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called Riverina, and is within tlie colony of New South Wales, Now, the 

 Noi'thern Railway, at its Echuca terminus, taps, as it were, the whole of 

 this inland navigation, and brings the whole Riverina trade to Melbourne, 

 New South Wales governs Riverina, but Sydney is not its commercial 

 metropolis. Most of the Riverina squatters and traders transact their business 

 at Melbourne, and when the Judges of the Supreme Court of New South 

 Wales go circuit to Deniliquin, they find it convenient to go by sea to 

 Melbourne, and thence by railway to Echuca — a coach conveying them thence 

 to the circuit town. Melbourne is thus not only the capital of Victoria, but 

 is the metropolis of a vast interior, into which settlement is rapidly extending. 

 At Cooper's Creek, the starting place of Burke and Wills, and not far from 

 which they died exhausted, there is now an accommodation house for travellers. 

 One striking piece of evidence of the meti'opolitan character of the City of 

 Melbourne is furnished by the press. What the Times is to Great Britain, 

 the Argus is to Australia. Tt is not merely the Melbourne paper, it is the 

 Australian paper. Primarily, it represents the opinion of its Victorian 

 subscribers ; secondarily, it is the embodiment of public opinion in Australia. 



From the geographical features of New Zealand, and the manner in which 

 settlement has been made, we cannot have a great metropolis. There are 

 many disadvantages in this — economical, social, political ; but it is quite 

 inevitable ; our town populations cannot be so concentrated, but must ever be 

 distributed between Dunedin, Lyttelton (with Christchurch), Wellington, 

 Auckland, and the smaller coast towns. Notwithstanding this, there are good 

 grounds for anticipating that what has taken place in Yictoria upon a scale 

 exceptionally grand, will take place in New Zealand in a minor degree, and, 

 so to speak, distributively. Who can doubt that if the Hutt Rivei-, which 

 falls into Port Nicholson, had been navigable for only 100 miles into the 

 interior, Wellington would now have been a considerable city. Who can 

 doubt that if the harbour of Dunedin had enjoyed the advantage of a navigable 

 river, the growth of the city would have been much more rapid than it has 

 been. The same may be said of Auckland, with its fine harbour. That which 

 navigable streams would have done here, had they existed, will be efiected by 

 railways — though, of course, in a minor degree and less rapidly and efiectually 



The growth of towns depends upon the prosperity of the country. The 

 country population mainly consists of producers, that of the towns of dis- 

 tributers and exchangers. This division, though convenient and intelligible, 

 is neither perfectly accurate nor perfectly exhaustive. It is not quite accurate, 

 because distributers and exchangers (that is, merchants, agents, brokei's, and 

 carriers) are really producers. They perfoi'm a service, and add a value to the 

 pi'oduce and goods which pass through their hands. The division is not 

 exhaustive, because there are dix-ect producers in all towns, and there are 

 distributers — that is, traders — in all parts of the country. Still, it is con- 



