A new Act in 1902 offered those who elected to take advantage of it a fresh lease, at the expiration of the current one, of from ten to forty-two years, according to classification; and farther resumptions were made for closer settlement. The classification, which was decided by the Land Court, was governed by the degree of remoteness from railway and the demand for land in the neighbourhood. The low range of hills surrounding the Darling Downs encloses over 2,000,000 acres of land of a quality that invites the plough to convert it into the granary of the State. As the railway to the New South Wales border takes its rather serpentine course southwards, coasting round many of the undulations to avoid cutting through them, the traveller looks upon a land which he must recognise as capable of maintaining a large farming population. What he actually saw till quite recently was paddock after paddock of sheep on each side, then a paddock of cattle and horses, and again more sheep. It was palpable that this could not continue indefinitely. The railway built at the cost of the general taxpayers had greatly increased the value of these estates and rendered their working more profitable. The owners of these flocks and herds had done good service to the State, and deserved the most generous treatment. Successors of the original pioneers, they had bred the stock that helped to occupy the West, and had founded studs that enabled others to replenish their flocks and herds from the purest sources. It was important above all things that no legislative interference should harass men who deserved so well of Queensland, and that no step should be taken to dispossess them which could be suspected of any taint of harshness. In time, doubtless, they would themselves have parcelled out their estates for tillage, but the process would have been slow, the easy terms of payment possible to a Government borrowing money at a low rate of interest not being generally convenient to an individual, and time in the development of a young country is important. Parliament therefore took the matter in hand and decided that where possible these landholders should be bought out on a valuation made by an independent tribunal. A number of properties have been bought by the Government, cut up into farms of from 80 acres upwards, and sold to farmers on liberal terms, payment extending over twenty-five years. Mixed farming and dairying are the chief purposes to which the land has been put, and busy townships have sprung up at the railway stations where a few years ago the stationmaster, his family, and an assistant porter formed the bulk of the resident population. Breeding lambs for export is found to be a profitable branch of the pastoral business on the Downs, and the breeding of crossbreds is consequently increasing, the Lincoln or Leicester being mated with the merino. Southdown and Romney rams have also been tried, but the Lincoln cross has been generally preferred.