ST. PARTRIDGE AND ST. GROUSE.

Auckland Star, Volume XLI, Issue 293, 10 December 1910, Page 10

ST. PARTRIDGE AND ST. GROUSE.

(To the Editor.) Sir, —Your correspondent, " H.J.", who is bo anxious that there should be no : interference with his patron saints, St. ' Partridge and St. Grouse, except, OI ! course, at the hands of their lordly clay- ! ers, is apparently unaware of the fact that in the United Kingdom no less than 20 million acres, or rather more than : one-third of the land, are held idle for I grouse covers, game preserves, deer for- '■ ests, and so forth, while, in the interests i of similar murderous " spoTts, " millions 1 of acres more axe only half-used, only producing half the food, etc., that they ought to produce, and only employing half the labour that they ought to em- ! ploy. He is also evidently ignorant of 1 the fact that on the one hand much lana at Home has been reclaimed from the moors, and on the other hand much land so reclaimed has been allowed again, in the interests of these killing "sports," to revert hack to moorland, i If your readers wish to learn something ; of this matter they should read the chapter on Scottish landlordism, and "The Highland Clearances," in Professor Alfred Russell Wallace's " Land Nationalisation " — a chapter that will simply make their blood boil, if they have any I thoughts and feelings higheT than deer and grouse and partridges. Of the 26 million acres above-mentioned 9 millions have been covered with forest, and should be covered with forest again. And if re-aiTorested. they would, according to Dr. Sehlich, the great German au- ' fhority on such matters, employ some 150.000 men directly, and three times that number indirectly in the various industries connected with the forests. This means employment fox 600,000 men, or the whole ; number . of the unemployed in a normal year. Twelve million acres ■more are suitable for allotments and i small holdings, and are capable of sup- ' porting a family to- every five or ten acres. At ten acres to the family these 12 million acres would employ ahd'sup- : port 1,200,000 families, or 6,000..000 men, ' women, and children, And that this is

>y no means the limit of what could be i lone is well known to those who have ; •tudied the question of intensive culture j n such books as Prince Kxopotkin's I 'fields, Factories and Workshops." j " HJ." is of opinion that " New Zea- : and also suffers from the L.G. breed of •anters." Well, if such " ranters" can inly preserve " God's own country" from icing fenced in for St. Partridge and St i Jrouse, while the people are fenced out, j f they can only rid this fair land of the ! ivils of land monopoly and land specula- j ;ipn, I, for., one, shall be only too prond j ;o be numbered amongst them. —I am, i' ite., ARTHUR WITTY, j Gen. Sec. N.Z. Land Values League. Auckland, Dec. 7, 1910.