A GREAT ENTERPRISE.

New Zealand Times, Volume LXXIV, Issue 4881, 5 February 1903, Page 4

A GREAT ENTERPRISE.

Now Zealand keeps up her reputation by coming once more to the front. This time it is a triumph of peace, and the men to whom it is duo are those enterprising colonists, Messrs Charles Pharazyn and Acton Adams. These gentlemen are well known —the one here, the other in Christchurch—as men of large ideas and “pushful” character. But few ever suspected them of such a large idea as was revealed by our London correspondent in our columns of yesterday, or thought to see them pushing so far as Arnheim’s Land in the North Territory of Australia, known to fame as part of “South Australia.” According to our correspondent, they have engineered

through all its difficulties a £150,000 company —vein’ not half a million at. once?—for the acquisition of 20,000 square miles of land, for the purpose of

supplying the world with chilled beef. The institution is known as the “llastcrn Cattle, Cold Storage and Land Company. Limited.” and the title speaks for itself sufficiently; That its object is confined entirely to supplying chilled moat must he doubted, until further information is received on the subject generally, and more particularly on the question of tiio invention of some now process, the rights of which have perhaps been acquired by the newly-formed company, for improving the method of chilling, hitherto regarded as unsuitable for long distances. There is. of course, no need for the company, if it acquires the land indicated, to confine itself to the chilling process. It is described by its title as “inter alia,” a Land Company. Twenty thousand square miles is nearly thirteen million acres. It is an area about as largo as the piece of country included by lines drawn from Raglan on the west coast of the North Island, across to Opitiki on the Bay of Plenty, thence south of Cape Turnagain and across from there to Wanganui. This principality, if wo allow onc-third of the capital to bo reserved for stocking, equipment and other necessary expenses, will stand the company, so far as we can judge, in about sixpence an acre.

The company’s territory is apparently the pick of Arnheim’s Land—about 180 miles by 110—and Arnheim’s Land is, from the agricultural point of view, the pick of tho Northern Territory. It is a country with a rainfall that has averaged CO inches for the last thirteen years, and it lies within the tropical monsoon area. It is part of a country which, in the South Australian Roprcsen. tative House, was described tho other day as “magnificent open plains, in some places lightly timbered, consisting of rich black, chocolate and rod soils, heavily grassed with Flinders, Mitchell and other first-class grasses.” It was added that in the Northern Territory there aro 80,000 square miles of agricultural land as productive as Java, which, with tho same area, easily maintains twenty million people. Tho central plateau of 'this Northern Territory, rising 2000 ft above soa level, is estimated, with a small but certain rainfall or 25in, to carry 30,000,000 sheep. This is, of course, a long way from Arnheim’s Land. So aro tho mineral regions, of which a great deal was said during tho debate. But a future that is dazzling to these parts cannct 100 harmful to Arnheim’s Land, with its own great advantages or climate and soil. Those aro well supported by good harbours, all along the coast-lino, from the mouth of tho lloper River, in the Gulf of Carpentaria, to Arnheim and Buckingham Bays in the Arafura Sea.

The formation of this company is opportune, for tho South Australian Parliament has revived tho trans-continental railway project, for tho fourth or fifth time, and thereby filled tho North with gladness. Ignorance of geography might lead to the conclusion that the Eastern Cattle. Cold Storage and Land Company is anxious to have a share ot the land grants. Bub these grants—alternate blocks of 75,000 acres per mile, within twenty-five miles of the railway line—not being within a hundred miles of the south-eastern corner of tho company’s principality, arc not likely to bo in the company’s calculations. It is, moreover, uncertain whether tho federal Government will not intervene to prevent this transaction by which the contracting syndicate will acquire seventyfive million acres of land with all metals and minerals, and freedom from taxation for ten years, together with the ownership of the railway for that time. But if the railway is constructed, the cattle company must share in tho advantages. If, however, tho railway fails—it will probably succeed, for tho country is now known not to ho the barren desert of tho old maps—tho company has within its territory enough • resources for ensuring a most prosperous career. The only drawback they suffer from at present is, it appears, tho publicity given t 0 their enterprise. No wonder, for in the face of publicity no Government can dare to continue tho old vicious policy of giving away its priceless resources to speculators. But so long as such opportunities arc .left open, so long will it he a pleasure to congratulate New Zealanders upon getting the host advantage of them.