Page:The Present State and Prospects of the Port Phillip District of New South Wales.djvu/119

 backs of the sheep be estimated at £400. This is by no means a solitary instance. These tremendous sacrifices at forced sales are not only to be attributed to the want of ready money, but also in a measure to the defective working of the insolvent law, which has encouraged an immensity of fraud, and under the operation of which there is in general so little to be recovered from an insolvent estate, that it is not worth the creditor's while to look after it, and see that it is not sacrificed. Sixpence in the pound is about the average which has been realized on estates which have gone through the Insolvent Court at Sydney. I do not know the proportion at Melbourne.

In order to give a succinct view of the causes of this depression, I do not think that I can do better than make an extract from the report of the committee of the Legislative Council on immigration, which briefly recapitulates them. After going into the present state of the labour-market, and stating their conviction of the absolute necessity of restoring emigration from Europe, the report goes on thus:—

"The proceeds arising from the sale of waste lands of the colony have been hitherto appropriated for this purpose. During the last six years no less a sum than £1,000,000 sterling has been expended in the introduction of emigrants from the United Kingdom. The expenditure of so large an amount, and its sudden abstraction from the colony, has been productive of consequences which your committee cannot but regard as disastrous, and as originating to a considerable extent the embarrassments under which the community are now suffering.

"The advantages which the colony had previously enjoyed