Memorandum of Hon. J. Macandrew, Minister of Public Works.

Memorandum No. 88/78, for the Agent-General, London.

Enclosed be good enough to receive extract from "New Zealand Government Gazette," calling for tenders for supply of steel rails, to be manufactured in New Zealand from Colonial ores. There are also enclosed sundry reports upon the subject of iron, coal, and other mineral deposits in New Zealand, together with maps showing the various localities in which such deposits have heretofore been discovered.

I have to request that you will be good enough to cause the notification to ironmasters to be inserted in the Mining Journal and such other papers as are most usually circulated in the iron districts, both in the United Kingdom and in the North American States.

It would, I think, be well likewise to have the notification translated, and to give it publicity in the chief manufacturing districts in Belgium, France, and Eastern Germany. As to this, however, you will be the best judge, and had better exercise your discretion. The object in view is one which no doubt you will fully appreciate, and do your best to promote.

Probably it might be well to have the enclosed reports printed in pamphlet form, or at all events such portions as may seem to you expedient; and I have informed Mr. W. W. Evans, of New York, that you will send him a supply, and give him full instructions.

It is unnecessary for me to expatiate upon the vast mineral resources of this colony, inasmuch as you are page 8 fully as well acquainted with the subject as I am. In my opinion, all that is required to enable us not only to supply our own wants, but the markets of the world, is labour and skill. There is probably no country in which human industry could command and bring to its aid such an unbounded supply of natural mechanical power in all directions as New Zealand.

Among the various localities which present themselves as suitable for the manufacture of iron I might allude specially to the province of Nelson. An attempt has been made (since you went to England, I think) to work the mines at Parapara, and there are now in my possession some splendid specimens of both malleable and cast iron manufactured from the ore of that locality. For want of capital, however, the undertaking seems to have collapsed. I have directed a few tons of the Parapara ore to be sent home, consigned to you, for experiment; but you are aware that this is not the only locality in which coal and iron abound in close proximity.

Should the Colony be visited by experts, they will be best able to judge for themselves.

There are inland districts abounding in mineral deposits, which hitherto have been looked upon as beyond the pale in relation to practical working; the railways into the interior which it is now proposed to construct will, however, enable many such deposits to be turned to account.