32 OUR ENGLISH LAND MUDDLE. 



of Stanley and Bourke immediately surrounding 

 the settlements at Moreton Bay and Melbourne 

 respectively ; second, intermediate districts, com- 

 prising a belt of land from fifty to two hundred 

 miles inland beyond the boundaries of the 

 settled districts, extending westward to the 

 extreme limits of the State. A system was also 

 introduced by which leases were granted for 

 various terms for pastoral purposes only. During 

 the currency of such a lease the lessee could at 

 any time purchase the freehold at the upset 

 price of £1 an acre, and on the expiration of the 

 term he had a pre-emptive right at the same 

 price over all or any part of the land. 



That was the end of Imperial legislation 

 affecting land conditions in New South Wales. 

 In 1855 responsible government was granted, 

 and the colonists were left to manage their 

 own land affairs. The land system they had 

 received from the Parliament of the Mother 

 Country, legislating for a distant colony and in 

 the light of old-fashioned ideas (it is improbable 

 that there had penetrated to the minds of the 

 British legislators of the day the " Single Tax " 

 ideas of the French Physiocrats, afterwards 



