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Southland Times, Issue 1049, 2 November 1868, Page 2

♦ — Chief Surveyor's Office, Oct 3rd, 1868. His Honor the Superintendent, Southland. Sir, — I have the honor to submit, in accordance with your instructions, a detailed statement and report of all Public Reserves in the Province of Southland. The total area of land reserved from sale, including township, village, educational, ferry, cemetery, bush, gravel, sheep, native, temporary, and other reserves is 107,409 acres, bat only 38,785 acres of this can be considered as reserved for Provincial Government purposes, or for which grants will have to be obtained from the Crown. Grants for 46 of these containing 1884 acres 3 roods 32 perches, exclusive of those for the reserves in the towns, have been issued under the the " Public Reserves Act 1854" to the Superintendent and his successors in trust for the Province ; 9268 a. Or. lip. have been recommended by the Provincial Council, under the " Southland Waste Land Act 1865 ;" tbe rest of the reserves have been set apart from time to time, some prior to the Separation of this Province from Otago ; others such as gravel and bush were selected by the assistant surveyors at the time of survey ; a great many, such as the education, ferry, village, and sheep reserves were recommended to be reserved by the Waste Lands Board ; and others were withheld from sale by the order of the late Superintendent. The Waste Lands Acts of 1856 and 1863 provide that reserves shall be made by the Superintendent with the consent of the Provincial Council, but I can find no official record of the assent of the Council having been obtained for the reservation of any o f these reserves, and as the question might hereafter arise, whether they had been properly constituted, I will with your Honor's concurrence, forward a detailed list of those for which you have not yet received a" grant from the Crown, and which it is desirable to permanently retain as, public reserves, to the Provincial Council, so that they may be now recommended as reserves under the present Land Act. The reserves (88 in number) temporarily set apart by your Honor under the XVI. clause of the " Southland Wasle Land Act 1865," have been sent from time to time to the Council for confirmation, excepting those made since last session j these I will duly forward in the usual manner. I have divided the reserves under town and rural, and will for convenience of reference adopt the Canterbury system of giving each reserve a separate number of its own, by which it will hereafter always be designated. I have divided the town reserves into seven different classes, and the rural ones into sixteen, some of which will have to be subdivided for different trusts. The town and rural reserves contain over 1140 different sections or blocks of land, and the task of properly arranging them, finding out when, by whom, and how they were made has been no slight one. It will be impossible for mo without first personally inspecting them, l> recommend all the present reserves, such as t-'ti* gravel, stone » and others to be permanently vomitied as such, but a detailed list of all the in->-t, important ones, such as the Education, Collegiate, School, Cemetery, Ferry, and Sheep Reserves, which itia desirable to permanently retain as public reserves shall be ready during the present session of the Provincial Council.