The Evening Mail. WEDNESDAY, JULY 31. 1878.

Oamaru Mail, Volume III, Issue 720, 31 July 1878, Page 2

The Evening Mail. WEDNESDAY, JULY 31. 1878.

These are the days of railways. Those lines carried out under the Public Works policy, welcome as they are, will be nothing when compared to the railways that will be constructed by private enterprise within the next three or four yeare. The present Government lints for the moat part skirt the coast ; the feeders have yet to be constructed. The very interior of the colony is as unfamiliar as ever; millions of acres of good agricultural land there are, some being used for grazing purposes and some not at all, notwithstanding the expenditure of several millions oif pounds on railway works. But the almost unknown rejrions 1 of the Interior are about to be opened up. Those who bonght land, and settled upon it in the hope that, although their path was beset with difficulties at first, they would eventually reap their reward ■.■ in; about to have-their hearts gladdened by one of the greatest evidences of advancing civilisation. Amongst the numerous railway projects that are. showing signs of developing into accomplished facts is that whereby the Hr.k.iteramea district is to be opened up to the agriculturist; and why, we would ask, should the good work not be pushed into the. Mackenzie Country? The Tiniarn people are not o'rvliri.cs of the advantages : that would accrue from connecting the ! Mackenzie Country with their port by rail, aud we tFiink that wo can dt-mou-strate not only that Tiniaru, by way of • Burke's or Mackenzie's Pass, is not the | natural outlet for the Mackenzie Country. 1 but that any attempt to make a paying linedirecr.from Timaru tothatdistrictmnst result in an unnecessarily large expendi- : fure for construction and maintenance. What we would suggest is that the line ; shculd be started at Duntroon and inn \ through the Hakateramea Valley to the ; Mackenzie Country. It is true that the I line to Albury, which is on the road to ', the Mackenzie Country, is 29 miles in ' length, and that it traverses the fertile valley of the Opihi, nnd that the Silversrr*nm Country—lis extensive as the South Waitaki plains—equally good and already settled, is not yet favored by railway communication. B it that is no reason why nil attempt should be made to tap" the Mackenzie Country by way of Burke's Pas«), or Mackenzie's Pass, through mountains which seem to have been raised by nature as a barrier to progress" beyond the Siivorstream Conntry by that route. Of course, there is not anything too difficult for modem engineering science to accompl'sh, but there are things too difficult for some purses, and that is why the extension of the Albnry line into the 3lackenzie Country j would be a mistake from a Colonial point of view. However, the surveyors are j busily engaged in making trial surveys of j the country with a view to aseer- j tiuning the probablo co3t of the, work. We are prepared to await their decision before going into particularity. We might, however, be allowed to say that the natural highway to the Mackenzie Country is ailing the valley of the Waitaki, and by way of the tributaries of the Ohou, Kakapo, and Pukeka, This would simply mean nn extension of the proposed Hakateramea line. A great deal has been written of tho engineering difficulties of the line proposed to connect Oamaru with the Maniatoto Plains ; but the difficulty and expensiveness of constructing the OamaruNaseby line would be nothing compared to those that would have to be encountered on the route between the north of the Silveratream and the Mackenzie countries. ! It is pretty generallyacknowledged that the ! natural method of tapping the Interior of New Zealand is by following the courses of its streams. We presume that the route of the Hakateramea line has already been determined, and that, starting from Duntroon, it will skirt the Waitaki river. This would be a simple route, aud its —> :~. *~ *%,~ M«„l.- a T.™ Conntry

would suggest to the Waimate people that they should. so construct their contemplated line into the Hakateramea country, that it should form a junction with that from Duntroon. Settlers would then have choice of three markets : Oamaru, Timaru, and Wainiate ; the two former being nearly equi-distant. We have suggested the only practicable means of opening up the Mackenzie Country with reasonable economy and ultimate r.tlv.intage. With regard to the Timaru project, the incline from Kakapo t<> Hilverstream—a distance of 26 miles—would be so heavy that it would be most diniu'ilt arid expensive to maintain the linu and convey produce into Timaru.