The New Zealand Times (PUBLISHED DAILY.) WEDNESDAY, JULY 3, 1878.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 5387, 3 July 1878, Page 2

The New Zealand Times (PUBLISHED DAILY.) WEDNESDAY, JULY 3 , 1878.

The difference in the rate and in the character of progress between the North and South Islands of New Zedland is very marked, and is greatly in favor of the South. The cause of that difference is not far to seek; it lies in the fact that from tho start, so to say, tho Southern settlors have had an unlimited area of land which in its natural state was at once capable of being made productive by the simple operation of placing stock upon it. The whole was moreover made legally available for use upon very reasonable and encouraging terms at a very early period. Tho men who occupied these wild lands, who took their flocks and herds into the wilderness, and thus laid the foundations broad and firm of tho national wealth it is tho fashion now to decry and to envy, and it is their properties that the now economy desires to “burst up” by tho force of taxation and tho popular will. That the discovery of gold accelerated enormously tho rate of progress, by inducing immigration and affording profitable employment to those who were attracted by tho new promise of fortune, is of course recognised and admitted, but it was only the free and unoontestod right of access to tho whole land which made the success of the goldmining, as it had mado tho success of the pastoral interests. In the North Island, from tho foundation of tho colony, conditions exactly opposite prevailed. The native occupation and title stood persistently in tho way of the European occupation, ns they continue to stand at this hour. All tho efforts which have been made, by the Crown in the early days under its 'pre-emptive rights, by individuals under the operations of tho Fitzrof proclamations and at a later time under the authority of the several Native Lands Acts, and by the Government itself recently with tho means placed at its disposal by the Immigration and

Public Works Acts, have had results which cannot be regarded as other that ridiculously insignificant when the whole area of land thus acquired is compared with the whole area of the land which still remains in the hands of the native owners. A map not long since published by the authority of the Government, and distributed for the information of members of the General Assembly, showstheserelativeproportionsat a glance, and with startling distinctness. - Within the boundaries of a straight lino drawn from Kawhia to Tauranga, in the north, and a straight line drawn from Wanganui to Napier, in the south, the whole intervening territory, containing many millions of acres, —excepting only a narrow fringe here and there on the seashore, —is tinted on the chart in the appropriate brown which denotes “native” land. Even in what may be called the settled districts the land tinted in the aboriginal color, and still held by natives, may be said to be equal in extent to the aggregate of the spots which are tinted white, as indicating the extent of the unsold Crown lauds. Broadly, it may bo said that in comparison with the South Island there is no land in the North Island at present in the hands of the Crown which is available for sale and settlement, or open for occupation and use by those who may desire to become colonists. Herein, as we have said, lies the cause of the difference between the rate of progress respectively in the North and the South Islands. It needs no argument to prove it; it is rendered on the chart strikingly patent, and visible physically to tho naked eye of the most careless observer.

Whether or not tho waiver of the Crown’s pre-emptive right secured to it by tbo treaty of Waitangiwas a politic proceeding need not now be discussed. The right has passed away, we fear, beyond roach of recovery, in its original completeness at any rate. We, in common with many others, believed that the original error of surrenderingthatright was a fatal one; but there was an antecedent error which perhaps made the waiver of pre-emption inevitable under the circumstances, and that was in the failure of the Imperial Government to provide, in tho early years of the colony, the means of acquiring from the natives, not a national estate, but even the small quantity of land which was required to meet the immediate wants of the first settlers in the neighborhood of tho capital in Auckland. The possession of land readily available for settlement is the fundamental'condition of progress; in this island that condition is wanting. There is abundance of land ; not much less than two-thirds of tho area of this island is shown to be still in the hands of the natives; hut under the operation of existing laws even the most legitimate efforts to acquire a satisfactory title to such land are subject to failure, or are liable, when apparently successful, to be defeated by the legal ingenuity of the disinterested professional protectors of the weak and credulous Maori. This is what we see now in Hawke’s Bay and elsewhere. It needs no argument to prove the necessity of some action being taken, and thatspeedily, to remedy a state of affairs which is an insuperable barrier to healthy progress. An effort iu this direction was made by the late Government in the introduction of the Native Land Courts Bill; the time was, however, out of joint, and that Bill, which might have been made, with such modifications as the Government wore willing to accept, a workable and useful measure, was sacrificed to faction, by being made the ground of a party fight in the House of Representatives. It is a burning question, however, the want of laud for settlement, and it must be faced. As we have had, happily, no promises given on the stump or elsewhere in regard to it, there may bo a hope that it has engaged tho attention of Ministers in the few moments which they have been enabled to devote to the consideration of public questions, and that something will really be done in regard to it. After tho determination which has been expressed by the Government not “to show their hands” either to friends or opponents, it would be, perhaps, useless to suggest—that for the information of the natives alone, and in order to secure their intelligent assent and co-operation—-the new Native Lands Act, it there is to be one, should be translated into Maori and circulated in native districts before the meeting of tho Assembly. If the Government should fail in their duty of originating legislation in this regard, wo do not doubt that some independent member will take their work in hand.