62 



Taking the lowest average, viz., one gallon to the 

 tree, and sixty trees to the acre, the produce at *8s. a 

 gallon, the Brisbane market value of the imported article 

 would be £24i per acre in the early years of bearing ; 

 while the value of the Olive when cultivated increases 

 as a matter of certainty with each additional year of age 

 until maturity. But, in the face of this indisputable 

 fact, and the knowledge that a plantation of Olives is a 

 permanent, safe, and improving investment of a most 

 enduring character, we can well afford to be patient for 

 our first returns, especially as the land is not occupied 

 by the trees to the absolute exclusion of other crops. 

 Taking the produce in the early years of bearing at one- 

 fourth of that named, with the knowledge of what to 

 expect as year by year the trees grow older, and with 

 the use of nearly all the land on which they stand for 

 other crops, we can still well afford to wait. 



The Olive already in Adelaide, like the cotton with 

 us, affords employment to the children in the picking. 

 For this they are paid 4d. a bucket, or by some 2s. a 

 cwt., and can earn at this light labor, so suited to their 

 strength, as much as 2s. a day without difficulty. 



I do not desire to import into the calculations of 

 profit the residuum of oil-cake as an important item ; 

 out this, of course, also has it value. In Australia we 

 have not been in the habit of stall-feeding cattle ; but it 

 is by no means certain that, as population becomes more 

 dense, and our grazing grounds more remote from the 

 cities, it may not yet enter into our agricultural system. 

 But apart from a somewhat wide question like this, 

 there is at least our old friend the pig quite prepared to 

 convert the Olive oil- cake into bacon, hams, and lard. 



* The market price in Adelaide, of the local product, is 12s. per gallon. 



