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New Zealander, Volume XXII, Issue 2484, 17 July 1865, Page 2

As the laud is necessarily the main reliance and the great source of wealth to a new country, so in all the British colonies it has proved a fertile source of dispute and discussion. The true mode of dealing with the lands which form the heritage of the new nation, and rendering them available in the speediest and most efficacious manner for the production of wealth, has always presented peculiar difficulties, and the questions connected with it cannot he said to be even yet set at rest. In dealing with the waste lands of a colony, there are two evils of an opposite tendency, equfllly easy to fall into, and, if not both equally, yet both seriously injuricus to the progress of colonisation. One of these is the evil ou w.hich we have lately commented, the evil of allowing vast tracts of country to pass at a mere trifling price into the hands of individual owners, who have not the slightest intention of expending a single sixpence of capital in developing the resources of their "land, or in any way rendering it a means for the production of wealth, but simply of keeping it until the progress 3$ events, the increased population of the country, and chiefly the labour of more industrious and useful members of the community, employed upon neighboring estates, shall increase tenfold the value of the lands which have thus been locked up effectually from beneficial use and in order to swell the purse of certain capitalists, the drones of the community, who live and grow fat by the toil of their more industrious neighbors. It seems'obvious enough that a system which allows this practice to prevail to any considerable extent, is a monstrous perversion of the ends of good government, and a direct thwarting of the progress of colonisation, the great end which we ought all to have in view. It is, of course, the system which we blame, and not the individuals who take advantage of the system. We art) not so purely theoretical in our views of human nature as to imagine that men who live to make money will refuse to avail themselves of the chance of making money when they can clearly see their way to it without any trouble or risk on their own part. But it is clear enough that the land which thus passes into the hands of these capitalises had much better reoiaiu in the hands of Onv«rnmont. The enhanced price to which it sooner or later attains, would then constitute a fund avauaoio iui' public purposes, iusiead of going to swell the ea«y profits of the drones. And here we may at once discern the evil effects of allowing the management of these matters to be placed in the hands of those who are directly interested in the maintenance of this vicious system. Where the land regulations are made and ad mistered by men who are bound by all the obligations of mutual interest and support to play into the hands of land-sharks, it is mere folly to suppose that land-sharking will not continue in the ascendant.

We trust that our remarks may induce a large portion of the public to keep this subject iu their minds, whoa it again becomes their duty to influence by the>r votes the formation of a Dew Provincial Government. The management of our provincial lands is at the present moment a matter of vital importance, and we hope that the electors of the Province of Auckland will take counsel in time, and will not lose

i the opportunity which will be aflbrdrf them by the coming provincial d£! But whilst dwelling strongly nr*-. the evil of allowing large tracts o fV£ best land iu the country tobeabsohiW locked up from beneficial use and cupation, for the sole advantage ef°* few private individuals, we are Ji ignorant that a mistake may be omu mitted upon the other hand alao/ 1 " mistake not indeed so injurious in *«? effects as the other, yet sufficiently Jl! judicial to make it quite worth o» while to avoid it. This is the mistaS of distributing the land too abundanlS amongst a class of occupiers who ham not sufficient capital to make their laud become a means of the wealth. There can be no that this practice constitutes a seriona evil. Where a district is in the hand* of a number of small land-owners who have not the means of working the? land to advantage, a depressed and stagnant condition of things is cenS to arise. To make the farms remunerative, roads are necessary; but theownera of thes.e farms cannot afford their sham of the costs of these roads, aud so the progress of the district comes to a stand, still. It therefore- appears that there it such a thing as lettiug the waste lata, of a colony pasa too easily iuj© 3j| hands of private owners, and that it h> not good policy to allow the mdustriona labor of the most useful class of colonists to be dissipated by distribution amongst too large a number of small holdings, without the capital sufficient to render that labor remunerative* This evil has appeared so clearly to the legislators of Tarauaki, that a Select Committee of the Provincial Council has recommended as a remedy tha-iaia. ing of the price of land. We cauuot now discuss the value of this recomweudV tiou, but wo may observe that the two evils of which we have spoken might, both be met to some extent by a system which we believe has borne good fruits, in Australia—the system of leasing to* public lands, vith a purchasing clan* to take effect after a fixed number of years. This plan would equally di*. courage the speculations of land-shark. and the miscalculations which prompt those with insufficient means to engage in unprofitable and even ruinous oneta* tions.

The peculiar circumstances of this province, and the necessity of making self-defensive settlements, may, of course, necessitate mauy modifications of ordinary rules, but the more dearly ordinary rules are understood, the more efficiently will the necessary modifies* tions be applied. '