FROM GISBORNE TO MELBOURNE.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume X, Issue 1160, 27 September 1882, Page 2

FROM GISBORNE TO MELBOURNE.

WRITTEN FOR THE POVERTY BAY STANDARD. No, XVI, HOBARTON (Continued). [Want of space has compelled us for some time past to shut out our “ Gisborne to Melbourne ” letter. It will be continued in our next issue. 1 I don't know whether the statistics of religion will have any particular fascination for your readers, but there may be some amongst them who would like to know how the higher order of civilization progresses in the once far-famed convict settlement of Hobartown. I regret that the time at my disposal will not permit me to give any lengthened data as to the past and present spiritual welfare of the Seople, nor any later than the year 1870, ineed, I am credibly informed that no authentic returns have been compiled since that time. Then, as now, the Church of England stood at the zenith with 53,047 ; Rome, 22,091 ; Scotland, 6,644; Free Church, 2,420; Wealeyans, 7,187; Baptists, 931 ; Independents, 3,931; Jews, 232; Society of Friends, 82 ; Mahommedans, etc., 4 ; other sects (including, I suppose, the Salvatiuii Army, nnd Latter Day t üb-thiiuipwH, 2,759, making u total of 99,323 souh, What the population was in l 870» wiwu thu previous (gmsud wan

taken, I have no means of knowing, but, considering, as stated in rny last letter, tiiat in 1881, 11 years after, the population was only 115,705, we may conclude either that the number of church-goers, or professing Christians, was not very great at the former period, ; or that the augmentation of the people had not very materially increased in the last decade. At the present day, I am informed, that there are upwards of 100 places of worship, belonging to the Anglican communion, in the Colony, but these only give an average of 160 worshippers to each. Church government is carried on by a Synod, comprising the Bishop (The Right Rev. C. H. Bromly), the clergy, and lay communicants. The Roman Catholics have 43 places of worship ; Chrch of Scotland, 25; Wesleyans,7o chapels, and 51 “p. eaching places,” Congregationalists, 54 chapels ; the Primitive Methodists, 15 chapels ; the United Free Methodists, 1 chapel, and the Society of Friends and Jews have meeting houses and synagogues both at Hobart and Launceston, bringing the total number of churches, and other conventicles in the island up to 316, presided overby 129 ministers and preachers. Hand in hand with religion, march the primary and higher orders of education—the former are under a Board, the latter under a Council—a distinction, probably, without much difference. The system of education in Tasmania is, as with you, supported by the Government, the average cost of each scholar being £2 17s Sd per annum. Yearly examinations take place in the inferior schools, for candidates preparing for the higher branches of education. There are four colleges in Hobarton. The Council of Education is empowered to hold local examinations similar to those of Oxford and Cambridge. To male associates between 16 aud 20 years of age, the Tasmanian Scholarships are open, of which two are of £2OO per annum ; each tenable for four years at a British University. Two minor scholarships of £4O per annum : each tenable for 2 years within the colony, have also been established, to enable “ Associates of Arts” to pursue their studies until they are in a position to compete for the superior order. Thus any child possessed of the requisite ability has the means of rising from the comparatively humble position of a scholar, in the Government Elementary School, to the more honorable one of a “Tasmanian Scholar,’ and the “ Young Tasmania” looks upon this as tiio goal of his ambition, no one acquainted with Colonial youthdom can deny. I must, perforce, pass over many items of interest, connected with this lovely island, but I think I shall be pardoned by concluding this part of my subject with a few notes in relation to the agricultural products of the island. These do not vary in kind from those raised in other laud exceptin, perhaps, hops, which are cultivated on rather a large scale. It is superfluous to say that fruit of all kinds abounds, in magnificent luxuriance, and that the fruit-preserving industry forms an important branch of the trade done both iat home and over the sea. From the latest returns to hand 1 find that in 1880 the export of jams and other preserves, amounted to no less than 3,43Q,9121b5.; valued at £83,318, or, roughly stated, at about 6£d per lb., a price which, considering that even in New Zealand these jam* are retailed at from tid to 7d per lb., seems to be mostly on the side of the manufacturer. During the same year 155,468 bushels of green fruit were also exported, valued at £49,356, or about 6s 4d per bushel. The whole area under cultivation, of all kinds, in the colony, at the same period, was 373,289 acres, divisible amongst the usual crop producing serials, and all are spoken of as being tolerably prolific, at any rate farmers like statistical comparisons, I append them as follow:—Wheat, 14’99 bushels per acre ; barley, 20’38; oats, 22'13; potatoes, 3’12 tons; hay, I’l3 tons; hops, 1,1341t>5. According to my idea the returns seem to be below the average, according to New Zealand products, but it is not every country under the sun that is so blessed with the elements '

