SYDNEY COMMERCIAL INTELLIGENCE.

Otago Witness, Issue 76, 30 October 1852, Page 3

SYDNEY COMMERCIAL INTELLIGENCE.

whose habits had been sedentary, who found the rough work of the colony unsuited to them. And let us also point to the evidence of selfreliance in Otago. In the North-East Valley the line of road, formed partly at the expense of the inhabitants of that district, is lined on each side by well cultivated small farms, with their substantial weather-boarded houses peeping from out the ever-green woods—the rich green of the oats and wheat crops in this the spring time contrasting with the dark brown of the fern and tufted grass-clad hills in the background—the stout fences—the deep and well-dug ditches draining the surface water into the clear and limpid brook, leaping gaily along over its pebbly bottom, pleasantly suggestive of trout and fly-fishing (too indolent and luxurious a sport, by the bye, for a colonist)—the fat sleek cattle grazing by the road side—-the heavily-ladened dray progressing calmly along, drawn by the labouring oxen—the ploughs with irresistible progress turning the rich and virgin soil—the stacks of golden grain and the merrysound of the flail;—all speaking of peace, industry, and contentment, and each year marking the rapid progress of cultivation and civilisation. In., that Valley, where four years since might have been seen one solitary house and one solitary garden, now can scarcely be found one unoccupied section. Formerly the cultivations appeared as an inroad upon the waste lands; now the waste lands appear but as gaps in the continuous line of pretty farms. . Much credit is due to the men of the Valley; they have done more than well; and a walk in this direction will repay any one interested in the progress of the Settlement. :The Half-Way Bush also presents evidence