LAND FOR THE PEOPLE.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume 2, Issue 295, 21 October 1879, Page 2

LAND FOR THE PEOPLE.

[To the New Zealand Times.] Sm,—Small farms and small farm settlements are requisite in all parts of the Colony, if New Zealand is to become the great nation that we all desire. The lands of the Colony, held in enormous estates, retard the progress that \vs expect should take place. " Land for the people," is the cry, and Small Farm Associations are being formed. The result ef a recent meeting upon the subject was the formation of a deputation who waited on the Minister of Lands, requesting that 10,000 acres on the Waimate Plains might be set aside by the Government. The Government are, however, not yet in a position to deal with this land, which is distant from Wellington 150 miles. Every facility should be given to meet the immediate and pressing demands of the people, who lire crying out foreland to settle upon, not only of those who are daily arriving in the Colony in search of freeholds for themselves and families, but for the overcrowded population who. are a great deal too fond of remaining in the towns, and who excuse themseives by saying they cannot get land.. They go into trade, There are too many distributors, and too few producers. Let half those engaged in trade take to farming, and both town and country would be equally benefitted by the change, It is the magic of property which alone gives the inducement to in dustry sufficient to make the small farm

It is not generally known—at all events to new arrivals—that within fifty miles of this city there are estates which, if cut up and subdivided, would supply that immediate demand there is for available land for small farms; land that can be broken up, cropped, and in the same season yield a profitable return for industry. Such, however, is the case. The lower valley of the Wairarapa, which has for upwards of thirty years been going through a gradual state of improvement, is now ready to receive a population of thousands of people; open fertile land, ready for immediate occupation, with a beautiful climate. The subdivisions, therefore, of some of these estates is a practical answer to those who are seeking

for happy homesteads, This letter is addressed particularly to those families and young men, to the working man.and to all who are really earnest in acquiring upon deferred payments, small freeholds situated within a few hours of the cityof Wellington, Two of the estates to which 1 refer are the Huangarua and Otaraia stations, comprising 40,000 acres, which the Hon. John Martin is placing in the market upon liberal terms. I notiee in an excellent little pamphlet on Small Farms, published by Mr Wakelin, of Greytown, at page 11 ;—" Wellington, - the first and principal settlement of the mA New Zealand Company had not long been TO founded befoJe the settleis, hedged in by cold hills or dense bush, pined for the open and fertile plains of the Wairarapa, distant from Wellington about forty miles, and separated from it by the Mungaroa and Rimutaka ranges," The_jHs>---tance which a few days, and owing id the »tals%gss rivers and roads, sometimes weeks to accomplish, is now accomplished in a few hours. As Mr Wakelin observes at page IV of his pamphlet :—" If, with unmade roads and unbridged rivers, at such a distance from a marketand a seaport, as the Wairarapa then was the small farmers could hold their own, and undertake military duties besides, who is there that will assert, now that all these obstacles have been removed, and a railway has been made to the district, the subdivision of the large agricul" turalruns into small farm stations will not be followed by even more satisfactory and gratifying results ?" I have, &c, J. H. Wallace. Lower-terrace. Wellintgon, ' October 16,1879.