THE FUTURE SLUMOPOLIB OE AUCKLAND.

Observer, Volume 7, Issue 237, 28 March 1885, Page 3

THE FUTURE SLUMOPOLIB OE AUCKLAND.

Sentimental and sensational writers in London and other large cities sometimes excite a passing chord of sympathy for the dregs of society who herd in the fever-breed-ing slums. To heighten the picture a contrast is drawn between the squalor of these dens and the magnificence of the Belgravian palaces under whose very walls they nestle. The slums and rookeries are the sources from which many dwellers in the adjacent gorgeous mansions draw their princely incomes. It is true, we have not yet arrived at the dignity of possessing a Belgravia iv Auckland, but we are rapidly getting the slums and rookeries. Had it not been for a vigorous protest raised in the Observer some time ago the Surrey Hills property would have been cut up into insignificant lots, divided by narrow lanes, which in the course of a few years would hare become the plague spots and fever-beds of the city. «a, I was under the impression then that the city authorities had found legal means of preventing the proposed method of partition, but, if so, the law is again being set at nought. A correspondent complains that the owner of certain property in Grey-street proposes to erect two shops and ten small cottages on an Miotirent measuring only 33 feet frontage x 20-0 in depth, each tenement having- its own back-yard. Of course, some men claim to possess miraculous powers, but how the above feat is to be performed is a mystery to me, unless some of the houses are to be piled up on top of each other. In the absence of further information, I can only adopt this view of the matter. The insatiable " greed " of some callous money-grubbers is such that they would bequeath a heritage of disease and misery to an entire community if they could squeeze out a few feet more of frontage, ™ and draw cxhorbitant rents from a few more hovels.