ENGLISH EXTRACTS.

Daily Southern Cross, Volume I, Issue 4, 13 May 1843, Page 4

ENGLISH EXTRACTS.

Aerial Steam - Carriage. — This is the name which has been given to a new machine, for which a company has taken out a patent, and which is to convey passengers, goods, and despatches through the air, performing the journey from London to India in four days ! and to travel at the rate of from seventyfive to a hundred miles per hour. At the first glance of such an announcement our readers will doubtless feel disposed to treat it as some chimerical absurdity, written merely to excite wonder, and expressely for the marvel-loving i mass of society ; but the facts connected with the subject are of a kind to diminish disbelief, at least as to the truth of such a contrivance being in process of formation. A company 1 of gentlemen is really formed, even of mechanical men : the patent was formally sealed on the 29th of September last, and systematic arrangements are in progress to complete the design. In such an age of improvement, we really have no right or precedent to deny the possibility of this measure. In January the machine will be thoroughly organized ; and until then we take leave of the subject, and |only trust that this alleged invention is neither exaggerated nor an Utopian project ; and from the conversation we have had with those in connexion with the design, we have every reason to believe that neither is the case. — Atlas. German Emigration. — We have been much gratified to learn that a party of German colonists, purchasers of land in the Nelson settlement, are preparing to take their departure shortly for the colony, and have chartered the St. Pauli, a fine vessel of about 380 tons, to sail from Hamburg on the 20th December next. They will muster about sixteen or seventeen in the cabin, and about 100 labouring emigrants in the steerage. This is the first result of the measures recently taken by the New Zealand Company to spread information in Germany respecting New Zealand ; and we are informed that great probability exists that the emigration thence will be followed up with spirit next season. Mr. John IST. Beit, of Hamburg, whom the Company some time since appointed its agent in Germany, wrote a little pamphlet containing an account of the Company's settlements ; and many of the papers issued by the Company have been translated into the German language, and extensively circulated. A spirit of inquiry has been thus awakened ; and the results are the purchase of land to a considerable amount, and the despatch of the first body of German emigrants to New Zealand. Mr. Beit himself proceeds to Nelson accompanied by a large I family ; and two clergymen, sent out by the North German Mission, will also form part of the expedition. We believe that the whole of the arrangements respecting the ship have been made b}- the parties themselves ; and that the labouring emigrants have been carefully selected according to the regulations of the Company for English emigrants. Severalvine- ' dressers are of the number, and Mr. Beit has expressed his determination to attempt the cultivation of the vine at Nelson. We hail with pleasure this commencement of a German emigration to the Company's settlements. The number of emigrants who leave Germany annually is about 22,000 souls, the greater part of whom emigrate to the United States or Canada ; and it has been calculated that these do not possess less than from £15 to £20 per head : many of these are of that " intermediate class" which has just gone out in the fore-cabin of the Ph&be, and would be a most valuable acquisition to New Zealand. We have little doubt, from all we can learn, that a considerable stream of emigration will now, be kept up, particularly Avhen accounts shall have been received from this expedition. Messrs. De Chapeaurouge and Co., a well-known and most respectable mercantile firm at Hamburgh, have accepted the agency of the Company, and have taken up the subject with great spirit ; and we may look forward to the despatch of another vessel in the course of next spring, with a fresh batch of settlers for Wellington or Nelson. — (New Zealand Journal, November 27.)