FREE LAND GRANTS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume IV, Issue 1122, 19 June 1867, Page 6

FREE LAND GRANTS.

To the Editor of the New Zealand Heraid. Sib, X do not altogether agree with your correspondent Colonist," whoii he advocates the giving of land to parties in tiio other colonies "who miv immigrate to this Province for the purpose of settlement. "With other parts of his letter I cordially agree, but not with that. I, for ono, believe that it is C[ iiif o unnecessary to go elsewhere for settlers when wo have so many hero already overcmw;li:ig the town, who would willingly if they had the land go and settle in the country, and I think it is a fit' subject for ridicule to encourage men from oth<;r c >an tries to obtuiu land free in this Province, while at the sums time we have amongßt us many men ail rjU'd to cultivate the ground, and will.not get an acre, far less tho privilege "we give strangers, shall X lau»h or weep at the childish absurdity. = Gi v 200 hundred acres free to every head of a family no matter from whence ho c trno should he ; oven have been bred and born in lunary limbo itself making him pay for survey and office fcs. If men of capital want a thousand or two of acres let them pay a pound an acre, and that on conditions of bona fide settlement, it is the small man or the industrious settler that is to make this country the great country it is destined to be, and although it appears' to be a crude doctrine it is capital in the hands of unpatriotic men that is the bane of our Province. J?or instance, 35,000 acres have been given, on special terms, to Nova Scotians at Waipu. Now with 140 families, in a year or two they will average 100 sheep each, in a few years more they will average 200 sheep, which will make 23,000 sheep ; should that block have been given to a capit .list would it be as valuable as it is now, even should he have a capital of £50,000 at commencing ? But such is man ! Where once those little settlers have enlarged their iloclv, they, too, will all begin to advocate large runs as the rule of the day.—Yours, &c., Another Colonist. Auckland, June IStli, 1867.