already in the colony and under the control of the State two large reserves of workers, out of whom we might create prosperous schools of industry, and later a great commercial success. The foundlings of the State exceeded two thousand children of both sexes, and in our jails we had an army of indolent and dangerous men who ought, I thought, to earn their daily bread, and wherever they are capable of amendment be offered the occasion and agency of reformation.
Cashel Hoey was now acting as a member of the Board of Advice in London, and I invited his help in this work. After a little he wrote:—
"I have made a careful selection of all the reports from Consuls and Secretaries of Legation, bearing in any way on the Cultures and Industries you desire to introduce, and sent them, with a fresh instalment of French literature on the subject, by the Somersetshire to your address—about thirty volumes in all. I am daily expecting a collection of official documents from a friend, formerly in the Ministry of Agriculture and intimate with its heads. By correspondence, it is agreed one can do little. You must send agents to the places where you desire to find emigrants, with power to offer suitable inducements—for people engaged in such industries are in general well employed and not naturally disposed to emigrate. I believe your very best plan will be to found a model farm for each industry and to import on salary for a number of years the staff of skilled hands necessary to work it. You could then train your young people there to the best advantage. I am pushing inquiries, and will forward materials as fast as they reach me."
One of my Parliamentary supporters suggested that we had no need of these foreign dainties. For his part he was content with the native products of his own country, and if he were a Minister he would not pester himself ransacking Asia, Africa, and America for exotics. My friend's hair was disposed to stand on end when I told him that wheat, potatoes, and tobacco, which he found necessary to his daily comfort, were once foreign exotics, and that we had to ransack Asia, Africa, and America for such familiar friends of to-day as tea, coffee, and rice, and that the fig and even the
