DEFERRED PAYMENT LAND.

Dunstan Times, Issue 917, 14 November 1879, Page 3

DEFERRED PAYMENT LAND.

Among the Parliamentary papers received l»y us from the Government Printer is the report of Mr W. H. Pearson, Commissioner of Crown Lands “ as to the working of the system of selection of Land on deferred, payments ” We oin* space will not admit of us publishing the report in full, but the following paragraphs from it, which will give some slight idea as to it as a whole : Being desiro 8 of ascertaining by hersonul inspection the progress made by the deferred payment selectoi s on the east bank of the Mataura, I "lately traversed the district from the Toi Toig to Tapanui an-* beg to subjoin my repoit.

I In 1871 I stood on a hill in the centre of the Toi : Tdis Hundred, and fir .is the eye could reach the I noonday sun disclosed earth’s bosom Covered with its primeval carpet. The tussock lent its ydlow hair to I the breeze The graceful head ofihe cabbage-tree | quivered in its embrace. The brilliant green of the ‘ flax and tutu bushes glowed in contrast with the i darker tin sof the luxuriant fern, and tne spirit of solitude brooded over the landscape. The purple i shadows -f descending night were unbroken by a ! single scintillation of light fro'ii cottage window or ruddy glow of cotier’s tire, and under the gentlyfalling beams of the mistress of the night, earth slumbered with the perfect rest of utter sol tude i In 1879 1 stand on the same hill, and see streched before me the undulating plains clothed with the : strong breath of man’s labour, the spirit cf man’s life The sunbeam dances over we 1-tilled fields ripe 1 with cultivated tbondance he soft autumn breeze. J sighing through the golden effort of the dying summer, I wafts along the gladsome laughter of sunny childhood; ; kisses the russet Cheek of the martron watching at i her cotlagedoor the gambolsof her children; cools th brow of honest labour, as, re ting for a moment the j farmer surveys the bright landscape, and proudly I realizes that the great ffift of “ the Master”— .1 *< the earth and the abundme 9 ’hereof,” is being j turned to its legitimate use—the blessing of the many j - while the grev smoke wreaths it?elf aloft from j many a smiling homestead. Th -t the experiment of settling the waste lands of j of the (Town under a system of deferred payments 1 his proved a perfect success in the l* i I’ois istrict, i there can be no doubt. In these districts the beneficial fruition of the system has developed into a phase, which, small in its inception, will lead to large results, and that with a rapidity which will give a surprising stimulus to trade. » refer to procreation—for in this case it virtually is such -of inland townships, not of mushroom growth, seething up from the hotbed of transitory and migratory industry such as a gol field, hut o'the -table, if slower, expansion result in from the spirit of permane cy,