12.—Concluding Remarks.

The owners of the properties which are to be purchased by the Company, feeling assured that the same can be better developed as a whole by a Company with a large capital and extensive resources than as separate individual properties, have determined to invite the public to participate with them in what they are convinced is a thoroughly sound enterprise, and on terms which they are satisfied will bear rigid enquiry and investigation. They are therefore themselves promoting the Company by their agents in London, Sir Julius Vogel and Mr. Larnach (himself a part owner), who will act as two of the Directors of the Company.

The whole of the preliminary expenses of establishing the Company, up to and including the allotment of shares, will be borne by the above-mentioned agents of the vendors, so that the Company will start without any preliminary charges to be repaid out of future income.

Sir Julius Vogel and Mr. Larnach are acting under a power of attorney dated the 14th November, 1878, from the owners of the properties, in which is set forth the terms and conditions of the arrangement, as to remuneration and otherwise, bet ween the owners and themselves. The following contracts have been made :—

1. A contract by which certain of the vendors agreed to convey, free of charge, lands required for the purposes of the railway above referred to in course of construction. The Company undertakes to perform this agreement.

2. The contract for the acquisition of the properties above referred to. This contract is dated the 9th day of page 17 December, 1878, and made between the Vendors, namely: George Meredith Bell, Joseph Clarke, Patrick Kinney McCaughan, Henry Driver, the above-named William James Mudie Larnach, Malcolm McNeill, and Alexander McNeill, of the first part, Sir Julius Vogel, and the said William James Mudie Larnach, of the second part, and Robert Miller Robertson, as a Trustee for the Company, of the third part.

3. The Power of Attorney above referred to, which is made between the Vendors, other than the said William James Mudie Larnach of the one part, and Sir Julius Vogel and the said William James Mudie Larnach of the other part.

General Maxwell has an equitable interest in one of the properties purchased.

Copies of the Power of Attorney and Contract above-mentioned, and of the Memorandum and Articles of Association of the Company, and the form of Mortgage Debenture, may be perused at the office of the Solicitors to the Company, 21, Cannon Street, London, any day between the hours of eleven and four o'clock, except Saturday, and on that day between eleven and two.

The properties have recently been valued by Mr. W. H. Pearson, Commissioner of Crown Lands, Southland, and Mr. Horace Bastings, a Member of the House of Representatives, and of the Otago Waste Lands Board. This valuation with maps of the Estate, and detailed particulars of the properties, can be seen at the office of the Company.

Applications for shares and Debentures must be made in the accompanying forms, either to the Bankers of the Company, or to the Secretary at the offices of the Company, 110, Cannon Street, London, of whom prospectuses and forms of application may be obtained. If no allotment is made the deposits will be returned in full.