LAND SETTLEMENT.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1156, 27 April 1894, Page 17

LAND SETTLEMENT.

The Survey Department are engaged in preparing maps in respect of the following approaching land sales :—3243 acres in North Auckland district, to be offered under optional system on 30th May; also on same date to be sold at Auckland several township sections and 285 acres of unsurveyed second-class land ; 31 acres at Hokonui, Southland, to be offered under the optional system on 30th May; on same date grazing run of 2534 acres at Pohui, Hawke's Bay, will be sold; on 23rd May pastoral rim No. 509, in the Eyre Mountains, Southland, containing 40,600 acres, will be leased for 21 years. An important sale of 99 years' lease is to take place at Rotorua en the 7th June, viz., 172 quarter-acre town sections, 22 sections of suburban land averaging 10 acres each, and 24 sections of rural land ranging from 9 to 59 acres each.

Messrs G. Y. Lethbridge and Sons have offered their Feilding property, consisting of an area of between 7000 and 8000 acres, to the Government (says the Advocate) at a price equal to the Government valuation. The property adjoins the Feilding borough, and considering the stimulus which has been imparted to the demand for land in the neighbourhood by the expansion of the dairy industry, there can be no doubt that, if the Government decide to purchase, they will have no difficulty in disposing of the sections. It offers, in fact, a splendid chance for the Government, if they really desire to foster close settlement in the vicinity of towns, and will be regarded by Feilding people as a most auspicious opening for the increased commercial activity which follows increase of population on the

land. We understand, too, that the Government have so far entertained the offer that Mr Smith is to bo sent up to inspect the property. The eighteen special settlement associations which have put in applications for allocations of land in the fertile Awarna Block are doomed to disappointment. It has been decided by the Government that no special privileges can be allowed in respect of it. Those who desire to settle on this block will have to compete on equal terms and under the ordinary clauses of the Land Act. Months must yet elapse before the portions of the block awarded to the Government in consideration of tho interests in it they have acquired from the Native owners can become available for settlement. But when tho land is ready it will bo offered to the public under the ordinary clauses of tho Act.