ORMOND.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume II, Issue 113, 13 December 1873, Page 2

ORMOND.

[from a correspondent.]

While the roads remain passable it is desirable that the attention of the outside world should be drawn to this rising settlement. In a few months Dur communications with Turanga and elsewhere will be finally closed, and like the natives of the extreme South Pole we shall, until tho return of summer, be dependent upon our own resources for existence. Nor is this view of our position greatly puffed, for when we remember the almost impassable condition of the roads last winter, we are not encouraged in hoping for other than a worse state of things during the coming wet season ; for their is no sign in the heavens or on the earth that any steps will be taken while yet the fine weather lasts to remove our apprehensions in this regard. The Road Board slumbers peacefully, content occasionally to cast a languid glance in this direction, sighs and returns to a state of forgetfulness. The Surveyor taking example from his superiors looks us up now and again, and pays his attention to the public with praiseworthy impartiality, and that is all the sign of road works or worker we see until rate paying time comes round. The matter is becoming every day more serious and I am astonished at the apathy of my fellow settlers. The General Government Engineer, Mr. Bold, has just been here, but it docs not appear that advantage has been taken of that visit to draw his at tention to the necessity of doing something. As long as we are content to sit quietly in this wilderness of mud until some kind of metal falls from the clouds, here we may sit, for without the most strenuous and pertinacious squeezing nothing will be got out of John Ormond, Esq. Neither will all our unassisted effort extricate our wheels from the mire. I think it will be difficult to find any other community which has done so much for itself hitherto, and has received so httle encouragement or help from elsewhere, but there is a limit even to self help. We have inflicted upon ourselves a great evil in the shape of a Road Board in the fervent hope that good might come, but up to this date nothing but disappointment apd expense have resulted from our efforts in that direction.

There are several other matters of importance bearing immediately upon the prospects of this settlement to which I shall, with your permission, draw attention in a series of letters from time to time. For instance:

There is the Education question. The monthly sitting of the Bench, most vital subject, but as your space is limited I shall continue this letter to a few general observations relative to the importance of this place and its rising prospects. Trades of different and useful kinds have commenced active operations. Land is being fenced in and improved in all directions, and signs of the increased value of property are to be traced on all sides.

Our farming operations are somewhat limited, but such as they are they afford evidence of great things in the future in that direction, but dependent upon their successful development almost entirely upon the means of transit. In that the whole life of this place hangs upon that one great fact.

Shearing is nearly over, but the result of the clip is not upon the whole so satisfactory as the wool growers could wish ;it is light. The extraordinary quantity of rain that has fallen during the last twelve months, though good for grass, and for fattening of the large sorts of stock has proved bad for sheep; the mortality amongst the breeding ewes has been unusually large, and the lambing by the same token unusually small. But in consideration of the advanced price of wool, the stock owners upon the whole have no very serious reason to complain. The grass crops on the other hand would seem to be remarkably fine, and the prices likely to rule for the seed, render the harvest prospects highly gratifying, if only the weather continue dry. Amongst the buildings which are springing up in the village, the public houses are the most prominent, and are rising in importance, one of them has got as high as three floors, and the other is having its roof exalted. The traditional School House with its sheltering Church are conspicuous only in so far that they are not in existence. And while we take good care of our bodily comfort, it would seem that our mental arrangements are left to take care of themselves. But I shall certainly enlarge upon the school question shortly, so we will pass to a brief observation about the Dramatic Club and so finish.

Those energetic votaries of the Drama gave, as you are aware, a capital performance on Monday evening last, and as I hear succeeded in amusing their audience with a variety of entertainment and which leads us to hope that we may have a repetition of ft. It is rather astonishing what a number of really clever young men are to be found in the ranks of the Colonial Force. But upon the whole ft is something Dot altogether cheering to them, that their talents are likely to rust in that confined sphere of action and “waste their fragrance ” upon the drill Sergeant.