NEW ZEALAND AND ITS CIVILISATION.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume III, Issue 128, 15 October 1875, Page 13

NEW ZEALAND AND ITS CIVILISATION.

We take the following from an American exchange. There is a proverb about going abroad to hear news, and we must confess that this is the first time we learned that this colony has a " Survevor(jeneral. J Mr I. H. Baker of the Southern Province, Otago, in New Zealand, is registered at the Planters' House. He is maluno- the trip round the world having shipped by way of San Francisco, and goes to London before returning. Mr. Baker's position is TT m -f i£ 4t4 t t°? S^eyor-General of the Public Lands in the United States, and he has from forty to fifty assistants under his supervision. In addition to sectioning the public lands, he is charged ulso with laying out roads, and of making a complete topography of the country. It is curious to compare the rapid strides in civilisation, wealth and population and progressive improvements, -made in this barbarian island, which embrace* a territory larger than Great Britain, since Captain Cook visited it, one hundred Sii'r 0 ™ v Cont , ained f Population of cannibals numbering 100,000. The natives have dwindled down to about 30,000, the decrease among them being more rapid than among our American Indians. None of the British colonies have increased in population more rapidly during the last ten years than New Zealand Its population has risen within that period, from 104,043 to *05 946 A steady stream of population has teen pouring in for several years, and that stream was never so broad and deep as durino- the present year, let labor of all kinds was never in such brisk demand and it commands a liberal remuneration. Durino- the year 1874, nearly 56,000 emigrants were landed, and a verylar-e proportion of these were consigned to the province of Otao°o Nevertheless, so great is the scarcity of labor that some public baths which the Town Council of Port-Chalmers had determined on constructing, cannot be proceeded with, owing to the want of hands. The exports of the country last year were §32,408 435 and the revenue §13,705,905. The great staple of export is wool The value shipped last year amounting to $15,900,000 Some of the mountains which form the backbone of the island have a height of over 14,000 feet, and then- tops are capped with snow all thl year round. The shepherds who attend the flocks of sheep alono- the slope of the mountains, distant from human habitations, subafst on raw oatmeal winch they mix with water and drink as a oruel The great terror to the sheep raiser is not the wolf, as in Missouri, but the wild hogs, the descendants of the swine left on the island by Captain Cook. These hogs devour the lambs, and havo increased m such numbers that Government pays sixpence a head for their destruction. When Captain Cook visited the island he found

according to Forster, only native quadrupeds, all of which have nearly become extinct. These were the native dog, which was eaten before the missionary arrived, the rat, the bat, and the sealion. Mr. Baker states that during a residence in the country of seventeen years he saw only one native rat, the rest were derived from the imported vermin. With regard to the natives, the last missionary eaten by them was about ten years ago. In the olden times the natives subsisted on human flesh. There being no native beasts the want during the rigors of winter had to be supplied by their victims taken in war. Notwithstanding their proclivity to eat their own people or an occasional Englishman, it yet appears they have, on the yhole, fared better from the Government than our aborigines. Sir Charles Wentworth Dilke, who visited New Zealand in 18G6, said of the natives : "We recognise the claim of a handful of natives to the soil of a country as large as Great Britain, of not one-hundredth part of which had they ever made the smallest use; and disregarding tlie fact that our occupation of the coast was what gave the land its value, we have insisted on biiying every acre from the tribe." The English keep faith with these "pets" of the country, and have no trouble with them. Wellington is the capital of all the provinces of New Zealand, where the Governor resides. The capital of the province of Otao- 0 is Dunedin, a finely-built city of 25,000 inhabitants. It has" a university, churches of various denominations, two theatres, two daily newspapers, club-houses, and all the concomitants of a metropolitan city. New Zealand has 2,389 miles of telegraph wires, and a regular line of steamers connects it with the rest of the world.