THE TIMES ON TASMANIA.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 6191, 12 December 1881, Page 4

THE TIMES ON TASMANIA.

The Times' correspondent at Melbourne, in the issue of October 15th, describes a visit ho paid to Tasmania, and in a leading article on the subject our contemporary remarks:— "Tasmania Beems to have been reserved for the present crisis of English aspirations. We have not a word to say againßt Canada, but it is not every adult constitution that can stand half a year of frost and snow, relieved by sledging wrapped up in a buffaloskin, cutting wood in a bam, and brushing up what remains of ones schoolday learning and literature. No one thinks _of Scotland under a thousand a year. A millionaire can amuse rhimself there, but even a millionaire cannot make money there. We are all under orders to quit Ireland, and consequently not to go there. In this country it is a universal complaint that farming will not pay, and that it is impossibleto purchase land except where no-body wants it. _ Tasmania is still in the market. Its ambitious and savoy Australian neighbours have long despised it and laughed at it. They had the wit to see that them was a certain spell upon it, and they called it Sleepy Hollow. The gold discoveries drained its male population, till Tasmania was the only British Colony in the world in which the sexes were in equal proportion, There was nothinggoing on there; not even the floating of new companies, The hotels were no better than English country inns. The people vegetated, and wore genteel. They felt exclusive and shy in the presence of visitors from faster Australian circles. This is like keeping girls too long at school or at home. But the spell is broken at last. The earth jhas opened its treasurehouße, and Tasmania can show now her vast deposits of tin, gold, and other precious minerals. Fortunes can be made there, if not in a day, yet more quickly than by sowing wheat and planting potatoes. Meanwhile, if you are not obliged to be always at the grindstone,, you can fish everywhere with the line and the net, paying ten shillings for your annual license; .there is the charming scenery to put on paper; there are mountains higher than any in the British Isles within easy reach; thera ia a temperature which may be favourably compared to that of St. Holier and its suburbs, the group called the Cliannol Islands, and there appears to bo an abundance of'organisation for no more than a hundred thousand peoiile.. More than all, there aro country gentlnmen, living in mansions, with parks, tenantry, servants, and at least, with a pack of beagles, occasionally bringing together a field of a hundred hunting men in the costume of the Colony. There l_s no international playground or holiday resort in all Europe that cannot supply all that is summed up in that tight little, island. It is true there are features of tho oldor civilisation that are missed in Tasmania. Our correspondent glided through s.cenory that reminded him and his follow travellers of tho Rhino, but there were ( no castles or- cathedrals. Well, liidiu is tsoiimtiring to" be said oven to' this want. You will not have to spend the best hours of tho day in being shown dismal ruins or questionable skulls, and bo nhnrmsd f.u"> !ihi)]m(»i a head for it. You will not ascend a hill or a church tower, and soo a dozen oities chequering tho plain, or breaking: the horizon with their tall spires. But you may see all these with tha ago of faith. You may conceive a Tasmania of the fniurn taitninted with tho greater European scandals and crimes. Thero could not bo planned a better ground for a now country, for the origin of families, for honourable enterprise, for that mixture of hard work and innocent recreation which makes the Englishman. It is frequently said hero that old English life is gone. Tho country is ploughed up and fenced in to tho roadside; and the towns are too- big too busy, too amoky and dirty for gentry to live m, if they can. possibly live olsewhore. For several generations to come Tasmania promises to combine an open country and, so it is said, good society, either in the country or in rather old-fashioned towns." :

Amarkot for the sale of toads is held every weak in Paris. The 'goods' are brought in ' : well-ventuated casks, in which the toada are packed in damp moes in lota of 100. A lot of 100 good ones will bring from L 3 to LS 10s. The gardeners buy them to put in their g»rw "-j den to devour insaots. •' ' ;..,■-.•;