven he could discover a copper or d coal -mine ; other settlements have landed upon such discoveries for years, and we do not see why -Otago should not. As it is, his paper is one eternal croak, to which he evidently believes the ears of all Europe are listening."