NEW ZEALAND SETTLEMENT.

Otago Witness, Issue 2056, 20 July 1893, Page 11

NEW ZEALAND SETTLEMENT.

INTERVIEW WITH MR GLYN.

(Fbom Oub Special Cobbespondent.) 30 and 31 Fleet stheet, London, June 10.

Mr R. S. Glyn, chairman of the Bank of New Zealand, arrived in London a day or two ago, having Tuturned from New Zealand by way of Chicago. I had a conversation with him to-day at the bank. He is delighted with New Zealand, and spoke in warm admiration of its scenery, climata, and capabilities. "But," he said, "I am not sure that the climate in some parts is not almost too good— l mean it is so fine that people aie apt to lose some of their energy. I fancy that the people of the extreme south are more. energetic and progressive than those of the extreme north. At any rate, I think that is the tendency when a climate is so exceedingly fine." In -reply to my inquiries as to the progress which he had made with the scheme which he was said to have in view for settling the properties of the New Zealand Estates Company, Mr Glyn said : " Matters have hardly yet assumed a sufficiently definite shape to enable me to make the proposals public, but the arrangements are prooeeding very satisfactorily. I find it is necessary to ha-e the fullest detailed information as to boundaries, locality, &c. before I can deal with the right sort of people we want to settle on our lands, and this I expect-to have very shortly. We want to put on the land men with capital enough to work it. An idea is to let them have it on deferred payments. We can afford to do that, as our debentures against the land have 30 years to run., We shall jbake advantage of the reduction in passage money arranged with the shipping company by Mr Perceval, an arrangement made by him after he and I had talked the matter over together,' so that this should be some inducement to persons who desire to settle in the colony." " I Jhink," Mr Glyn continued, "we shall most likely make a beginning with one of our estates in the southern part of the North Island, in the Wellington district. The fact is that most of our lands in the South Island are so highly improved that they are paying very well as they are. We shall probably sell them satisfactorily as they stand. However, nothing is positively settled yet." Mr Glyn remarked that New Zealand was not so largely represented as she should be in the Chicago Exhibition, but what he did see there-waa good. He was struck with the beauty and good taste of the exhibition buildings, which contrasted forcibly in this respect with other Chicago architecture, but the exhibition was not yet nearly ready for opening. Ab present it was little more than a collection of unpacked packing cases, and it was not being well attended. Whatever might be the reason it had not attracted the crowds that were expected. One thing that struck him on hia voyage from New Zealand to San Francisco was the large number of men, apparently the right sort of colonists, who were going from New South Wales to seek their fortunes in California. There were fully 100 of this class in the same steamer that he travelled by. " I believe New Zealand trade is thoroughly sound now," concluded Mr Glyn, "and the public finances too. I am not prepared to say whether the present Government have gone the right way to work in what they have done — I mean I cannot pretend to determine whether all the details of their taxation have been judicious. Bub 1 am a Radical myself and I do consider they have acted on a right principle. I hold that the number of largo estates in New Zealand constitutes a misfortune to the colony and that the ; more they can be subdivided the better. This may be done in a right or a wrong way, but the principle itself is a sound one."