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Waikato Times, Volume XII, Issue 1006, 3 December 1878, Page 2

A correspondent from Wailou writes asking how it is that the Government will do nothing in the matter of giving the settlers of that district the benefit of telegraph extension. We cannot of course say why this is so, nor indeed do we see why it should be so, for the Waitoa and Piako districts possess now an amount of population which fairly entitles them to consideration in this respect. Now, however, that it is determined to commence the Thames Waikato Railway from this end the line, it may reasonably beanticipafced that with the line, telegraph com munication will a'so be provided." The .£2OOO, allotted for the extension into Hamilton and the .£30,000 upnoi tioned for the construction of t e Thames-Waikato railway during the present financ'al year will probably be sufficient to complete the

lino as far us tho Piako. The

distance between the Waikato and Thames rivers even is only thirty i?jiles, a L the railway is so far the settlers will be placed -ia easy communicition with! &•% ddttbte market, either direct by railway with Auckland, or by raildr road to the head of the Thames navigation, and thence by river steamer to Grahamstjwn. At the present time, it is lioi possible to commence; at both ends of the lino, because-, as yet, theliue between Shortland and the Thames river is not even surveyed. The extent surveyed to the Thames river is just, thirty and a half ,nrile3, and as the wholo of it is quite level, and much of it ready for the laying of the sleepers and rails, the Government in apportioning £?0,000 for the first years expenditure on the ThamesWaikato Hue, has very likely calculated, if othar provision be made for the cost of the bridge over the Waikato, in being able to co.npietc so much and thus 1 open up a large area of valuable country which is rapidly being- settled and cultivated. Referring to the engineer's report on the surveyed portion of the Thames-Waikato line—th.t is, the first 30£ miles from the Waikato river to Omaha on the Thames, — we find that of this distance 9} miles are already formed and ditched that some 14 additional miles of the line require nothing more than merely ditching and forming, and that tha work to : be done on the remainder consists of very ordinary earthworks, and that all the bridges, with the exception of that oyer the Waikato river, will be of very easy construction. We may, therefore, reasonably suppose that before long the line will be constructed so far as the Piako, and as the work of railway construction' proceeds so, too, we trust will that of the telegraph. If, therefore, the Government has left the very reasonable request of providing for the extension of the telegraph to the Piako in abeyance it is because it is intended to raaka the line of telegraph the same as that of the railway, and possibly appoint as stationmaaters at the Piako ai.d Omaha stations, officers who can combine with those duties tint, also of telegraphist.