Small Grazing-run No. 177, Block IX.; 1,566 acres.

Agricultural and pastoral land, at an elevation varying between 40 ft. and 1,200 ft. above sea-level. This run comprises 105 acres of agricultural land, and 1,451 acres of pastoral hills and downs. About 62 acres of the agricultural land is of exceptionally good quality, and is now in English grass and lucerne; the remaining 43 acres is not so good, and most of it is in tussock and native and English grasses. Three hundred and sixty acres of the pastoral land is more capable of improvement than the remainder, and part might be ploughed; there is a good deal of English grass and clover scattered throughout the tussocks, and native grasses on the frontage of this portion. The remaining 1,091 acres of pastoral land is higher, much rougher, and partly of limestone; formation; it is steep and bare in some places, and scarred with slips in others. The whole is more or less covered with tussock and native grasses, with a little scrub in places. The pasture is very patchy, varying from indifferent to good. There is a small patch of Californian thistles near the dip. Watered by the Needles Creek and Flaxbourne River, and probably from springs in other places on the run. This run adjoins the proposed township, and is fourteen miles distant from Seddon Railway-station by the main Kaikoura-Blenheim Road. The improvements (which are included in the price of the run) consist of 374 chains of boundary and other fencing, and the dip, valued at £216 11s. The improvements which are not included in the price of the run, and which must be paid for separately by the tenant, consist of—Office (about 30 ft. by 12 ft., with annexes 18 ft. by 10 ft. and 10 ft.), built of wood and roofed with iron, two rooms, valued at £5; cookhouse 50 ft. by 30 ft., all iron, lined with wood, concrete floor, lean-to pantry, fireplace, range, and baker's oven, valued at £80; shearers' hut, in bad repair, built of wood and roofed with shingles and iron, five compartments, valued at £20; five men's huts, with iron walls and roof, concrete foundations, all match-lined and floored, connected together by a continuous verandah in front, valued at £140; six-roomed cottage 20 ft. by 36 ft., built of wood and roofed with iron, two chimneys, valued at £45; five-roomed cottage 24ft. by 32 ft., built of wood and roofed with iron, two chimneys (one of clay), small verandah, valued at £40; four-roomed iron cottage on south side of the Flaxbourne River 22 ft. by 28 ft., with lean-to 9ft. by 18 ft., one chimney, valued at £35: total value, £365, repayable in fourteen years by half-yearly instalments of £18 8s. 8d.

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