The Poverty Bay Herald AND East Coast News Letter. PUBLISHED EVERY EVENING. FRIDAY, JUNE 13, 1879.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume VI, Issue 808, 13 June 1879, Page 2

The Poverty Bay Herald AND East Coast News Letter. PUBLISHED EVERY EVENING. FRIDAY, JUNE 13, 1879.

Heke are a few statistics which readers will consider not by any means as dry as they should be. The people of New Zealand imbibe annually fermented drinks to the extent of two millions sterling, . or over ; .£4 for every man, woman, and child. Our public debt is twenty-four millions, a large proportion pf which lias been incurred by the prosecution of railway works, initiated by the Vogelistic policy of public works* Against' the latter .expenditure., we have for. the last twelvemonths, receipts from the railway lines, amounting to ,£900,000 j that is to say, if the totals f6r the four weeks ending March the Bth last, ai'e taken as a standard. 'In that return the length of railways,- in both Islands is set down as 1111 miles. But to return to the staple of revenue which meets to so enormous an extent the interest iu moneys borrowed for railway, purposes^ we may state 'that large as it .is/the amount is notning when compared to that of. the United States of America, where, the. cost of. strong drinks and tobacco almost surpasses

belief. There, according to Government returns lately published for the financial year ended June 30th, 1878, no less than two billions of cigars — in round numbers — were consumed, notwithstanding the hard times, and cigars, it must be conceded, are articles of luxury. The value of this item of consumption alone is put down at £38,000,000 ! In addition to this, twenty-five millions of lbs. of tobacco for smoking purposes were used, the value of which is set down at three millions sterling. But the expenditure of tobacco among our .American cousins seems insignificant almost, when compared with the sums spent on drinks of every kinds. Thus nearly three millions of gallons of fermented liquors were drunk "during the year — or seven gallons per head of the entire population, including women and children 1 The value of this liquid absorbtion cost the Yankees about £2 13s. each. What would the apostles of Temperance in New Zealand think of these figures, which, in proportion to, the heads of the population, prove how immeasurable more sober we are on this side of the Pacific than the followers of Uncle Sam's striped standard. In the North Island, in proportion to population, there is three times as much beer consumed as in the South Island; while in the latter, the inhabitants exceed us in the North in ardent spirits as five gallons stand to two. More whisky passes through the Otago Custom-houses than Wellington, Christchurch, and Auckland added together. Rents are higher in Otago than in any other city of New Zealand, Wellington comes tiextj Christclmrch follows ; rents in Auckland being the lowest. There are sixty-two more places of worship in the North Island than in the South. The average "of Ministers stipends in the, Soiith Island is £298 ; in. the North Island, £240. Landed estates, belonging to the Church in the South Island are estimated in value at one million six hundred pounds ; in the North at two hundred and sixty thousand. School endowments in Otago exceed in value those of Canterbury by £240,000, while the total value of endowments in the two provinces mentioned are six times in excess of the value of educational endowments throughout the whole of the other parts of New Zealand. ' "-] „: