District Notes

Southern Cross, Volume 2, Issue 2, 14 April 1894, Page 11

District Notes

SEAWARD BUSH. [By Our Special Reporter.] The plate-laying on the Seaward Bush railway is progressing fairly well, being done more than halt way from Mokotua to the Gorge. It is expected that , a little over a month will complete laying the line up to the gravel p[t near the Gorge station. Gravel is there in unlimited supply, ■and of good quality. Ballasting the line may then commence at the gravel pitsj and be continued backward to Mokotua. When completed and opened for traffic the Oteramika Gorge will be brought within about nineteen miles of Invercargill by rail. SILVER PINE SLEEPERS from the "West Coast are being used. They are hewn on three sides and sawn on the fourth, for laying upmost. The timber is light, and said to be durable. TV hen the line is opened it will give access to a considerable area of good forest land yet in the hands of the Crown, in which it is more than likely one or two sawmills will be set to work. There is also a good-sized lilock of freehold forest partly fronting on the railway. As the line extends eastward THE MATAURA PEOPLE •seem to get more anxious for the completion of the bridge over the river .and railway into their district. It will doubtless be of great benefit to -the lower Mataura and Fortrose districts, reducing the distance from Invercargill to a little over an hour’s travelling. Harvesting is all over in THE OTERAMIKA DISTRICT, •and threshing operations will for the most part take up the attention of the -farmers for some time to come. The land in block XXII, Invercargill Hundred, near Tisbury, has been applied for pretty freely during the last year under the d.p. and perpetual lease systems, and several of the applicants are clearing the land and putting up homesteads. The Tisbury school, still in the keeping of the Misses Hamilton and Rout, is very well attended, the scholars numbering .nearly sixty. Shelter-sheds are now in course of erection for the benefit of i&he children ; the timber used was the first cut by the Excelsior sawmill. A -monthly church service is held in the schoolroom by the Rev. A. H. Stobo. A small sawmill is now at work in the Seaward Bush Township, about half-a-mile from the Seaward Bush railway siding. Under the careful management of Mr William Murdoch it is Corning out a considerable quantity of timber. The greater part of the bush in this locality has already been worked by the old Kew sawmills some jrears since, but at that time the forest was run over, and not so closely worked as now, and in consequence patches of good timber were often passed or missed. Some of this passed Forest will now be utilised by Mr Fairweather of the Excelsior sawmill. A shelter shed is very much -wanted 3>y passengers awaiting the train at Seaward Bush siding. In contrast with the late management of the railways, which would not grant a level •crossing to a number of hard-working men with families to maintain to enable them to get their firewood to market, the present Commissioners liave been approached on the same matter, and are likely to favourably •consider an application to LAY A TRAMWAY across the line for the purpose of liauling timber to the mill, on the same site as the firewood cutters had petitioned their “ majesties ” for, without success, some two years ago. The obstinate Maxwell regime seems at length to be supplanted by a more conciliatory order of things —favourable to the settlement and industries of the country, even though such consideration or concession happens to be at the request, or for the benefit of, poor men, living by the sweat of their irows. To foster industry and the

location of people on the soil was the first purpose of the railways. Several ROAD CONTRACTS are in progress in the Seaward Township. Mr Wood is gravelling Scott street, Mr Gibson is laying gravel on the Boxall road, and Messrs Mason and Macgregor have just finished a very substantial bridge over Kingswell’s Creek. Road-making and improvement is also going on in other parts of the district. In these hush districts successful settlement largely depends on the construction of roads, and the present Government have done a great deal of road-making in aid of the settlement of bush country. Xdr can we overlook the fact that our popular member, MR KELLY, as a supporter of the Government, obtains a fair quantum of the loaves and fishes annually distributed in the big talking shop for his constituency. This may not be statesmanship in its purest sense, but it is Hew Zealand nay, colonial politics, and must be followed, at any rate until we get a little nearer the millennium. April 7th.