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After the appointment of the Board of Commissions to carry out the provisions of the Act of Parliament, their first duty was to fulfil the conditions required from them by the Government, viz., to sell £35,000 worth of land, and to invest £20,000 in the name of trustees before any act of the Board would be valid. This money question had hitherto been the crucial point, and it remained so now. In June, 1835, therefore, the Commissioners published their first "Regulations" for the sale of land at £1 per acre; and for two months, advertisements, pamphlets, and maps were scattered broadcast; agents were appointed at considerable expanse to aid the Commissioners, but all to no purpose.

At the end of that time not half the required quantity of land had been disposed of, and there seemed to be no chance of selling any more.

At this crisis Mr. George Fife Angas said to his colleagues on the Board of Commissioners: "Without some collateral association to assist the Commissioners I do not see how the Act is to be carried into effect." "He then proceeded to unfold a scheme which was, in brief, that a Joint Stock Company should be formed with sufficient