colonies should be in a measure counterbalanced by an influx of
well-disposed and intelligent people, with such domestic associations as
will insure their responsible and good citizenship. Families, where they
can be induced to emigrate, should be offered the most liberal
inducements, especially if they are persons possessing a knowledge of
farming,--these would be a most valuable addition to the colony.
Government can well afford to give to such desirable emigrants a free
passage, and land on which to settle without a cent of first cost to
them. The high rates of passage and the price charged for land in these
colonies have together acted as prohibitory measures to new settlers
going thither. There are millions of acres of good land in Australia and
New Zealand which lie idle, and will continue to do so for a century to
come, unless proper persons are induced by liberal terms to go and
occupy them. There is a certain class in England and Great Britain
generally to whom the agents of the colonies can well afford to be
liberal and open-handed, and there are others upon whom all such
liberality would be worse than thrown away. To cause a steady emigration
from the old country the conditions must be made at first entirely for
the benefit of the new-comer, and in the end his presence will redound
to the permanent good of the colonies.

The cultivation of wheat is growing more and more general in Queensland,
but the staple productions may be said to be wool and sugar. Coffee,
tobacco, and cotton are also grown, but only to a limited extent,
though the acreage devoted to the latter is said to be annually
increasing. The laborers upon the plantations, and indeed the colored
laborers both in town and country, are composed largely of South Sea
Islanders, imported hither from both the near and far islands on the
very objectionable Coolie principle which so long prevailed in Cuba.
These laborers are engaged to serve a certain period,--say five
years,--for which time the employer contracts to pay them six pounds
sterling per annum, feeding and housing them in the mean time; and at
the expiration of the term agreed upon he promises to return them to
their island homes free of all cost to themselves. Of course this system
is open to unlimited abuse, as was proved in the West Indies and
elsewhere, resolving itself into a species of actual slavery. Besides
which, under the guise of securing contract labor it has been proved
that nativ