The Press. SATURDAY, AUGUST 13, 1864. MONTHLY SUMMARY.

Press, Volume V, Issue 558, 13 August 1864, Page 2

The Press. SATURDAY, AUGUST 13, 1864. MONTHLY SUMMARY.

THE "PRESS" SUMMARY WILL BE PUBLISHED THIS DAY (SATURDAY).

The principle question which has occupied the attention of New Zealand during the past month may be said to be the financial condition both of the General and Provincial Government. The colony seems to have awakened to a sense of the great task imposed on it to people and civilize islands only the other day desert?; and in its e3gernes3 to fulfil the task it fancies that everything can be done at once. No sum of money, however great, can be named which any province would not be prepared to spend, could it only get it—in roads, railways, bridges, and bo on ; and that, too, in the full conviction that the investment would be a good one. And so it would, were the money only expended with skill and prudence; but it is possible to move too last. Southland has taken the lead in the van, and has come to grief terribly over the first fence. That aspiring province essayed to borrow £300,000, but she spent £400,000 ; and after draining the money from the Banks, found that her debentures were not as eagerly sought after as was anticipated, in other words, were unsaleable. Otago has exhibited a similar imprudence; but to a less courageous extent; and with her goldfields, will soon got out of the scrape. Canterbury commenced the financial year on the Ist of July, with a balance of £50,000 in the chest, having enjoyed during the past twelve months the enormous income of about £450,000; of which only £50,000 was borrowed—the rest current revenue; and this with a population of under 30,000. In England the public expenditure is about £2 109. a head ; in Canterbury it is £15 a head. But even Canterbury is pinched for money to make her railways, north and south. She only asks to borrow about a year and a-halFs income to make works that would certainly in' two or three years, if not in the first year, repay a good interest on the money, without troubling the public chest at all. From a recent return it seems that out of 6,000,000 acres of agricultural land in this province, 500,000 only are sold. Of the rest, at least 2,000,000 are sure to come into the market in the next few years at £2 an acre. It is very hard that on such a security we cannot borrow four or five humlr? I thousand puuuds to make mil-

