A Settler's 35 Years' Experience in Victoria, Australia: And how £6 8s. became £8,000 — John Shaqi
A Settler's 35 Years' Experience in Victoria, Australia: And how £6 8s. became £8,000Hulme, E. (Edward)
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A Settler's 35 Years' Experience in Victoria, Australia: And how £6 8s. became £8,000
Hulme, E. (Edward)
Hulme, E. (Edward), 1818-1904; Immigrants -- Australia -- Biography; Victoria -- Biography
If I were to draw up a plan of settlement, basing the costs according
to my own personal experience, but depending upon a company for the
capital to start with, I would advise, after the company had agreed
with the Government for the purchase of the land, and the same was
surveyed in blocks of 200 acres each, to settle down 200 families,
which would amount to 40,000 acres, and a reserved right for 40,000
more at a somewhat higher figure. The cost to place each family of
say five individuals, would be about £200 each family; that is, to
pay passage, supply them with food, implements, stock, seeds, &c.,
for the first year, until some produce came to hand. Residences, of
course, would be rough, and should be erected by themselves. Thus
far the support and provision of the 200 families for one year would
be £40,000, or for 1600 families--8000 souls--£500,000. Say, for
illustration, the company got the land for two shillings per acre,
and gave each family a lease for 10 years at two shillings an acre
per annum, the payment to be for purchase money, so that at the end
of 10 years it would be his own, having paid the company £1 per acre.
The £200 also, advanced in the first instance, to be paid off by
instalments with 6 per cent. interest per annum added, so that at the
end of ten years or a little more, each family should be possessed
of their own freehold, and a considerable increase of stock, etc.
The company should have a depôt, where everything necessary for the
settlement could be supplied at the lowest possible rate, and also
undertake to preserve and market the produce of the settlers to the
best advantage, to ensure them the highest possible price, like Chaffey
Bros. propose doing. To go more into detail and figures as to the first
year's expenses of a family of five, I would put it down thus:--
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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