cable connecting our capital with the seat of Government in the 
Northern Island. We have our great tunnel in construction, and 
our road across the New Zealand Alps. We have our goldfields, 
our coal mines, our founderies, our broad acres tilled with the 
steam plough, our clipper steamers, our mail coaches, and our 
locomotive railways, and we have all this in a country which, 
fifteen years ago, was an almost unknown land, but which is now, 
by God’s blessing , the happy home of prosperous thousands of our 
fellow men.” 
Government Buildings at Christchurch, Province of Canterbury. 
Appendix. 
The Otira or Arthur’s Pass road, the first road across the Southern Alps. 1 
Amongst the public works of the Province of Canterbury stands pro- 
minent the new road, just constructed, by the gorge of the Otira, across 
the New Zealand Alps, connecting the City of Christchurch with Hokitika 
and Greymouth, the ports of the western goldfields. The Otira road is a 
remarkable work, in every point of view; whether we consider the grandeur 
of the scenery through which it passes, the geological interest of the Alpine 
districts which it traverses, the engineering difficulties attendant on its con- 
1 The present state of applied science in the Canterbury Province (Adress, 
delivered at the annual meeting of the Philosophical Institute of Canterbury, on No' 
vember 5, 1866 by Mr. E. Dobson, Prov. Engineer, and Vice-President of the 
Institute. 