ways, which would so rapidly people the countryThe General Government, however, has undertaken to bring in a bill into the General Assembly to guarantee all provincial loans, so thai we may hope in a few months to see all our securities standing favorably on' Change, and our borrowing powers increased with equal pro6t to the lender and to the colony. Whether, however, this be a wise financi.i scheme is very much to be doubted, and all sorts of difficulties suggest themselves in the way of such an arrangement. There has been heart-burning enough in the colony already as to the distribution of the revenues amongst the various provinces ; but if the General Government is to back the bills of all the provinces, will there not be even a greater difficulty in apportioning the extent of the claim which each province may have on the endorsement of the General Government? Nor can we shut our eyes to the fact that the guarantee of the General Government to the provincial loans must, in justice to all, be co-ordinate with that Government's control of the expenditure of such money; and the meaning of this, in other words, is, the substitution of General Government for Provincial management in the most important branch of Provincial affairs. At the same time it must not be forgotten that this policy was initiated last session when the General Government undertook on behalf of Auckland to conduct the immigration at the cost of the colony, a matter up to that time left to the Provincial Governments, and -which all other provinces have done for themselves without assistance. The Native war lias greatly relaxed its interest of late. Fighting i* at an cad for the present, and Auckland having got all the land she could hope for, there is no likelihood of any further spoliation. At Taranaki, as soon as spring commences, we shall of course make a brief campaign. The Waitara must of course again be taken, and something more, to pay for the Oakura tragedy. It is in the full light of this policy that the brilliant stroke of giving up Waitara at the peculiar moment selected, becomes intelligible. We gave it back a few days after the Oakura murders . now we take it again as utu for the same murders j Poor Natives ! you are notwithstanding expected to understand what we do want and what we don't want, and why we do or don't. Though the fighting has ceased, the paying goes on, and that with a vengeance. What the war has cost, or is costing, no one knows. It is admitted to have cost the colony a million already. That million, if spent in making railways in the Middle Island, instead of making war on the wretched Natives in the North, would have afforded homes to thousands of English emigrants, and England would have been saved two or three 'millions of money and numbers of brave lives. It would have been ten times a better speculation for England, as well as for the colony, to have settled the Middle Island, and the Natives alone in the North. Ik Pdblic Woeks in Canterbury there is little to report. The new Council Chamber, a very handsome stone building, is beginning to make some show above the foundations, and promises to bo ready for the Assembly should it be held in March. The iron bridge for the Market-place is on the spot, and we hope will be reported as nearly finished before our next summary. All the works on the Lyttelton and Christchurch Railway aro now complete—stations, working stock, &c, and in admirable working order — excepting only the tunnel. This great work, however, is now progressing with uniform rapidity and success. On the Christchurch side the drive is carried some yards beyond the half-mile, and the work is of so favorable a character that considerable progress is being made. The strata in the latter part of the drive has somewhat changed. Layers of clay, some burnt and some even not burnt, have been met with as thick as eighteen inches, and on one occasion a quantity of sea silt was exposed. The water, which did not make its appearance for bo long at the north end, has appeared in such quantities as to give both trouble and expense; and the floor of the drive, instead of being carried down the slight incline which is the ultimate gradient, is kept level to get rid of the water, and is now about six feet above the proper height. The roof is kept in the true line. Aβ the drive progresses the floor will therefore approach the roof, but as the gradient is very slight the lower, or Lyttelton, drive will be broken into before they meet. The water will then be got rid of by the fall into Lyttelton, and the floor on tho upper drive will be reduced to its true gradient. Every yar J now «nve3 fresh assurance that the work may be accomplished within the time, and with no fresh difficulty. On tho Lyttelton end the tunnel is finished from the face inwards, the drive extending'to something above 34 chains. There is, therefore, now not more than 1200 yards left to complete the whole work. Last month the amount done was 90 feet at the Christchurch side, and 51 feet at the port side. If the present hard black rock at the Lyttelton end shortly gires way, as is hoped, for softer material, the progress will ensure tho completion of the work by June 1866—the contract time. The stone face and entrance to the tunnel at the Lyttelton side is all but complete, and the iron bridge which is to take the road down to Peacock's wharf, across the open cutting in front of the tuunel mouth, is on the ground, and will be put up the moment the weather clear 3. At the Ferry station, on the Heathcote, the arrangements are very complete. One steam crane on a railway truck is constantly at work, whilst a steam hoist works two other fixed cranes. There are two hand cranes besides, making in all five powerful cranes for discharging cargo. Ey these facilities the cargoes of three steamers can readily be discharged in the morning, and deposited in the railway sheds in Christchurch in the afternoon. Four hundred tons can be discharged in a day. Messrs. Holmes and Co. have made arrangements by which they take charge of goods either on board ship, in the harbor, or in the wharves at Lyttelton, and deliver them in Christchurch at any house for 20s a ton. This is, our readers will remember, what we contended for when the railway was about to be let. The province may thus save many thousand poirtids in carriage alone in the courcr of this rear,

