do not know whether Sir George ever visited the Riverina in New South Wales, or the Darling Downs in Queensland. Had he done so,—and had he then become as well acquainted with the pastoral properties of land as he has since become,—he would hardly with all his energy have ventured upon such an assertion. It will be only necessary for any investigator to look at the prices of Australian and South African wool to enable him to form an opinion on the subject. The average price in London of medium Australian wool in 1877 was 1s. 6d. a pound, and that of South African wool of the same class 1s. 1d. a pound. In both countries it is common to hear that the land should be stocked at about the rate of 3 sheep to the acre; but in Australia patches of land which will bear heavier stocking occur much more numerously than in South Africa. The Orange Free State has not yet arrived at the ponderous glory of full statistics so that I cannot give the amount of the wool produced, nor can I divide her wool from that of the Cape Colony, through which it is sent to England without special record. But I feel sure that no one who knows the two countries will venture to compare the flocks of the Free State with those of either of the four great Australian Colonies, or with the flocks of New Zealand.
But if Sir George Grey spoke too loudly in one direction Sir George Clerk spoke very much too loudly in the other. He was probably struck by the desolate and unalluring appearance of the lands to the north of the Orange. They are not picturesque. They are not well-timbered. They are not even well-watered. If Sir George Clerk saw them
