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New Zealand Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 4188, 22 August 1874, Page 2

A report, dated as late as July 31 of the present year, has been submitted to Parliament respecting tho Feilding Settlement on the Manchester Block, Manawatu. This is from Mr. Halcombe, and with it is some correspondence that might be perused with advantage by persona in England interested in the migration of large numbers of persons from the laboring classes for their own benefit, and for that of those whom they leave behind them. The mistaken idea is so prevalent that all necessary to make a laborer a thriving colonist is to give him a free passage and a small section of land on the deferred payment system. Mr. Halcombe, the Agent of the Corporation, finds that very much more is required. The emigrants sent out to him enjoy special advantages, and it is only reasonable to presume that they are picked men. Every one, on his arrival, costs the Corporation from £4O to £SO for house-building, carriage, temporary supplies, &c. It is scarcely necessary to add that this is an advantage which could not be extended to Government immigrants. Mr. Halcombe, it would appear, was, when ho first engaged in his work, inoculated with the prevailing delusion. By the Duke of Edinburgh he recived a consignment of twentythree immigrants. Ho tried to locate them at once on country sections of land, and set them to build for themselves habitations from materials ready to hand. He says of this experiment, “ A very few days proved to me conclusively that such a course would be fatal to the prosperity of the settlement ; and that with so large a number as I had to expect to deal with, settlement under these circumstances would be impossible.” He found that tho plan would have cost him all his available land, leaving him only forests which could not be settled till road lines were cut; that tho separation of the people rendered their supply difficult, and their concentration upon work impossible ; that not being accustomed to building shanties, they could not do this in reasonable time ; and that being separated and constantly losing themselves, they became dispirited. Tho result of the first experiment was difficulty, discontent, discomfort, loss, and “ a waste of valuable time and expensive material in the production of an utterly valueless shanty.” This is just what might have boon reasonably expected ; but there are thousands of people interested in emigration who seem to bo utterly oblivious to tho possibility of such a consequence. The Manchester block, as most of our readers are aware, consists of 100,000 acres of land purchased at 15s. per acre, and 0000 which were given in for roads and reserves. Up to the present time, 420 statute adults out of tho 2000 the Corporation is bound to introduce and settle before April, 1877, have been placed on tho block. These have come out in Government emigrant ships, and they have entered into bonds to the Corporation for a part of their passagemoney. On their arrival, they are at liberty to engage, themselves how they please; and if they elect to go to tho

settlement, their lives are insured in the Government office for £IOO each, as a protection to the Corporation by whom the first half year’s premium is advanced. Up to the time of their arrival at Palmerston, no charge is made against them, although they are provided for by the Corporation. At the depot they are charged for their rations, and then with 30s. per head for conveyance to the settlement.. There they are lodged in either bell tents or huts, and furnished with all necessary cooking utensils, tools, and supplies. The estimated cost of their cottages and the acre of land on which these stand is £42, and by a payment of 7s. per week they become the owners in three years ; but should they remove they are charged 3s. 6d. per week as rental. Work is found for them in the construction of a railway from Feikling to Foxton and in other ways. The Corporation has its own sawmill, and about fifty cottages and other buildings have been erected at its expense. A large school and schoolmaster’s house, another sawmill, and other buildings are in course of construction. The land has been surveyed in town allotments of from a quarter of an acre to an acre each, suburban allotments of from five to twenty acres, and country sections of from forty to 2000 acres. It is intended to sell alternate blocks of about 1000 acres each to the immigrants, on the deferred payment system, charging a light rental. The present upset price in the township is £25 per quarter acre in a central position, and £lO per acre on the outskirts, the condition being that there shall be immediate occupation. With this restriction sales are brisk ; without it the whole town would be sold at once. Suburban sections are valued at from £5 to £8 per acre, and country lands at from £2 to £4. Leased lands are charged 2s. 6d. to 4s. per acre, with right of purchase at £3 to £5 per acre in seven to ten years. The above figures supply convincing evidence of the success of the method of settlement adopted. They effectually demonstrate the folly of the Australian nostrum that cheap land is the one grand prescription for settling a Colony and making it prosperous. The immigrants, after residing in their cottages in town for a short time, generally remove into the country. Most of them, says Mr. Halcombe, are doing very well, and at the last pay-day many had paid all their debts to the Corporation, and the weekly charge on their cottages up to date ; and all, or nearly all, were satisfied with their position and prospects. They were laboring men, and, as it will bo seen, are on a fair way to become freeholders, first of small and then of large farms. On the whole, Mr. Halcombe says, he is well satisfied with them, although a small percentage had been a source of anxiety to him. But even of these, said he, “I am very hopeful, for I find that the sense of present possession of a house and land, and the prospect of an independent future for himself and his family which is here opened out to a man, have generally a great effect upon his character ; and the laborer who in England merely worked for the Saturday night and began the world again on Monday morning, devotes himself to the accumulation of property, and is rapidly transformed into a careful and thrifty citizen.” How far Mr. Halcombe is with the Government on the States Forest question may bo judged from the following remark : —“I look upon the timber of the Corporation’s block as a far more valuable crop than the land will over hereafter at one time carry, and one which, if properly worked when the means of carriage to Foxton and Wanganui by railway shall be established, will be a source of very large revenue to the Corporation, besides being the means of employing a numerous population for many years to come. I may also state for your information, that the tramway which I propose building up the Oroua Valley to the northern boundary of the Manchester Block is but the first step towards tapping the _ almost inexhaustible forests of timber which stretch, as far as the eye can reach, for many miles beyond on either side.” Mr. Halcombe looks forward to other settlements of the same character as the Feilding, in continuation of it. That there may be such seems very desirable. Wo are bold to say that the report we have been considering tells of one of the moat rational, promising, and successful attempts at colonisation yet devised ; and we cannot but think that a most interesting pamphlet respecting the settlement might be compiled for distribution amongst intending emigrants, not only in England but on the Continent. Laboring men are taken from their homes, conveyed to the settlement, well housed, and fed ; have work provided for them at a high rate of wages, and are put upon sections of rich fertile land, which they can with ordinary prudence become the freeholders of in a short space of time. If this would not bo a boon to Hodge, halLstarved in an agricultural district in England, and with no prospect before him but the workhouse in his old age, wo are much mistaken.