596 PROCEEDINGS OF SECTION F. 



example a section of country which is the most sparsely inhabited 

 part of om: continent, despite the prodigious extent of its undeveloped 

 tropical and sub-tropical riches. I refer to the Northern Territory 

 of South Australia, which extends from latitude 26 to latitude 11, 

 covering about 15° of latitude and 9° of longitude. It is about 560 

 miles wide by 900 miles long, containing an area of about 523,620 

 square miles— or 335,116,800 acres. The Northern Territory is about 

 two and a half times the size of France, and four and a half times the 

 size of Great Britain. It has a frontage of 1,200 miles to the Indian 

 Ocean, intersected by numerous rivers, including the Roper, the Ade- 

 laide, the Daly, and the Victoria, which are navigable from 20 to 100 

 miles from the sea. As a South Australian Government report on the 

 region, which was published in 1902 (" The Land-grant Railway 

 Across Central Australia," pages 10, 11) remarks — " The number 

 and volume of these great rivers ma}^ afiord some indication of the 

 fertility of the country through which they flow. Along the extensive 

 northern seaboard there are many valuable harbors, of which Port 

 Darwin is equal or superior to any other in Australia. Situated as it 

 is in a commanding geographical position with regard to India and 

 the East, at no distant time it must become one of the greatest em- 

 poriums of the Southern Hemisphere .... Doubtless when 

 the transcontinental railway is completed from this port to Adelaide 

 the principal mail traffic from Europe will take this route, and prove 

 a powerful factor in the development of the Territory." 



The carrying capacity of the country to the north of Barrow 

 Creek alone — within the tropics — for horned cattle may be imagined 

 when it is remembered that 200,000 square miles of that area exist 

 which can easily provide pasture for 2,000,000 cattle at the rate of 

 10 head per mile. Yet so rich are the grazing lands on the rivers that 

 this is considered an extremely low estimate. Drawing a line east 

 and west of Barrow Creek, another 200,000 square miles of country 

 running southward from this boundary is peculiarly adapted for sheep, 

 and here an average of 50 sheep to the mile would give an aggregate 

 of 10,000,000. An annual wool clip, valued at 2s. 6d. per sheep, would 

 give an annual return of £1,237,500. Horses, camels, and ostriches 

 could also, with immense advantage, be introduced into certain sections 

 of the region. Coming to agricultural products, the Northern Terri- 

 tory is exceptionally favorable for the growth of cotton. This fibre, 

 although not indigenous, is found growing wild throughout the jungles 

 in many varieties, and Dr. Holtze, when Director of the Botanical 

 Gardens at Port Darwin, was strongly of opinion that there is no place 

 in the world better suited for its successful cultivation. In a paper 

 read before the Geographical Society in Adelaide, a few years ago, 

 that gentleman mentioned — speaking only of one suitable area out of 

 many — that a belt of 80 miles round the coast would give an area of 

 80,000 square miles, or upwards of 51,000,000 acres, capable of yielding 

 large quantities of diverse tropical products in addition to the one 

 just named, and of employing many hundreds of thousands of hands 

 in tropical culture. 



