"The land on the North Esk, and that which runs in the line of road to Hobart Town through Perth, Ross, and Campbeltown, as far as Oatlands, is tolerably well cleared of timber, and many extensive fields of corn, &c., are to be seen. This latter place lies about the centre of the island. The country from thence towards Hobart Town becomes very hilly, with here and there a few farms in the valleys; the bush, of course, having sheep, horses, and cattle in abundance depasturing on its soil. The harvest of Van Diemen's Land generally commences in February. Around the capital are said to be some fine spots. The government gardens, about three miles distant, are considered worthy of a visit, from the many exotics and fruits grown there-apples, pears, and all other English fruits, growing to great perfection. The grapes raised against the wall are as large as those of Spain or Portugal; but a friend who has spent much time in all these places considers this Tasmanian crop deficient. As in the other colonies, many of the settlers here have been officers in the army and navy, grants of land being given them on retiring from active service, which has, no doubt, tended much to the formation of an excellent community. Many civilians who ventured their future happiness by emigrating to this island, have been very prosperous, principally by dint of determined perseverance."

CLIMATE, SOIL, NATURAL PRODUCTIONS, &c. The climate of Van Diemen's Land is exceedingly pleasant and salubrious, and is especially adapted to the constitutions of the natives of Great Britain; the heat in summer is not so intense as that of Australia, not often much surpassing that of London or the southern parts of England; while the mornings and evenings, even at the hottest periods of the year, are always cool and agreeable. The cold in winter, however, though mild when compared to what we experience at that season, is more intense and of longer duration than that of Australia, snow lying frequently on the higher mountains throughout the greater part of the year; but in the valleys and lower districts it seldom remains more than a few hours. There have not yet appeared any diseases which can be said to be peculiar either to the climate or to the island; and, on the whole, the chances of life are estimated to be considerably more in favour of Van Diemen's Land than of Britain or any other of the most healthy parts of Europe. Colds are sometimes caught in winter, but never prove fatal unless neglected. It is not subject to any extremes of heat or cold: the easons are regular, mild, and agreeable; the atmosphere constantly pure and elastic; and the sky clear, unclouded, and brilliant. The average number of days on which rain falls throughout the year, is from fifty to sixty. The island possesses a considerable variety of trees and shrubs. The gum-tree is the largest; and there are numerous others well adapted for ship and house building. The trees are all tall and straight, branching only at the top, and they are nearly all evergreens. The bark of the trees is in general of so white a complexion as to give them the appearance of having been peeled, and their leaves are long, narrow, and pointed. All the vegetables and fruits known are cultivated in England and Scotland, are raised without difficulty-apples, pears, plums, gooseberries, &c., to which the warmer temperature of Australia is unfavourable, are produced here in great abundance and of excellent quality. Both the climate and the soil are sufficiently favourable to the

to thrive remarkably well; potatoes are in general a good crop, and of excellent quality. The island is altogether, in short, fit for all the purposes of agriculture aimed at in this country, being neither more nor less favourable to them, but in all respects nearly the same; its climate being ours, only somewhat modified, and its soil in general not materially differing in quality. Its animal productions are nearly the same with those of Australia, consisting of the kangaroo, opossum, squirrel, &c. The native dog, however, so well known in the former country, is not to be found here; but in its place there is an animal of the panther tribe, which, though it flies from man with the timidity of a hare, is yet extremely destructive to the flocks of the settlers, among which it frequently commits the most dreadful havoc. This animal attains considerable size, having been found in many instances to measure six feet from the snout to the extremity of the tail. The birds of Van Diemen's Land are the emu, or Australian ostrich, parrot, cockatoos, herons, swans, pelicans, &c. There are here, too, a considerable number and variety of poisonous reptiles; but these, on the whole, are neither so numerous nor so venomous as in the sister colony.

The seas around Van Diemen's Land abound with whales, dolphins, and seals, and its shores with shell-fish, particularly the mussel, these last literally covering the rocks on its coast, and in its bays, creeks, and harbours Oysters were once plentiful, but they have become almost extinct.

