COMMEECIAL INTELLIGENCE.

Colonist, Volume X, Issue X, 12 February 1867, Page 4

COMMEECIAL INTELLIGENCE.

" The Colonist" Office, Tuesday, 12th, February 1867. Trade has undergone no improvement during "the past month; indeed,if there is any change,business ia duller than it was in the middle of January, The stock of all kinds of imported goods is large; and the arrival of the English vessels British Merchant and Celestial with general cargoes has fully supplied the market in all articles. The next English ship the Fairy Belle is expected in the course of the next three or four weeks, and will with present arrivals afford ample supplies for the wants of the place. The demand for goods, of which there is such abundance in hand, is small, West Coast ports being well supplied, and receiving large quantities of goods from Melbourne and Sydney at very low freights in many oasps. We have heard of goods being landed at the Grey and Hpkitika from Australia at the low freight of 50s. and eyen at 40s. per tqn. This was by sailing vessel and if the swifter speed of stpam is required ifc has of course to be paid for at higher rates. Flour continues low in price, and sales at presenfc rates are effected only at a loss. Stocks are still heavy, there having been large importations within the past few months, and until there is a considerable reduction in the quantity on hand, there is not much prospect of an adva.npe in the present low and unremunerative rateg.

As was the case last year about this season this province as well as that of Maryborough, has been visited by a heavy flood, Hero it did not infliot so. much damage as the flood of 1886; although some parts of the town, which at that time were not under water, were this year flooded, tfp the country the crops have again suffered considerable damage, not perhaps to the same extent as last year, but still sufficient to cause a very considerable loss which will be severely felt by the farmer, both in grain and in potato crops, particularly as this is the seoond year running when crops and consequently profits have been injured from similar causes. The losses by the flood in the Wairau district of Marlborough province have been severe, as at Blenheim and the surrounding country the flood was the heaviest that has been seen for many years, and as harvesting operations had commenced, much loss has resulted, both in reaped and standing corn, as well as in various other ways. Mr. Eedwood, the enterprising farmer at the Wairau, has, we are told, sustained a loss of about ten thousand bushels of wheat; and he was also a loser by the flood of last year. These are discouraging facts in the history of our agricultural progress, as anything which lend? to lesson the extents of our internal productions, little enough as they are in the way of agriculture—is to bo deplored, in addition to the individual loss which such aocidents occasion. As an instance of what may be done in certain soils, and ■with plenty of comparatively level land, we have been informed that the province of Otago will this year produce ten bushels of wheat for every man woman and child in that province. The West Coast Trade has been very quiet up to last week when a new rush of miners set into the river Haast about 120 miles to the south of Hokitika. This river is described as one of the largest on the West. Coast, with good depth of water at low tide. It is tolerably close to the southern boundary line of Canterbury, and of course the usual sanguine expectations of its auriferous character are entertained. On one day last week as many as 400 passengers sailed from Hokitika in the Alhambra, which had been preceded by the little paddle steamer Bruce which took a small party of pioneer diggers and others whose steps were speedily followed by many others, and no,^' steamers have been plying with regularly during the pasjb week. About 2QSO persons are now on the Haast river.

Mr. Cross sometime since bought a m'pe liptis steamer the Lady Barkly which he intended to put on the passage, between Nelson, Motueka, and other ports in the bay. She is now expected daily from Auckland, and a useful roomy boat, as the Lady Barkly is described as being, will greatly advance the means of communication between Nelson and the other side, and increase the number of passengers. Another gteamer, the tiny Woodpecker, the propertyof .Captain Johnson has als.p lately been brought to Nelson, from the West Coast, and we believe hej? owner contemplates placing her in the local trade, af she ig scarcely adapted to face the difljeulties of thp West Coast navigation.

JBelow we giye our price list vWoh Jjwi iwui«rg«s§