THE SETTLEMENT OF THE COUNTRY.

Waikato Times, Volume XXXIV, Issue 2780, 8 May 1890, Page 2

THE SETTLEMENT OF THE COUNTRY.

TO TKK EDITOR. Sir,—lt is a pleasure to all who have the welfare of this colony at heart to road your well-conceived and ably-penned leader of the 2!) th ult., on what would promote the material prosperity of the colony. It is a pity not to see more enthusiasm evoked by it amongst your numerous readers—the men whose welfare it was written to promote. One is left to imagine that the settlers in Wai pa and Waikato, through long continued depression and Government neglect, have become a hopeless lot. They are well provided with halls and assembly places in all the different towns used for places of mere amusement, song and dance, rink and ball. Why have they not associations and mutual improvement societies, to meet weekly or periodically, and discuss those questions meant for their good? If your leader had beun so dealt with, the settlers would soon make themselves heaid and felt. Valuable suggestions like yours will fall deftly on the ears of the Railway Commissioners when not taken up and echoed and re-echoed as they ought by the farming class. Bent on raising revenue alone from our railways, they pride themselves on having so far bled you as to make them pay three per cent, on the lavish outlay with which they were built, utterly regardless or forgetful of your fruit and potatoes perishing and rotting where they grew, because railway freight for your distance is so high they cannot be carried and sold, and afford any profit to you who produced. You are poor gainers if you send them, and losers if they rot. And yet the railways wore made for you, not y>u for the railways. Why not insist that your produce bee urifid, as suggested, to port or market. Empty waggons and steam power unutilised is constantly passing your doors. You have cleared bush, drained the swamp, uprooted ti-tree, swept off fern, made grass grow in million blades, all no use. In other lands railways save time and diminish space, make the far off comparatively near, and why not here? Potatoes can be brought from Hobart Town or Ouinaru more cheaply than you can send yours to town. You have a good soil, and yet, owing to your having to pay 15s or £1 per ton, equal to one-third of the whole value, you cannot forward your crop, while people a great deal more distant take your place. Wake up ! Before your next crop is ready for market you will have a new or re-con-structed Government, a re-formed Parliament, and an opportunity of making yourself felt. Select two men for your vast district thoroughly imbued with a desire to see your country populated, your idle wastes cut up and parcelled out to men willing to expend their stiength in reclaiming tham, whether they pay for them or not. Waikato is the natural base from which Auckland should be fed. And if you find two representatives who have ability to insist that your vast tracts of good land lying waste shall be so dealt with and railway charges reduced, say to Pnkekohe prices for all distances, they will succeed, or else you will create an Auckland in your own midst if you occupy and cultivate tho areas now lying idle waste. I hope to hear 3ome response.—l am, <fec, Waipa.