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The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Volume 62

Emigration

Emigration.

As all assistance to emigrants on the part of the Government has ceased, on account of the enforced economy found requisite to rehabilitate its finances, the intending emigrant must very carefully ascertain what his prospects are of employment, and of taking up land, farming, &c., before he selects this colony as his new home. As I keep always in touch with the Agent-General for New Zealand (my friend Sir Francis Dillon Bell) and with the Emigrants' Information Office (31, Broadway, Westminster, S.W.), I am enabled to give the latest information on these points. The chief present requirement of this colony is for practical farmers with a capital of from £500 upward. The land laws are simple and excellent. My eighth chapter gives page 35 a summary of them. A man with £500 remaining after purchase of 100 acres of first-class land in a good agricultural district, say Taranaki, can comfortably clear, fence, and stock his farm, build a small house, and maintain his family until his produce was marketable. In poorer districts, such as Otago (interior) or Southland, a man could fairly start on 200 acres, with a capital of £300, if he took up the land on "deferred payment, by which he would become possessor at the end of ten years by paying 2s. per acre per annum, or a perpetual lease at 1s. per acre per annum. Thus a first experiment has been made in New Zealand, by this latter system, of land nationalisation.

There is now a good demand for sober, hard-working agricultural labourers in most districts of the colony. As the demand for special kinds of labour vary month by month, the quarterly circulars issued by the Emigration Office must be studied. But I am safe in stating that at the present time (June, 1891) there is a demand for bush-fellers in Taranaki and North Auckland, for miners in Otago, and for female domestic servants in all parts of the colony. How happy "Mary Jane" is, or may be, in New Zealand may be guessed by the comical way in which the following bona-fide advertisement from the Auckland Evening Star turns the tables upon mistresses: "Situation wanted—To take charge of a laundry or dairy. Advertiser can cook, and understands housekeeping. None but a respectable mistress, who wishes to leave her servant in uninterrupted discharge of her duties, need, apply!" The wages of domestics range from two-thirds to two-and-a-half times the average English rates for the same kind of service.

There is no demand in New Zealand at present for clerks, shop assistants, or dressmakers. The clerical, legal, medical, and educational professions are fully stocked, only the highest appointments being filled up in England by the Agent-General. All employés in New Zealand have to work harder in the hours of labour, and to do a greater variety of things, than in England, where duties lie in grooves. But once he obtains a stable situation, the employé will have shorter hours of work, better pay, better food, more personal independence, and the speedier attainment of a home than he could have in this crowded old country. It is certain that Britain has too much population for her comfort, and that New Zealand has too little for her development. Capable as this colony is of sustaining twenty millions of people, its wonderful growth during its first half-century, and the energy and hopefulness of its inhabitants, inspire me with the belief that in the course of a generation New Zealand will be at the head of the new Australian Confederation.

The lecturer then proceeded to exhibit, describe, and explain the following views of New Zealand, selected from his collection: Map of the colony, showing the four climatic zones, as first page 36 described and differentiated by the author of "New Zealand for the Emigrant, &c." The Waitemata Harbour of Auckland. The city of Auckland, looking N.W. from Albert Park. The Free Public Library of Auckland, which cost £40.000, and has an annual income of £1,600. Portrait of Sir George Grey, K.C.B., the "G. O. M." of New Zealand, who has been Governor of the colony twice, and Premier once, and the founder of the free constitution of the colony in all its essential principles (1852). He is now (1891) in his 80th year, and by far the most impressive orator in New Zealand. The Auckland residence, built of concrete, of Sir William Fox, K.C.M.G., erstwhile Premier of the colony three times, now retired from politics, but an ardent leader of the Temperance movement, being president of the New Zealand Branch of the United Kingdom Alliance. The oldest stone (compact scoria) church in New Zealand, an object of interest as having been built by Bishop Selwyn and his assistants in early times, at Remuera, near Auckland. A settler's cottage in the forest of Waitakerei. The Nikau palm, the pith of which is edible, and other forest vegetation. A giant kauri pine tree, 120ft. high, and 47ft. in circumference. A "corduroy road" in the bush, made of stems of tree ferns and of ti-tree laid transversely across the path. The Falls of Waitakerei, 300ft. high, a lovely bush scene 20 miles from Auckland. The town of Devonport, on the north shore of the Waitemata, the favourite seaside residence of Auckland merchants. Hotel and hot springs of Waiwera, 30 miles north of Auckland. City of Napier (8,800 population), capital of Hawke's Bay district.