OUR COAL DEPOSITS.

Westport Times, Volume IV, Issue 695, 9 August 1870, Page 3

OUR COAL DEPOSITS.

(From the Wellington Independent.) One of the most interesting facts brought out by recent discussion iff the General Assembly is undoubtedly the extent and quality of the coal deposits of this colony. From the ex treme north to the extreme south of the two islands, it appears that deposits of coal, accessible and easily to be worked, present themselves in every direction. In referring to this subject, we find in the Jurors' reports on the New Zealand Exhibition, 1861, the following notice of the various localities in which coal is found : " In several districts of the province of Auckland, viz., the Poor Knights, Bay of Islands, Drury, Waikato, Matokana, Kawhia. In the Province of Nelson, at Pakawau, West Wanganui, Buller and Grey Rivers, and at intervals along the West Coast. In the Province of Canterbury, at the Grey River, Kowai River, Mount Harper, Clent Hills, Malvern Hills, Mouut Somers, Rakaia, Coals Creek, Rangitata, and River Potts, Ashburton, and Tenawai. In the Province of Otago, at Green Island and neighborhood, Molyneux River, Shag River, and widely distributed throughout the interior, and at various points on the West Coast.

Several of thes i deposits have actually been worked, and have proved most valuable to the residents in the immediate locality, but from want of the means of transport the use of the coal has been confined to a very limited area. The return laid upon the table of the House of Representatives this E63sion, showing the quality and value of the coal imported into the country since 1863, gives some idea of the wealth \\e are wasting by importing an article which we have in such abundance within our own limits. The total value of the coal imported in the last eighteen years, is set down at £1,324,000, a sufficiently large sum to encourage us in making a strenuous endeavor to keep the trade within our own hands; but the savingof past expenditure by no means represents the advantages the colony would gain by the opening of some of our numerous coalfields. It is impossible to over estimate the spur to all sorts of manufacturing enterprizes which a cheap supply of good coal would give. And not only possible future manufactures would gain, but in these days, when steam power is so largely applied to agricultural operations, the produce of food would be largely stimulated by the additional facilities which would be afforded for the employment of capital in farming, especially while manual labor is comparatively scarce and always dear. Two at least of the provinces which at present most largely import their coal from Australia, viz., Canterbury and Otago, have deposits within their own boundaries of the finest coal in situations easily accessible. Both are agricultural districts ; in both wood is very scarce in many localities, and there can be no question that a Bupply of cheap coal would encourage the establishment of many industries which at present are not even thought of by the inhabitants. With facilities of overland transport from the mines to the nearest ports, New Zealand should be able to supply

. its own requirements, however large i they may in a few years prove to be. As steam is the great agent of modern civilization, so coal is the sine qua non of modern development. In considering the course of our future railway system, regard should be had to this most important requirement, and access to one or more of the most available fields should first engage the attention of the Legislature. We care not in what part of the country it may be, whether the Grey Eiver deposits or those in the Malvern Hills most completely fulfil the conditions required to obtain a cheap supply, or whether the Kavva Kawa mines at the Bay of Islands can compete with the other two. The question of husbarding our resources and circulating our money within our own boundaries is one in which the whole of New Zealand is equally interested, and especially when we have in contemplation a scheme which will, if successfully carried out, increase the demand a hundred fold within a very few years. Thanks to the scientific researches of such men as Drs Hector and Haasr, we have month by mou-.h placed before us undoubted and indisputable evidence of the vast natural resources of the country in which our lot has fortunately been cast, until at last we cannot fail to be persuaded that where nature has done so much—where to boundless mineral wealth, an unequalled climate, and a vast area of fertile land is added—it needs only the energy of man to dcvelope the vast resources which lie in and under the surface soil, and to make New Zealand assume that place among the future nations of the Pacific which England so proudly occupies in the other hemisphere.