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smallest which I conceived at all adequate to the purpose. Both are all but completed, and, small as they are, they will be found I think sufficient until the population has considerably increased.

Several Police Stations and Lock-ups have also been or are being built—viz., a Lock-up at Campbelltown and one at Dacre, each with accommodation for a married constable; a very small one at Hokanui, near the Longford, and a Lock-up at Invercargill.

Levels have been taken of all the streets of the town which have been cleared, and a map embracing the greater portion of them is completed in my office; also, very careful sections have been taken for determining any alteration in the course of the Puni Creek.

Information on these subjects is therefore quite available if your Honor should require it.

I have the honor to be,

Sir,
Your Honor’s most obedient Servant,

THEOPH. HEALE,
Provincial Engineer.

To His Honor the Superintendent,
Province of Southland.

DOME PASS ROAD.

MEMORANDA.

From a point near M’Kay’s accommodation house, on the North bank of the Oreti River, the proposed new line of road will pass through a low rangy country for a distance of about five miles. The soil is dry and shingly, and a good passable dry track can be made by blasting about twelve culverts of small dimensions, with slight cuttings and embankments in forming approaches to them. Side cuttings will also have to be made at different points, but there will not be any heavy work to contend with. The total length of cutting may be about 60 chains.

Leaving the Ranges, the line enters on a firm dry stony plain, the surface of which, for almost its whole length (about eight or nine miles), is covered with strong coarse gravel and boulder stones, and very favourable for dray traffic. Six (6) culverts will have to be built, and also drains cut and road formed at four (4) different spots, in all about seven chains in length. Where the ground is boggy, small cuttings will have to be made in the banks of dry creek basins.

The line now joins the present dray track, which is in some places in a very bad state for traffic, and in order to improve it, side cuttings must be made about 25 or 30 chains in length, and also four small culverts built.

Two (2) fords will likewise have to be made. The probable expense of the foregoing works may be about £800.

(Signed)
JOHN FINLAYSON.

REPORT OF CHIEF SURVEYOR ON SURVEY DEPARTMENT.

Survey Office, Invercargill,
21st October 1862.

SIR,—In reviewing the services performed by the officers of the Survey Department during the past year, it is necessary to commence with some explanation of the state in which I found the Surveys at the commencement of that period, and of the modifications of the system formerly pursued which have been adopted in carrying on the new ones.

The principles established by Mr Thomson, on which the Otago Surveys were conducted, are so excellent, that, under ordinary supervision, serious error affecting any considerable portion of a Survey is next to impossible. Unfortunately there was in this district at one time at all events a total want of supervision, and six whole Blocks in the Jacob’s River Hundred were in fact fraudulently connected by the Surveyor. A partial rectification of these Blocks was attempted by the Otago Government, but that readjustment was in itself defective, and it early became obvious that a complete re-survey of these Blocks would be required—an operation involving as much time and labour as the original work.

The Staff, however, organised by Mr Thomson was generally so efficient, that with these exceptions, and one other of a very minor character, the field work has proved to be in a high degree accurate.

There are, nevertheless, running through all the old Surveys some very important omissions and defects which greatly impair their utility, though they do not impeach their correctness. These seem to have arisen partly from want of the supervision of a local head, partly from an undue desire to keep down the expense of the Surveys; but chiefly to the unfortunate rules of practice with regard to the laying off of roads.

The Block and Section Surveyors seem to have laid off their roads in right lines, generally on the Meridian, or perpendicular to it, but always with the sole view of subdividing the land into suitable parallelograms, without any regard to the practicability of making or using the roads so laid off. Moreover, the roads of each Block were, as a rule, laid off quite independently of those of the adjoining Blocks, so that it frequently happens that road lines which should be thoroughfares between distant places, encounter a turn at right angles on entering and emerging from every Block, and perhaps come to an abrupt termination short of their natural destination.

Even in the best surveyed Blocks there is a striking deficiency in the actual work done, a very insufficient number of lines having been cut, and rarely more than two pegs in a Section, sometimes back ones, having been placed.

Considerable rivers running through Blocks have not been traversed, and the outlines of forests, having been only sketched in from a distance, it has happened that Sections have been mapped and sold as backing deep in the bush, which have proved to consist entirely of open land.

There were also a few minor defects in the Office work, chiefly in the calculation of quantities.

The altered rules which have now been laid down, will, I trust, prevent these defects for the future, while the system established by Mr Thomson, which so perfectly unites the circumstances of the Colony, will in its leading features be preserved unaltered.

As these Rules have been published in the Provincial Gazette of August 27th, it is un-