e is well worthy of consideration.

PRODUCTIONS SUITED FOR CULTIVATION. COTTON TRADE.

The cultivated productions for the growth of which the country and
climate seem best adapted are cotton, sugar, indigo, and rice.

A species of cotton plant grows wild in the greatest abundance, and if a
colony was established and the proper cotton-plant introduced the
following advantages would be obtained:

Great Britain would possess in Northern Australia a colony standing in
the same relation to her manufacturies for cotton that her colonies in
the south do to her wool-market.

This colony would also form a sort of entrepot to which the manufactured
cotton would again be exported for the purpose of sale in the islands of
the Indian Archipelago or its vicinity, and other parts where we have at
present no trade, and where printed cottons now are, and from the nature
of these countries must constantly be, in great demand.

Thus a fresh supply of cotton for our markets would be obtained, which,
coming from an English colony, would give employment to British vessels
alone, and the industry of our manufacturers would be called into
operation by an entirely new market for cotton goods being thrown open to
them, in which the demand for these articles is far greater than the
supply could be for many years.

ARTICLES OF EXPORT.

The natural productions that are at present found in North-west Australia
and might be available for exportation consist chiefly of timber, gum,
lichens, and mimosa bark; all of which are abundant, and might be
collected with a trifling degree of labour.

There are many varieties of useful timber. Among others, pine, fit for
the purposes either of building or making spars for vessels, is abundant
and good, and could be readily and cheaply exported if they were cut in
the vicinity of the streams and floated down to the sea in the rainy
season, whereby all land carriage would be avoided.

I sent to England specimens of five different gums in order that they
might be examined. These consist of an elastic gum, closely resembling
Indian rubber, gum tragacynth, another gum yielded by a sort of capparis
and which I believe to be hitherto unknown, and two kinds of gum resin.

The mosses are of various kinds, many of which would afford useful dyes;
and these, together with the gums, would probably be found valuable
articles of export; for the collecting of them is a species of labour in
which the native tribes wo