LAND REVENUE.

The receipts obtained from the sale of Crown lands during the past financial year amount to a sum largely in excess of what has ever before accrued from this source during a similar period. Your Honor’s estimate of the territorial income for 1874-5 was £75,000, while the actual income was as under:—

Cash ... £81,433 1 7
Scrip ... 9,672 10 0
Fees, &c. ... 22 1 8

£91,127 13 3

Forming part of the above stated receipts, is a sum of £13,625, being the purchase money for 21,800 acres of land situated in the township of Carnarvon, in the Manawatu District, bought by Messrs. John Douglas and others, in September, 1874. This land was set aside under “The Wellington Special Settlements Act, 1871,” by your Honor, and its sale was effected on certain specified conditions agreed to by the Governor in Council. These conditions are fully set forth in the General Government Gazette, No. 48, of date 10th September, 1874; but their general tenor is as follows:—The land is sold to an Association of persons, who undertake to drain and improve it, at an outlay, within the next two years and six months, dating from 5th September, 1874, of not less than £10,000. The Association also undertakes, within two years, to locate at least seventy families on a selected block of 7,000 acres, recently chosen by me out of the 21,800 comprised in the purchase. This block is to be surveyed and laid out by the Association in sections of one hundred acres each, which are to be sold to the heads of the families already mentioned on a system of deferred payments extending over four years, the price being £2 per acre. The price paid by the Association for the whole of the land included within the original purchase is at the rate of twelve shillings and sixpence (12s. 6d.) per acre.

The appended schedule, marked A, will supply detailed particulars as to the amount of land sold, and deposits received, during the financial year.

BLOCKS OVER WHICH THE NATIVE TITLE HAS BEEN EXTINGUISHED.

During the period between 9th April and 16th October, 1874, the Native title has been extinguished over 180,661a. 2r. 20p., comprised within the several blocks specified in the schedule attached, marked B. With the exception, however, of the Parae Kareta Porewa District, three small blocks in the Wairarapa, containing 2,841 acres, and some building allotments in the Te Aro Pah reserve, the whole of the land thus acquired has been for the present handed over to the General Government, pending the selection of 80,000 acres as special settlements for the location of immigrants.

MR. LARKWORTHY’S PURCHASE.

The payments on the 7,000 acres of swamp land at Foxton, in the Manawatu District, purchased by Mr. Falconer Larkworthy, of London, under the provisions of “The Wellington Special Settlements Act, 1871,” have been regularly made as they have fallen due.

HUTT SMALL FARM ASSOCIATION—LAND ON DEFERRED PAYMENTS.

It is also satisfactory to note that the members of the Hutt Small Farm Association, who hold the block in the Rangitikei-Manawatu District originally set apart for their use as a small farm settlement on a system of deferred payments, have all now paid up the instalments in full, thereby securing to themselves their properties in freehold, and thus reaping all the advantages looked forward to when the Association was founded. The whole of the land thrown open for sale on deferred payments under the provisions of Part I., “Wellington Special Settlements Act, 1871,” has been taken up. Thirty one (81) holdings, comprising 4,430¼ acres, on which the second instalments fell due during the past year, have, in accordance with the Act, been visited by an officer appointed by your Honor, who has valued the improvements made, in order to ascertain whether the conditions specified in the “license to occupy” had been complied with. In all instances this has been found to be the case, and payment of the second instalments of the purchase money has been made and received.

CROWN GRANTS.

During the year there have been prepared and forwarded to the Honorable the Secretary for Crown Lands, for the signature of His Excellency the Governor, 115 Crown Grants, including an area of 62,766 acres 1 rood 20 perches.