The above articles the colony can supply to almost any extent; yet it will be observed that their export is falling off every year. Its mines of copper, especially, are amongst the richest in the world; yet they are comparatively unworked for the want of hands, whilst the world holds so many human beings who would gladly toil for one-fourth of the remuneration which Australia could so well afford them. To the people of Great Britain it is a very material object that the agricultural and mineral resources of the colony should be more largely developed than at present; for if, almost exclusively by the produce of her gold-fields, her population of little, if at all, over half a million souls can afford to import our productions to the amount of above fourteen millions sterling per annum, what may be expected when it becomes enabled to export freely the raw material, the agricultural products, and the valuable minerals—copper, tin, &c.—which its soil will yield to an extent almost beyond the power of calculation? We have already stated that the increase of the population of Australia is self-creative; and we can very briefly show how that principle is likely to operate. We have a large amount of tonnage at present employed in the passenger trade from Great Britain to that colony; but we have not as yet sufficient homeward freight to employ one-fourth of that tonnage. Since the discovery of the gold-fields the ordinary agricultural and other pursuits of the colonists have been neglected; and, as we might have expected, the exports of bulky raw materials and produce, which constitute freight, have diminished in quantity. Hence our emigrant ships, except in the case of those of the established lines from Liverpool and London, which now return direct from that colony, have had to go in ballast to the Eastern Seas, or to the guano islands of Peru, to seek cargoes. Where such a course has to be pursued, the passage-money outwards must range high—far above the means of the most valuable emigrants, who are agricultural labourers, practical miners, and artisans. But this state of things cannot continue to exist long. The gold-fields are sufficiently tempting, no doubt; yet there are blanks there as well as prizes. The disappointed must resort to agricultural and other walks of industry. The flocks and herds of the squatters in the bush are increasing at a most rapid rate—far beyond the consumptive demand of the colony—and the supplies for export of hides, tallow, oil, and wool must very largely increase. Of the latter most important raw material the following were the shipments to this country during the past three years:— Wool—Sheep and Lambs’ 1851, 41,810,117 lb. 1852, 43,197,301 „ 1853, 47,075,963 „