132 Transactions. 
The cost of carriage of materials alone amounted, in many parts of the 
line, to upwards of £80 per ton, whilst wages at the rate of two shillings per 
hour were hardly sufficient to induce the workmen employed to continue 
the work in the face of the hardships and privations to which they were 
unavoidably exposed. Under these circumstances, the successful completion 
of the line across the New Zealand Alps is a work reflecting very great 
credit on the Provincial Telegraph Manager, Mr. George Bird. 
With the exception of the delay caused by the failure of the lines at the 
river crossings, the New Zealand telegraph lines may be said to have worked 
well since their erection; the vexatious interruptions which occasionally 
have occurred being caused chiefly by the great distances between the 
stations, and not by defective construction. 
I would call your attention to the efforts now making in ge to 
abolish retardation in the working of submarine cables. Should these 
efforts be successful, it is a question whether their greater efficiency would 
not far more than compensate for the extra cost of using land cables, in- 
stead of suspended wires, at the crossings of our wide shingle-bed rivers, and 
in exposed situations, where the maintenance of a suspended wire is liable 
to interruption from violent storms, heavy falls of snow, or other causes. 
Postat Communtcation.—I referred just now to the defective state of 
our postal communication twelve years back. It is pleasant to compare our 
then with our present condition. We have now about fifty offices open for 
the receipt and delivery of mails in our own province alone; morning and 
evening deliveries of letters in the principal towns, and constant communi- 
eation, by powerful steamers, with the adjoining provinces and with Australia. 
The recent opening of the Panama route is a great boon to New Zealand, 
as it not only puts us in direct communication with America, but brings us 
practically a fortnight nearer to England; and the announcement of the 
authorities that all letters and newspapers shall be sent viá Panama, unless 
otherwise directed, is an earnest of the desire of the Government to avail 
itself to the utmost of the advantages offered by the new route. 
The suecess which has attended the first voyages of the Panama steamers, 
the distance of 7,000 miles from land to land being run under twenty-seven 
days, is further proof, if proof were needed, of the perfection to which 
marine engines have been brought, although it may be doubted whether 
the proportions usually given to the steamers employed in long sea voyages 
are not ealeulated to insure speed at the sacrifice of other considerations 
equally important. 
It must be a matter of deep regret to all, that up to the present time 
the advantages that our province ought to derive from the visits of the 
intercolonial steamers are, to a considerable extent, neutralized by the want 