of fructification as is your Colony, and as long residence therein ha* inured me, bo to speak, to a familiarity with big figures, a* the outcome of land tillage. The live stock consisted of 23,267 horses; 127,187 horned cattle; 1,783,611 sheep; 48,029 pigs; 1,747 goats ; 6 mules, and 5 asses. In this last item I notice that the island of Tasmania has unmeasurable advantage over her eastern sister. Agricultural machinery seems to find great favor with the Tasmanian farmers, for I find the following record concerning the various kinds in use at the before-mentioned date;—Of engines there were 98, representing a total of 735 nominal h.p.; 101 clodcrushers ; 151 cultivators ; 25 buy elevators; 566 horse hoes, grubbers and scarifiers ; 79 mowing machines ; 215 subsoil ploughs ; 333 double-furrow ploughs; 122 reaping machines; 227 reaper and mower combined ; 80 reaper and binder; 22 sowing machines, and 229 threshing machines. The total area alienated, or sold to settlers, is 4,232,870 acres ; and 2,557,918 acres are held under depasturing leases, bringing in an annual rental of £8,833. In this exciting age of mining speculation, the mineral and other resources of Tasmania are attracting much attention, and this is the more noticeable just now from the fact that until quite a late period those resources have not received the attention due to their magnificence and wealth. The genuine Tasmanian believes in tin, everything with him is tin, tin—nothing, in fact, but tin. Gold, except that which is smelted in a tin crucible, and cometh in the shape of a minted coin, is held comparatively lightly in esteem. The original impetus given to tin mining in any considerable way, was the discovery of the new celebrated “ Mount Bischoff” mine, said ts excel anything of the kind in this hemisphere. Large deposits of iron ore have also been discovered,the more important are those on the banks of the Tamar river. But tin is the industry, and Mount Bischoff the tin mine of Tasmania. I can tell you some interesting things concerning this valuable find, for my mouth has been watering after the juice* of some of its fruit, ever since 1 arrived here, and heard of its marvellous productiveness, In the first place the quality of its yield is nearly 80 per cent, of pure ore--the average being about 74 per cent, for some time past. In 1876 the value of exported ore and ingots from the Bischoff alone was £100,000; in , 1877, £296,941 ; in 1878, £316,311 ; and in 1880, £341,376. More recent returns are not conveniently at hand just now, but the yield is unabated, and next to the prideful satisfaction one has in owning “a few Bischoffs,” a kind of veneration for the name ; and with that money adulation, cultivated so assiduously by time servers towards great men, is half inclined to take off his hat, in respect to its memory, whenever its name is mentioned. There is but one god here, before whose image the “ tin ” world bows the knee, and “ Bischoff” is his name. A dividend of 10s per share is generally paid by this Company about every two or three weeks, and sometimes it reaches to £1 I I think only 15* per •hare has been called up, and the market price of shares is in the neighborhood of £7O, and hard huld at that. Of course this good luck is turning the heads (and pockets, too, inside out) of a number of persons who never heard of so much money before, except in bank return*, and the multiplication table ; and as in the old Thames days, when Long Drives and Caledonians sent beggars to the Devil on horseback, these people, some of them, are simply ruined by an excess of wealth. One shareholder of whom 1 heard, o young fellow, received over £5OOO in one 1 year in divs., but with what result to his (ion- I stitutivu I did nwt lubru. Zvueo. ding t<« the • judgment of M/UH: (ortw the reports they give; j the Mount Bisub off minft Is likely to Ust for |

the next 30 years, and even then will be a

splendid property but whether any reliance can be placed on this, time, and the “ bulls ” and the “ bears ” know best about.