HARDSHIPS OF SETTLERS ON THE FORTY-MILE BUSH. [UNITED PRESS ASSOCIATION.] Napier, This Day.

Evening Post, Volume XX, Issue 265, 12 November 1880, Page 2

HARDSHIPS OF SETTLERS ON THE FORTY-MILE BUSH. [UNITED PRESS ASSOCIATION.] Napier, This Day.

Mr. Carr, District Engineer, having received notice that his services will be dispensed with after the Ist January, this is taken as indicating a total stoppage of all railway works. The settlers in the Bush townships have had next to no work for the last 12 months, and now they are not only unable to pay instalments due on their land, but i» many cases reduced to absolute want. They have no other possible means of earning money, as they are all long distances away from any market for produce, even if they oould raise it, while they cannot lease

their sections and seek work elsewhere without forfeiting them, and thus losing the labors of years. In the House last session, Mr. Ormond obtained the promise that a portion of the vote for the unemployed should be spent in the bush districts here. Hitherto the settlers have waited patiently, but now : being on the verge of starvation, and having exhausted their credit with the local storekeepers, they are holding indignation meetings in order to obtain a fulfilment of the promise. The local olergy paint the position of the settlers in pitiable colors, and the County Council is doing its best to find work in their neighborhood to relieve to some extent the existing distress.