Page:The Present State and Prospects of the Port Phillip District of New South Wales.djvu/63

than a pound of wool; or from whatever cause an attempt was made, by a forced system of concentration, to make New South Wales an agricultural country, without its being considered that had this attempt succeeded she would have had no market for her surplus produce. When, however, the aptitude of the country for the growth of wool, an article of sufficient value to bear the cost of transit to a distant market, had induced the colonists to overstep the bounds assigned as the limits of location, and to trust themselves and their flocks to the wilderness, government had to recognize their possession and to sanction their occupation, without, however, recognizing any right of property. Hence arose the present unsatisfactory squatting tenure, under which the property of the land is dissevered from the possession. And, in my mind, the problem which the government have to solve is, how this unnatural state of things is to be got rid of without doing injustice to any interest, and how the large and respectable class of men, who compose the body known as the squatters, are to be given such an interest in the lands which they occupy, as may enable them to reside with comfort upon their stations, and to spread civilization through the country, while they personally superintend the management of their farms. That a modification of the act of parliament, fixing the minimum price of land at twenty shillings an acre, must be one of the first steps, is an opinion about which there exists a perfect unanimity amongst all classes in New South Wales; and it is to be hoped that the temperate expression of that opinion will have its due weight with the government and legislature of Great Britain.