14 GENERAL REMAR.KS. 



spectable settler, from whom he extorts his price, 

 immediately after the sale, by threatening to cut the 

 allotment up into a number of dirty lanes and alleys. 

 Certainly all this is as much gambling as anything 

 that can be called by that name, and must blight 

 the prosperity of any new settlement. The necessity 

 of providing land for agricultural and horticultural 

 pursuits, as no private title to property was yet 

 acknowledged, induced the Government to put up 

 for sale suburban allotments cultivation allotments 

 and small farms, the sale of which took place in 

 September, 1841. The whole consisted of eighty- 

 five allotments, containing 1275 acres, at the upset 

 price of 20/. for the suburban, and 31. for the cul- 

 tivation and country allotments. Although more 

 land had been surveyed, all was not put up for public 

 competition; the best land was reserved, and, in 

 consequence of this policy, only seventy-three allot- 

 ments were sold, comprising an area of 559 acres, 

 and these realized 4S58/., or nearly 8/. per acre 

 Twelve allotments, or 716 acres, remained unsold, 

 as they consisted of very indifferent land, were 

 covered with large blocks of scorise, and, at all 

 events, were not worth the upset price. The greater 

 part of the country allotments did not fall into 

 the hands of the industrious, but into those of the 

 land-jobbers, who bought them not for the purpose 

 of occupying them, but in order to cut them up, 

 immediately after the sale, into towns and villages, 

 which were put up for public competition. 



