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heaped up a little in order to allow for the settling down of the 

 loose soil that must eventually take place. It is for the person 

 letting the contract to say whether he will supply tree pullers, 

 tools, explosives, and rations. As a rule, the contractors supply 

 themselves with all these things, and it is better, as it saves possible 

 complications, that they should. 



Before going any further, I should like to impress upon the 

 minds of not only new settlers, but old settlers also, the desirable- 

 ness of having all contracts made in writing. Verbal agreements 

 frequently give rise to misunderstandings that might have been 

 avoided if ink and paper had been resorted to. The best of inten- 

 tions may exist on both sides at the time the verbal contract is 

 made, but it is a very difficult matter, in the first place, to get two 

 minds to completely grasp the same situation from exactly the same 

 aspect ; and it is, in the second place, an infinitely more difficult 

 matter to get these same two minds two months afterwards to look 

 back upon the situation as it then appeared, and again view it from 

 the same aspect. Memory is so apt to play us false ; black and 

 white, never. The risks to both sides of acting upon a verbal 

 agreement are infinitely greater than committing oneself to any 

 serious error in signing a written contract that has been mutually 

 agreed upon. 



There is another matter I should like to mention here, and 

 that is, the aclvisableness of the settler, particularly the new comer, 

 keeping a daily record of his work. A diary may be had for a 

 shilling that will last for a year. It may be used as a day book, in 

 which the outgoings and incomings in cash and produce may be 



Eut down until such time as they can be entered up in the proper 

 ooks. Every event of any importance should be noted, the tak- 

 ing-on of a new hand, paying him off, ploughing, sowing, harvest- 

 ing, burning off, increase in live stock, and the hundred and one 

 operations and events that make up the routine of twelve months 

 of farm life. It is surprising the many little mental worries and 

 anxieties, occasioned by the vagaries of memory, that this simple 

 record relieves. Between tea time and bed time there is always a 

 spare half hour, and a portion of it cannot be more profitably 

 expended than in recording, in black and white, the more import- 

 ant events of the day. 



To return to cleat ing, and the new and inexperienced settler 

 who has, perforce, to undertake the work himself. 



On clearing the lighter soils, which generally in this colony 

 mean lighter and easily removed timber, there is very little to be 

 said. Common sense in this, as in everything else, must be the 

 settler's best guide. It may be that it will be considered desirable 

 the first year to leave all the large timber standing in which case it 

 should be ring-barked at once, no matter what time of the year 

 and grub out only the small stuff, say 12 inches in diameter and 

 under. If the large trees are not too thick this can be done 



