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Thames Star, Issue 3082, 3 January 1879, Page 2

People who were fain to disparage the efforts made here to secure the construction of the Thames Valley Railway, when they had exhausted ail other arguments, would sneeringly ask what traffic there would be to make the railway pay. We hare several times endeavored to show in what directions a payable traffic could be expected, and we were net er slow to recognise the fact that the railway would connect what is now to some extent a large producingdistrict.tvifchanequally large consuming district. Waika^md the Thames and Fiako Valleys are p^Hessingin every

way, and with additional settlement will be commensurately valuable as food producing settlements. Here we are not exactly increasing our population, but the consumption now, when the Thames is at its worst, of actual necessaries which. Waikato can produce, is extensive. It is of that character which should make it desirable for a producing district to be closely connected with, by the quickest and best medium of communication. We find that during the year 1878 there were slaughtered at the Thames 1748 oxen and. calves, 8612 sheep, and 958 pigs. Most of these animals were brought into the district fross other places—a very small proportion being from Waikato and Piako; if the railway had been built it is only reasonable to suppose that these cattle and sheep would have been drafted from the numerous herds which now browze on the fertile lands of the interior. Meat would have been cheaper; the profits of the Waikato farmers greater. We consider that this one item may be regarded as a very strong argument in favor of the railway being made to pay—which we never had a doubt about—but which has been urged as an important factor in favor of delay.