A
considerable number of labourers will find employment about the towns,
at the stores, on the wharfs, &c. at about 24s. weekly. Country work
on the sheep-stations--as shepherds, drivers of bullock-drays,
sheep-washing and shearing, cooking for the men, &c.--is remunerated
by about L.25 and food. These live far off in the solitary plains,
almost apart from men, and come to town once, twice, or thrice a year,
as their distance and employment may determine. The Sabbath has little
of the religious character for them, and they know little of the
progress of mankind. Agriculture also employs men at about the same
rate. There is no probability of wages falling, for a long time to
come, with any stream of emigration likely to come out hither; for if
the country cannot grow more wool, a greater attention to its quality
would employ more men; and agriculture will absorb a vast population
as soon as the land-question has been fairly overhauled, and settled
on a foundation that will allow a small capitalist to obtain, at a
fair price, a suitable farm: besides, everything necessary to
civilisation has yet to be done--roads, bridges, quarries, wells, and
a long _etcetera_ that one can scarcely catalogue.
Pages:
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92