Page:The State and Position of Western Australia.djvu/154

 1828 they had increased from 75,369 to 556,391, we may safely estimate their present number to be about two millions.

The sound of these words brings our thoughts back to the Cape. We have about two millions of sheep; but the wool exported this year will probably not exceed 100,000 lbs., nor realize a higher sum than 7000 l.

For what purpose are these statements submitted to our readers? Not to vex them by any humiliating contrast, but to encourage them by a splendid example of successful industry, which they have now the opportunity and means to imitate, and perhaps surpass. Only fourteen years ago the wool exported from both the Australian colonies did not exceed in quantity that which we now raise. They had to import the Merino breed from Europe to improve their coarse and inferior flocks, exposed to a voyage twice as long as, and more than doubly hazardous that, our imports have to encounter. We have a more abundant population, labour cheaper, and most certainly not of a worse description, and every thing else at least equally favourable. And we have at the present moment in prospect two additional advantages which render our position decidedly superior to theirs.

In the first place, an addition is about to be made to the capital of the colony, not as a balance for exports, the produce of many years’ labour—but an absolute addition, without any equivalent being rendered to the source from which it comes—of probably not less than 1,200,000 l. sterling, or about eight times the value of all the sheep at present in the colony.

In the next place, we have discovered a market where we can be supplied with sheep of equal if not superior quality, at nearly one half the distance, and at a much cheaper rate than in Europe. This is no other than New South Wales itself, which has already begun to export these valuable animals; and from the largeness of the stock and the rapidity with which they increase, constantly doubling their numbers in about two years and a half, there is no risk in our demand, however extensive, making any sensible impression on their means of supplying us.

The first investment has already arrived in Cape Town. It consists of thirty males of the pure Saxon breed, selected from the flock of Alexander Riley, Esq., of Raby.

The history of this Saxon breed is also worthy of notice, as it affords another instance of the wonderful results of sheep farming. They