THE GRIDIRONING MAP.

Otago Witness, Issue 2325, 22 September 1898, Page 7

THE GRIDIRONING MAP.

IT PROVES THERE WAS NO GRIDIRONING. The Christchurch Press, in a leading article, on the " gridironing " map, points out that the map which the Hon. J. M'Kenzie vvoduced"'shows that not a single act of "gridironing" took place in connection witlj, the purchase by Sir John Hall of the Hororata estate. To this it may bo added that so <iar from Sir John Hall having benefited J himseif at the expense of the Stale, it is the State n-tai has benefited at the expense of Sir John J-Tall. Twenty years and more ago he gave £60/000 for some 30,000 acres of mostly pastoral land, and its unimproved value to-day, according to the latest Government valuation, is only £54,000. Clearly, therefore, the State got the \ best of the bargain. As is well known, Sir John has greatly improved the property. Mr M'Kenzie's own definition of " gridironing " is as follows : — " Twenty acres were taken up by a man in one place, leaving 19 acres, then another 20 acres, leaving 19 acres, and so on ; but the laws of the country would not allow less than 20 acres to be selected, and by this process large areas were acquired by the use of it without paying for the land until it suited them to purchase." Now this practice — which the Land Office records will show in reality only prevailed to a limited extent, and was never resorted to by Sir John Hall at all — was tho outcome of the system of " free selection before survey," on which the Canterbury settlement was founded by the Canterbury Association. Under this system any applicant could, subject to certain rules as to position and shape of sections, purchase for £2 an acre blocks of Crown lands of any eize from 20 acres upwards. Tho whole province was open to selection in this way. In adjoining provinces runholders were protected either by leases or by the land being reserved from sale until it was thrown into hundreds. In Canterbury land was always open for sale, whether held as a run or not. This gave great facilities to intending settlers, of which, as statistics show, they availed themsplves to an extent which soon made Canterbury the _ granary of the colony. But free selection also opened the door to speculators, who bought, merely to sell again. Tho intending cultivator bought the best spots he could discover, but the speculator also "spotted" the runs, taking, for re-sale, the best land ho could find, and leaving the bad. When the general land scramble began in the seventies this speculation was greatly increased. To the runholders this, of course, threatened ruin, and many of them did their best to save themselves by buying on their runs. Some bought the best spots like outside buyers did ; others purchased in strips of all sizes from 20 acres upwards, and in these cases generally had to take bad land with good._ They left intervening blocks of various sizes, which were, of course, open to purchase by anybody, but were unlikely to tempt purchasers for bona-fide settlement. As it turned out, however, the runholder had generally to buy the intervening blocks in a very short time or see them pass into the hands of speculators. This is a factor which must not be overlooked. It wap in reality a fight between the runholder, trying to save himself from ruin, and the speculator endeavouring to pick the eyes out of his property in the hope of forcing the occupier to buy them again at an advance. In the early part of the seventies eoino of the blocks left open were of 19 acres only, which prevented them being sold excopt by auction. This, as Mr M'Kenzie explained, was "gridironing," and this practice was put an end to by section 6 of the Canterbury Waste Lands Act of 1573, introduced by Mr Rolleston. There was absolutely nothing of the kind in the Hororata purchases of Sir John Hall. Mr M'Kenzie's map shows this distinctly. Only two or three sections of le3s than 20 acres were left, and these were made by the eccentricities of the Survey department, and not by Sir John Hall. No less than 14,306 acres were purchased in one year, 1879, and 7582 acres in the following year. All his purchases were made in strict accordance with the law and regulations at open meetings of the Land Board. Everybody knew the terms on which the land was open for sale, and could have bought any of it at any time. There was no outside demand for it simply because it was stony and unsuited for agriculture ; and, as wo have already stated, according to the Government valuation, its unimproved value to-day iB less than the price tho owner gave for it 20 years ago.

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