AUSTRALIA AND POLYNESIA. 



43 



toward Melbourne, promise to soon bring the 

 four capitals of the leading provinces into di- 

 rect railroad communication with each other. 



PUBLIC LANDS. The Australian colonies 

 have pursued a policy with regard to the pub- 

 lic domain widely divergent from that of the 

 United States. While keeping the land out of 

 the hands of speculators almost as effectually, 

 their system has encouraged instead of prevent- 

 ing extensive agriculture and the formation of 

 large estates. The agriculture of the country 

 might have been more varied under the Amer- 

 ican homestead system, instead of being con- 

 fined to stock-raising, and the ultimate social 

 results might be better ; but such a rapid pro- 

 duction of wealth and such immediate eco- 

 nomical progress would have been impossible.* 



The Australian policy is for the state to re- 

 tain the lands until they attain a commercial 

 value, and meanwhile to lease them out -on 

 terms long enough and at rents low enough 

 to attract settlers. This plan has been really 

 more advantageous for the sheep-growers, who 

 were thus enabled to put more capital into 

 stock, so that many of them are rich in flocks 

 and in money from the sale of the produce, 

 and are able at the expiry of their licenses to 

 buy the land from the Government at good 

 prices. The inflow of public money from a 

 source possessed by no other states old or new, 

 and one quite independent of the taxable re- 

 sources of the people, was likely to lead to an 

 embarrassment of riches if the fortunate colo- 

 nies had not adopted the plan of building rail- 

 roads in advance of private enterprise. The 

 construction of a railway net-work to connect 

 the prosperous but scattered settlements of this 

 vast continental island is not only good public 

 policy, but under honest control, with tariffs 

 fixed on commercial principles, will prove a 

 profitable investment of the capital. But the 

 outlay on these public works, until the main 

 lines are completed, must exceed the receipts 

 from the land-sales; and thus it comes that 

 the public debt of New South Wales and the 

 other colonies is growing at the same time 

 that the revenues are abnormally large. 



MILITAKY FORCE. The Australian colonies 

 have busied themselves lately with military de- 

 fenses and the organization of militia forces. 

 This military activity was accelerated after the 

 outbreak of hostilities in Egypt. Victoria has 



* Even in America, the theory of the homestead laws is ig- 

 nored since modern transportation has rendered the produc- 

 tion of animal products, on a large scale, on outlying lands, 

 profitable. Such is the exigency of economic laws, that the 

 advantage given to money-lenders, by the sanguine disposi- 

 tion of farmers to improve their property with borrowed 

 capital, without reckoning on years of failed crops or low 

 prices, has been used to bring about a new distribution of 

 land, and the building up of large properties in some of the 

 settled states, since the cultivation of cereals on the extensive 

 system has become profitable ; although the introduction of 

 the Metayer system has also much to do with these changes. 

 The vastness of some of the pastoral estates in Australia is 

 illustrated by an auction-sale which took place at Melbourne 

 at which 335,000 acres of first-class riverine land, the greater 

 part freehold, stocked with high-grade sheep and blooded 

 cattle, with residence, pleasure-grounds, shops and tools, 

 steam-machinery, and all improvements equally complete 

 changed hands for the sum of 447,000. 



expended 200,000 in the reconstruction and 

 extension of coast-batteries, and 100,000 for 

 gunboats, torpedo-boats, and war material. 

 Torpedoes have been sunk in both the main 

 entrances to Melbourne port. The colony has 

 a paid volunteer corps, armed with Martini- 

 Henry rifles, numbering 3,903 men. The 

 naval armament consists of an ironclad, a 

 wooden frigate, a sloop-of-war, and two new 

 guriboats. Sydney is the chief station for the 

 imperial squadron. In return for the resigna- 

 tion by the Home Government of all rights 

 over land in New South Wales the Colonial 

 Government has provided a navy-yard and a 

 residence for the admiral. The fortifications 

 at the entrance to Port Jackson and Sydney 

 Harbor have been strengthened. In South 

 Australia a permanent artillery corps has been 

 established, a gunboat purchased, and the forts 

 renovated. The military preparations have 

 been made in concert by the different colonies 

 according to the recommendations of the Gov- 

 ernor of South Australia, Sir William Jervois, 

 a distinguished officer of engineers, who was 

 instructed by the Imperial Government to look 

 into the colonial defenses. 



AREA AND PRODUCTS. The total area of the 

 Australasian colonies is 3,103,903 miles. Their 

 aggregate male population in 1880 was 1,499,- 

 258. The total population of Australia, by the 

 census of 1881, was under 2,250,000. The land 

 in cultivation was 6,371,238 acres. The aggre- 

 gate agricultural production of that year was 

 as follows: 36,346,950 bushels of wheat, 17,- 

 766,875 bushels of oats, 3,506,191 of barley, 

 6,335,239 of maize, 424,155 tons of potatoes, 

 nearly 1,000,000 tons of hay, and 1,871,861 

 gallons of wine. The flocks and herds num- 

 bered 1,064,655 horses, 7,878,782 cattle, 65,- 

 915,765 sheep, and 882,337 swine. There were 

 24 animals, but less than one inhabitant, to the 

 square mile. The revenue raised by the colo- 

 nists has increased from 15,927,000 in 1879, 

 to 20,776,000 in 1882. The imports in 1880 

 amounted to 45,060,000, and the exports to 

 48,866,168, a trade of 35 per capita. 



VICTORIA. The compromise Cabinet of Sir 

 Bryan O'Loghlen held out only because the two 

 leading parties in the colony were neither of 

 them strong enough in the House or in the 

 country to make a Government, and so they 

 both of them gave some amount of support to 

 this Government, which represents no particu- 

 lar views or party. Mr. Berry attempted to 

 carry a vote of confidence, on the ground that 

 the Government had purchased pipes and rail- 

 road-wagons in England, but the Parliament 

 was not caught by such a demagogic appeal. 

 A tariff commission has been hearing the 

 views and complaints of all classes regarding 

 the tariff. The farmers complain of the high 

 price of implements. A manufacturer of steam- 

 engines declared that the complex tariff works 

 injuriously for his branch. The brewers asked 

 for a rebate of duty on barley converted into 

 malt, while the grain-growers demand the con- 



