OLD AUCKLAND.

Auckland Star, Volume LIV, Issue 131, 4 June 1923, Page 7

OLD AUCKLAND.

X.AND VALUES Uf 1845,

CONDITION OF THE WORKER.

During the last few weeks there have been several sales of property in Queen Street, and in view of the high figures paid it is of interest to record that 78 years ago a writer iv the "New Zealander," referring to the fact that Short. land Street had <becomo the main thoroughfare, complained that purchasers of land in Queen Street had been led to pay as high as £4 to £6 per perch at auction. The sales were made on the understanding that Queen Street was to be the main thoroughfare of the future city. The last sale of land fronting Queen Street was at the rate of £1420 per foot. At least one of the sections purchased at the first land gale in Auckland still remains in the possession of the children of the buyer. About six months ago another section fronting Queen Street, which was also bought at the first land sale in Auckland for £60, was sold by the son of the purchaser for over £17,000. MATTERS OF FINANCE. Evidently banking was carried on in a rough-and-ready manner in 1845, for in! Hie "New Zealander'-' of September 6 it | is notified that, with a view to closing affairs at the end of the year, all bills, promissory notes, and mortgages were to 'be sold by public auction. In the previous July there was a financial crisis. The public debt had reached the enormous total of £14,000, while the sum total of cash held T>y the Treasury was £19 10/3. and in the Bank of Auckland £3 1/3. Even in 1845 there were debentures issued, the total value being £0000. Fortunately a big smash was averted by a supply of specie coming to hand in time to avert a catastrophe. . "HIRED HANDS." The position of tho artisans was not an enviable one in the year 1840. An advertisement offered a reward for the arrest, of a runaway workman from Great Barrier Island. Another notice reade: "Three of my hired servants being absent from my employment without leave, anyone employing them will be prosecuted to the utmost rigour of the law." Similar notice appears with regard to three carpenters, five joiners, and one blacksmith. Tn the old Court records for 1845-46 there are frequent canes reported where employees were imprisoned for being away from work without leave, and in cases where they refused employment in gaol they we/c sentenced to twenty-one days' solitary confinement. It is a fortunate thing for the worker of to-day that, ho has ceased to be a "hired servant," and become an "employee." THE FIRST STRUCK. In 1848 occurred the first strike In New Zealand, and strange to say it was amongst the Maoris. Some 350 natives were employed by the Government roadmaking at "the munificent remuneration of 9/ per week. Owing to the cost of rations being deducted from their pay the Maoris dropped tools. There were forty men who resumed work, but the rest went to their homes after telling the authorities that they were not slaves, and claimed to be treated the same as the pakeha workers. They claimed to be entitled to roceive the whole of their wages, feed themselves as they pleased, and spend the rest as they liked. It is quite evident the Maoris worked at trades in 1845, for an advertisement calls for fifty natives for boatbuilding.