Page:The Present State and Prospects of the Port Phillip District of New South Wales.djvu/50

 A man with a family, who is able to afford many of the comforts of life, does not like to go and live in a hut in the bush, nor is he willing to build a good house without having any tenure of the ground on which it stands. He cannot purchase that land because it is not surveyed; and if he should succeed in getting government to survey the homestead and put it up to auction, he will have to pay, even at the minimum price, £640 for as many acres, worth probably about 5s. each, and run the risk also of losing his improvements, water, and homestead, in case any person should, for the sake of those improvements and advantages, choose to outbid him. The consequence is, that he leaves the management of his station to an overseer, while he himself resides at a villa near Melbourne.

The second result is, that the sheep-farmer is prevented from getting up his wool in as good a condition as he might, were he not prevented by the insecurity of his tenure from making the first outlay in putting up the buildings and other improvements necessary for this purpose. To wash wool clean, it is necessary that every sheep owner should have a washing place on his station; and, if possible, an artificial fall of water with a spout. This generally cannot be made without a good deal of expense. Even when the sheep are washed clean, it is impossible that they can be kept so during the process of shearing unless there be a proper shearing shed; nor can the wool when shorn be classed and sorted without a wool room. These are all expenditures which men should be encouraged to make. Many have done so at all risks, and in this respect