PROPOSED GENERAL LAND REGULATIONS FOR THE PROVINCE OF OTAGO, NEW ZEALAND:

I.

GENERAL REGULATIONS.

1. All Regulations now in force in the Province of Otago for the sale, letting, disposal, and occupation of the Waste Lands of the Crown (except such Regulations as are hereinafter confirmed) shall be and are hereby repealed.

2. All such Waste Lands shall, from and after the day on which these Regulations shall be in force, be sold, let, disposed of, and occupied according to these Regulations, and not otherwise.

3. For the purposes of settlement, the Waste Lands of the Crown within the Province of Otago shall, from time to time, be divided by the Waste Land Board, hereinafter constituted, into six classes as follows, viz.:

   1. Town Land—being the sites reserved, or to be hereafter reserved for Towns and Villages.

   2. Suburban Land—being the land in the immediate vicinity of Town and Village sites.

   3. Rural Land—comprising all lands surveyed by the New Zealand Company, and described as Rural Land on the selection maps of the Otago Block, and all such other lands as shall from time to time be declared as such, in manner hereinafter provided.

   4. Special Occupation Land—being the land to be set apart as such, under the Regulations hereinafter contained.

   5. General Country Land—being the Waste Land of the Crown, not comprised in one of the above four classes.

   6. Timbered Lands.

4. Such division into classes shall, before the same come into force, be approved of by the Superintendent and his Executive Council, and when so from time to time approved of, the land therein respectively comprised shall immediately be notified and declared by the Waste Land Board hereinafter constituted as aforesaid, in the Provincial Government Gazette, as open to settlement according to the terms of these Regulations, on and after a day to be named in such notice.

5. It shall be lawful for the said Waste Land Board, with the consent of the Superintendent and his Executive Council, at any time, and from time to time, to declare by notice in the Provincial Government Gazette, that any land (except special occupation land) which may have been placed in any such class, shall thenceforth cease to belong to such class, and that the same shall, from a day to be named in such notice, belong to any other of the said classes.

II.

TOWN LAND.

6. All Town Land shall be sold by auction, according to the Regulations hereinafter prescribed for auctions. The upset price of such lands shall be £5 for every quarter of an acre of Town Land.

III.

SUBURBAN AND RURAL LAND.

7. Any person desirous of purchasing any Suburban or Rural Land shall send in a written application to the Waste Land Board, under a sealed cover, with the words “application for Suburban or Rural Land,” as the case may be, legibly written thereon; and such application shall state the number of the section or part of section, and the number of the block in which the land is situated, if the same shall have been surveyed, which such person is desirous of purchasing, so that the same may be identified and marked on a plan of the district, to be provided by the said Board.

8. Every applicant shall, at 10 o’clock in the morning of the next business day after making such application, pay to the said Board the price of the land so selected by him, which price shall be after the rate of 20s. an acre for Suburban, and 15s. an acre for Rural Land.

9. All such applications shall be opened at 10 o’clock in the forenoon of the next business day after the same shall have been sent in, in the presence of the persons applying, if they shall attend; and if it shall be found that there are two or more applications for the same piece of land, or any part thereof, sent in on the same day, the piece of land in dispute shall be put up for sale by auction by one of the Commissioners of the Waste Lands Board, at the upset price of 20s. an acre if the piece of land applied for be Suburban Land, and 15s. an acre if it be Rural Land, at 10 o’clock on the morning of the fourth day (and if such day be Sunday or Christmas day, or the 1st day of January, then on the following day) after the application for the same shall have been opened as aforesaid, and posted as hereinafter provided by section 75; at such auction the persons who applied for the land on the same day as aforesaid shall alone be permitted to bid.

10. Every such selection shall comprise not less than 5 acres and not more than 10 acres of Suburban Land, not less than 25 acres nor more than 50 acres of Rural Land, and shall, so far as the features of the country and the survey of the section applied for will permit, be of a rectangular form, and when fronting a river, lake, road, or coast, be of a depth not less than three times the length of the frontage: Provided always, that under special circumstances the said Waste Land Board may deviate from such rule, and may also permit proprietors to complete their properties by the purchase of adjoining lands of irregular shape, and of small extent, so that the same shall not unduly interfere with the advantageous dividing of the adjoining sections into convenient allotments.

11. The Waste Land Board, at the time of any application being granted, or so soon as conveniently may be thereafter, shall, in all cases where a re-survey shall be by them deemed necessary, inform the applicant that he must have the land so selected re-surveyed at his own expense by a surveyor to be approved of by the Board.

12. Every such re-survey must be completed and delivered at the Waste Land Office within six months after the Waste Land Board shall have informed such applicant that the land is to be so re-surveyed; and in default thereof it shall be lawful for the said Waste Land Board to have the land re-surveyed at the applicant’s expense (which shall be repaid by him to the Board before a Crown grant of the land purchased by him shall be issued).

13. Where Suburban or Rural Land shall be purchased in a district in which the lines of road