The discovery of a goldfield on the West Coast is tnother matter of great importance to this province. Tn the depth of winter, however, little can be done 'owards opening up the communication with thu sido ; nor will the Government probably spend am more money on the Hurunui track until Mr. Arthur Dobsou's pass, at the head of the Waimakariri, ufully explored, and the pro 3 pect of a shorter and easier route ascertained. That there ia gold over » considerable portion the West Coast of Canterbury is fully ascertained. State op Thade.—The great depression in trade which has been gradually spreading throughout the whole of the Middle Island of New Zealand has now, it is to be hoped, come to a climax, though there can be no reasonable expectation of any decided reaction for two or three months to come. The imports during the latter end of 1863 were greatly in excess ot, the requirements of the community, and thoso in the lirst half of 186* were on a still more extravagant scale. Stocks of all kinds .increased to an unusual extent, and forced unremunerative sales have only tended to remove to the shops of retailersjetocks which were unsaleable at a fair value in the stores of the importers. But whilst the retailers are fully supplied, trade is unpreeedentedlj dull. The consequence is that the past month has soen the collapse of a considerable number of small dealers, who having started in a season of speculation without any capital, when trade was brisk, have failed to maintain their position when business was comparatively at a stand still. At the same time amongst the regular and established traders there is no symptom of inability to tide over the present season of dullness. The sheep fanners as a class are sound, | though stock and station property may be said to be unsaleable from the want of money to buy. Bills, however, have been met with a shade less difficulty than during the past two months. Speculation is entirely dead; and men unable to obtain the accommodation of favorable times confine their operations to the bare necessities of immediate business. In our opinion matters are now at the worst, and a few weeks will see a return to a more active state. At the same time the condition, of Canterbury seems to be more healthy than in either of the Southern provinces ; and in the financial condition of the Government, Canterbury stands at present facile prinoeps. For this great depression ia the South, three causes are obvious and prominent. First, —the war in the North, which has been carried on, cot with the object of beating the Maoris, and reducing them to terms, but with the object of securing and occupying their lands. The cost which, had merely the one object been kept in view, would have been moderate, has in fact been gigantic. The organs of Government in the North admit to the expenditure of a million up to the present time. How this money has been obtained, pending the raising of the three million loan, no one knows, as the General Government has, so far as we know, published no accounts whatever of the war expenditure. But that a very large amount of the capital which is ordinarily occupied in the trade of the South has been diverted to meet the extravagant expenditure in tho North, is beyond doubt. The South is reaping to its full measure the consequence of neglecting the warnings of those who in vain pointed out in the General Assembly that the desperate measures of the piesent Ministry would inevitably produce these disastrous effects upon all colonial industry, except that which fatten* upon the commissariat. The second cause of the present crisis must be sought in the insanity which seems to have seized the local managers of some of the Banks to advance large sums of money to the Provincial Governments upon the security of debentures, which were rashly assumed to be immediately negotiable. In Otago and Southland there cannot be less than half a million thus under advance to the Governments of those provinces. To such an extent does this mania appear to have extended that the Bank of Otago, although only very recently established, advanced to the Southland Government a sum very greatly in excess of its whole paid up capital. The money thus locked up hae been withdrawn from the ordinary purposes of commerce, and invested in permanent works, and the public have been deprived of the legitimate accommodation which is necessary for the healthy action of trade. Nor can the evil be remedied in any way, until the coffers of the Banks are refilled by the proceeds of the sale of the securities on which such advances have been made. The state of Southland i 3 an exact realization of those evils winch we foresaw might come upon this province had it rushed on in a similar career, and to avert which, by a timely warning, was the main object of the earlier efforts of this journal. It is likely the Banks may in some measure mitigate the results of their imprudence, by obtaining advances in England and the other colonies in which they have established credit, but they can never fully alleviate the pressure they have occasioned, until the debentures are entirely sold, and the capital of the Banks restored to its legitimate uses. The third cause is—the folly of English consignees in forcing goods upon our markets with no sufficient information as to the demand. This is an evil which has, we imagine, now corrected itself. The account sales sent home during the past four months must have brought conviction in the most unpleasant form of argument to the minds of exporters, that markets cannot be forced at their pleasure, and that such imprudent speculations not only injure all engaged in the trade of the colony, but most of all themselves.. The necessary result of the present state of trade is that great numbers are out of employment. It is much to be hoped that the Government has taken the precaution of stopping the immigration for a few months. The only class at present wanted are good, cooks and general servants : a hundred good female servants would find employment even now at good j ' wages. But the arrival of any other class would for the next two months only produce dissatisfaction, and ! tend to delay tho period of reaction which we may i then hope will have set in.