South Canterbury Times. MONDAY, DEC. 8, 1879.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 2094, 8 December 1879, Page 2

South Canterbury Times. MONDAY, DEC. 8, 1879.

As the result of the had times in Great Britain, and the energy exhibited by the lecturing agents employed by New .Zealand, the representatives of an association of British farmers are now en route for this colony, and may be expected here in the course of a few days. The infinite importance of the movement which has resulted in these delegates or advance agents being sent to spy out the land it is difficult to realise. It gives promise that at no distant period the immigration problem will find an unexpected solution and the system that has hitherto

prevailed will be entirely revolutionised. Instead of having to ransack Great Britain for eligible immigrants, and being required to put up with the indifferent, unsuccessful material that engenders discontent and creates poverty where there is no need for either, we have at length a prospect of being able to attract some of the cream as well as the whey of the British populationOwing partly to foreign competition, but principally to bad land laws, farming in the United Kingdom has of late years been a losing game, and farmers are looking wistfully towards the colonies for a remunerative field for their skill and capital. If the ill-advised financial scarecrow of a Property Tax can only be kept out of view, we have no doubt the practical gentlemen who have been sent to this colony will be able to return with a satisfactory report of the result of their mission. In that case we may safely anticipate that we will be able to divide with America the rich spoils, which the exodus of the pith and marrow of the Anglo-Saxon race is causing to be distributed abroad. In New Zealand the British farmer will be able to find a soil and a climate congenial to his tastes, while the prosperity of the colony under the influence of an agricultural invasion will grow with unexampled rapidity. Our object in directing attention to the impending visit of these delegates is partly to ensure for them a suitable reception. Of course it is not essential that they should be feted, or that any undue hospitality should be lavished upon them. Treatment of such a character they do not expect, and it is questionable whether they would care about it. But it is desirable that every facility should be afforded them for obtaining information and satisfying themselves as to the capabilities and prospects of New Zealand from a farming standpoint. Agriculture must be regarded as the basis of our prosperity. Compared with the other colonics of Australasia New Zealand bears the palm for productiveness. It posses attractions for the British farmer of which no other place in these latitudes can boast. All that is n ccessary is that we should set forth its merits fairly, and we have no doubt of the result. The favorable issue of the present sampling operations will, in that case, result in the influx, not of free immigrants, with neither money nor marbles, but of skilled, practical agriculturists of tolerably independent means. The colony will thus be a double gainer, for the money hitherto expended on immigration will be saved, and the population of the colony will be augmented in a most desirable manner by the addition of a class whose indomitable pluck, perseverance and intelligence has long been the backbone of Britain’s prosperity. An immigrant who brings capital along with him is in every essential a desirable addition, for the fact of his doing so is a guarantee of his good qualities as a citizen and colonist. America has thriven without free immigration by merely advertising her promising landscapes to the world, and leaving the energetic and industrious, to find means to travel the road unaided, if they liked the picture. A man who embarks his capital in an enterprise is almost bound to succeed, where success is attainable, and the little capital which an immigrant carries with him to the new land of hishopes, isa much better credential respecting his industrious and thrifty disposition and habits than the good wishes and opinions of bereaved friends and late employers, who perhaps, after all, were too glad to get rid of him. I the movement which has just taker place in Great Britain turns out as well as we are sanguine enough to anticipate, free immigration to New Zealand should be permanently as well as temporarily suspended. We believe it will be found far more profitable if, instead of lavishing money on the transportation of penniless adventurers to the colony, a good lecturing staff was retained in Great Britain to set forth the advantages of New Zealand as a field for colonisation. In that case instead of being deluged periodically with a mixture of the useless and the vicious of both sexes, families would be introduced trained in habits of industry and economy, and the social condition of New Zealand, instead of being depressed and degraded by every new shiploadof humanity, would be improved and elevated.