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6. The Chairman!] When could you get it ?—I can write for it; but I might find a document on the subject that was given to me at the Exhibition in Melbourne. If I find it I will send a written statement. 7 Mr. Macandreiv.] In what direction should the action of the Government be ? —To get out some olive-trees, and distribute them, and require some kind of report—say, from some officer connected with the Crown Lands Department to report from time to time what is being done. We could make inquiries through our Agent-General in England. Of course he would get the information as to the plant that would probably grow best in this country There is a great variety of plants in the olive. 8. I believe the whole of the quality of New Zealand cloth springs from the bad oil they use for the purpose of manufacture. I mean fish-oil, and the smell can never be extracted from it by any amount of washing? —I am of opinion that the parts of the colony I have named are suitable for growing olives, and the sooner the matter is taken in hand the better. You cannot begin it too soon. All these things might have been taken in hand many years ago, I think. 9. Sir George Grey's began to bear in six years, but the olives were not of any value. I would like to ask you —we have had in evidence this morning that we could not produce castor-oil?—It is growing as a weed in the North. Ido not know the quality ;it grows very freely I doubt whether the higher commercial quality of medicinal oil could be got from these ; but, for lubrication purposes, castor-oil could be grown in the North. Linseed-oil could very well be made in this colony, and made most profitably in most parts of the country excluded from the chance of making olive- or castoroil. 10. Mr. Macandrew : If the linseed were on the spot, many people might be induced to put in a certain quantity as part of their crop ; but, if the seeds are not readily available, it puts it off another year. 11. The Chairman."] The price is a mere bagatelle ?—Yes. The great thing is to divide the process in manufacture. There is a certain process to be carried on locally, and then the material should go to large mills. If a man attempted, upon his own property, to manufacture the oil, and manufacture the fibre, and to deal with the whole subject, he would probably fail altogether. 12. Mr. Macandrew.] I have always thought it better to go into that than New Zealand flax ? — Yes; very much. 13. Mr. Ballance.] Do you think young olive-trees could be produced in the Botanic Garden here ?—Yes, they would do well; but it is not the most suitable soil and climate for experimental culture of the olive. 14. Would it be useful to commence the growth of the trees here for distributing in other parts of the country? —I would rather put them in the most favourable situations from the beginning. They could be received for distribution, but they would not improve or yield good crops. There might be more suitable places found in the vicinity, however. 15. Would you suggest that an order should be sent Home for these plants, and would you place them in the most suitable parts of the colony when they came out ?—The most practical way would be to get the plants out, and to call for applications for the plants from private individuals. 16. Would you not plant them in some central place ? The applications might all come in at once, and you might distribute them to those who would take care of them very partially ?—We might choose a place very well for them—in some of the gullies about Napier, for instance. 17 There would be a difficulty in taking care of them in those nurseries, would there not ?—Yes, unless it could be done by private enterprise. 18. You think the Government should take control of these nurseries. Supposing you sent an order for 100,000, they would not occupy a great deal of space ; they could be put in one of the gullies here?—Even if the Government imposed a small charge for them,l believe they would soon get distributed, from my past experience. 19. The difficulty would be in letting them get into the wrong hands ? —No, it is rather that of losing all record of them, and therefore not getting the result of the experiment for future guidance. I may mention that, with regard to mulberry-trees, the Government went to a great deal of expense some years ago. The trees were distributed in different directions, and one person received very substantial assistance in propagating these mulberry-trees; but it all came to nothing, for the want of some Government officer to make a periodical report, otherwise the Government will never know how far such experiments succeed. 20. Do you not think the best way would be to publish hand-books on, say, olive-culture, sericulture, castor-oil, and so on ? Would not that be done by your department ?—Yes ; but we could not add very much to what is already published until experience had been gained iu this country We could give an experience which is more valuable than all others—the experience of the soils suitable for particular industries. 21. Mr. Lundon.] Is it dangerous to the children eating these castor-oil berries — the Native children eat them ? —Yes, it acts on them as the medicinal oil, and, in addition, the skip contains an acrid poison, like croton-oil in its effects. Witness: I beg to ask the Committee's attention to very important discoveries, made during the last few years, relative to the production of sugar from sorghum. Sorghum has for many years been grown in America for the production of glucose or syrup, which is sugar in an uncrystallizable form; but in 1878 experiments were commenced by the Department of Agriculture of the United States of America, with the view of ascertaining whether, by modifying the culture and methods of manufacture, crystallizable sugar could not be produced remuneratively. These experiments, which are of a most elaborate nature, have been highly successful; and it has been shown that, at certain seasons of the growth of some varieties of the sorghum, the glucose diminishes, and the amount of sucrose or true canesugar increases, and that the sorghum grown in temperate climates is then nearly, if not quite, as rich in marketable sugar as the tropical sugar-cane. This discovery has created a lively interest in the growth of sorghum, and, as it grows freely in the North of New Zealand, it promises to become of importance to this colony Judge Gillies was so impressed with the importance of the subject that he obtained a supply of the b'est Varieties of the EteetJ, and a complete though small-uc'ale machinery-plant