(3.) Leases in Perpetuity.

This is the essentially distinct feature of the New Zealand land-law. If the successful applicant elects to take up the land under this system he receives a lease for 999 years, which is practically a freehold, subject to a small annual payment, by way of feu-rent, to the State. This payment, or rent, is fixed by law at 4 per cent. on the cash-value of the laud at the time of sale, and can never be altered. Thus, for a section of 300 acres of first-class land valued at £1 per acre, the rent payable under a lease in perpetuity would be 9½d., or to be exact 9 3/5d., per acre, o? £6 half-yearly.

The holder of a lease in perpetuity saves immediate outlay for purchase, and retains all his capital beyond the first half-year's rent for the erection of his house and out-buildings, the fencing of the land, and the purchase of farming implements, seed, &c, without the necessity of invoking the aid of money-lenders—a very important consideration in new countries where money is dear and the burden of mortgages crushes the settler.

For the more complete understanding of these three systems of land selection, a few items, taken at random from an actual list of Crown lands just opened for sale, are here appended:—

Note.—It will be seen that if A selects Section 74, Block I., Blackstone, for cash, he pays £50 for it, and can get his title when he has fulfilled the conditions; if B selects Section 29, Block V., at Lower Hawea, under occupation license, he pays 9d. Per acre per annum, with the right of purchasing the freehold when he has complied with the conditions; and if C selects Section 1, Block VII., at Kawarau, under lease-in-peroetuity conditions, his rent for 999 years will be 4 4/5d. per acre yearly, or £2 per half-year for the whole section.

The holder of a lease in perpetuity may surrender the lands comprised in his lease, with the consent of the Laud Board; but it will not be competent for him to again become an applicant for the same land within one year from the date of the surrender, nor to have such land transferred to him by any other person who may acquire it.