"3 



travel over it. It is now the advice of the spokesmen of the district, 

 that until the railway is laid, only men with a few hundreds of pounds 

 to enable them to handle from 700 to 1000 acres, with a small llm-k 

 of sheep, should seek to establish themselves in so isolated a part 

 of the colony. When the freight trains are running, halt as much 

 land, with intelligent and industrious farming, will suffice. In this 

 statement an exception is made in favour of the viticulturist, or the 

 orchardist, who, if he possesses only small means, can, after planting 

 his trees and while waiting for his fruit and the locomotive, main- 

 tain himself by doing work for the roads board, or on the larger 

 holdings. There are no surveyed agricultural areas in the 

 district. The selector can, however, mark his boundaries to 

 please himself, as compensation for not being able to obtain 

 a free homestead farm without at the same time applying 

 for an additional 100 acres. Attention is drawn to the declaration 

 in the deliverance of the Premier, Sir John Forrest, to the country 

 at Bunbury prior to the last general election, that an early effort 

 would be made by the Government to allow free homestead farms 

 to be selected anywhere on Cro\vn lands and to further liberalise 

 the land laws in other respects. It is admitted that the Williams 

 has not had a large share of the new settlement that has so rapidly 

 taken place within the last five years in all farming localities that 

 have the means of ready transit of crops to the consumer, but all 

 things being equal, the evidence of the yields of cereals, fruit and 

 vegetables are pointed to as proof that there is no more fertile or 

 highly-favoured division in Western Australia. The want of more 

 schools has been brought under the notice of the Education depart- 

 ment, which undertakes to provide a school wherever there are not 

 less than 15 children to attend it. The Williams is described by 

 those who know it best as being well adapted for mixed farming ; 

 but if a large grazing area is desired, as well as an arable area, the 

 selection will have to include a proportion of ironstone country and 

 " poison" land. The buying agents of produce firms are to some 

 extent deterred from canvassing for supplies, which they prefer to 

 obtain nearer to a railway line, but when the stuff is taken to Pin- 

 jarrah or Jarrahdale on the west, or to Narrogin on the east, it finds 

 a ready sale. The railway freights are considered to be very 

 reasonable especially as about four times the freight has been 

 paid in wages, \vear and tear, and horse feed before the station is 

 reached. " We cannot compete, with any fairness to ourselves, with 

 districts that are alongside the rails," is the form in which this argu- 

 ment of Sir John Forrest, on behalf of the producer, is corroborated. 

 At the same time our informants concede that they know of no 

 market so good as that of Western Australia for the cultivator near 

 a line. The crops the district grows to the best advantage are 

 wheat, oats, and fruit, and on the moist parts of the river flats, root 

 crops and vegetables, but not much has been done to turn anything 

 but wheat and oats to commercial account. Only the local demands 



