46 OUR ENGLISH LAND MUDDLE. 



net result, when accounts could be squared up 



roughly, was this : — 



The leasehold pastoral areas had been 

 in very many cases converted to freeholds 

 by the buying out of " dummy " selectors. 



Many millions of pounds had been 

 spent in this process, the money going in 

 the main to lawyers, conspirators, and per- 

 jurers. The State got no advantage, as it 

 sold at sacrifice rates land for which it had 

 been getting good rents. In very many 

 cases the pastoralists were ruined by the 

 load of debt they had incurred to fight 

 " free selectors " by " dummying," and the 

 runs passed into the control of banks and 

 other money-lending institutions. 



Farming settlement, instead of being 

 concentrated for the time in a few areas, 

 was sprinkled all over the vast extent of 

 the State, and the Government was faced 

 with the task of finding railways, roads, 

 bridges, schools, police patrols, etc., for 

 these scattered settlers.* 



* I have received, since writing this, a return dealing with popula- 

 tion in New South Wales, which illustrates one result of this wide 

 sprinkling of the population. New South Wales is divided into 141 