The leading if not almost the only misfortune under which Van Diemen's Land labours, is a deficiency of good roads. This prevents all communication on a profitable or convenient scale, except in the few cases in which proper thoroughfares have been made. Mr. Dixon, a late writer on the country, observes, that the cost of transporting farm-produce a distance of thirty miles, is as great as is the cost of bringing the same quantity of articles from Great Britain; in other words, a barrel of beef can be sent from London to Hobart Town for the same price as it could be sent from thirty miles inland to Hobart Town. If this be true, it is a fact most disgraceful to the local authorities; for without good roads it is utterly impossible to carry on agricultural operations with advantage. The statistical accounts of the island mention, that latterly great improvements have been made in this respect, there being now upwards of 100 miles of macadamized roads in the colony, also several bridges, and good cross-roads; but we fear that much still remains to be done to extend the means of communication.

GOVERNMENT.

Van Diemen's Land is now an independent British colony. Till the year 1825, it was a dependency of the colony of New South Wales, but in that year it received a government of its own. The internal policy of the island is now conducted by a lieutenant-governor, and an executive and legislative council. There are also here a chief-justice, attorney-general, and all the other appendages of a supreme court of judicature, courts of requests, attorneys, barristers, solicitors, proctors, sheriffs, justices of the peace, and the whole of the paraphernalia of civil and criminal jurisprudence known in this country. There are, besides, as in New South Wales, a number of police magistrates, each having a separate and distinct district under his judicial authority; these are, as in the former case, stipendiary. The laws here are the same with those in England, in so far as the circumstances of the colony will admit. The members of all the civil institutions are appointed by the crown, consisting, in the.

* Mr. Dixon's observations on the state of the roads are com pletely at variance with those which we have quoted from Mr. Russell. Perhaps the roads are good one or two lines of route, but indifferent in others.

executive council, of four in number, including the governor, and in the legislative of fifteen, also including that officer. The expense of the judicial department amounts to about £13,000 per annum, and the ecclesiastical to about £6500. The military and convict establishment are paid by the mother country. The governor's situation is reckoned worth £5000 per annum, although his net salary is only £2500; the difference is made up by taking into account various items, such as furnished houses, gardens, farms, servants, horses, cattle, sheep, pigs, poultry, fish, &c.

Society in Van Diemen's Land, like that of New South Wales, is made up of free settlers who have emigrated from this country, and of convicts. Society is so much alike in both countries, that it is unnecessary for us to say any thing regarding it in this article. The convicts in Van Diemen's Land are in all respects treated the same as in New South Wales, to which article we refer for particulars. There are no aborigines now in Van Diemen's Land, these having been lately conveyed to an island in Bass's Strait, and an order has been issued by the home government for their removal to Port Philip district, New South Wales. Regarding the bush-rangers, or runaway convicts, from the effective police force kept up, their depredations are confined to the less populated districts, and even there they seldom exist long without being captured. We understand, that while we are now writing, measures are in the course of adoption for entirely altering the mode of convict management and labour, and leaving the colonists to be more dependent on the assistance of free labourers than formerly. Correct information may be obtained on this point on arrival in the colony.

We gather the following information respecting the condition of Van Diemen's Land from an official return, drawn up by the Colonial Secretary to the government for the years 1836-7-8, and published in the Hobart Town Courier, 1839. It appears that the fixed revenue of the colony has increased from £91,320 in 1835 to £98,081 in 1838, although in the interval there has been a decrease of £18,000 on the annual revenue from spirit duties. The number of licenses granted to publicans and wholesale dealers in spirits has been considerably diminished. The annual expenditure of the colony has correspondingly increased from £103,027 in 1835 to £138,681 in 1838: much of this increase, however, is caused by the colony now bearing the cost of the police establishment, formerly paid by the home government. The number of vessels cleared inwards in 1835 was 229, with a tonnage of 55,853; in 1838 the number of vessels had increased to 370, with a tonnage of 64,454. The number of vessels cleared outwards in 1835 was 225, with a tonnage of 53,560; in 1838 the number was 369, and the tonnage 63,392. The number of vessels belonging to the colony had increased in three years 40 per cent. In 1835 five vessels were built in the colony, with a tonnage amounting to 382, while in 1838 the number built was ten, tonnage 1267.

It also appears that the number of acres in crop had increased from 87,283 to 108,000. or nearly 24 per cent. The number of horses had increased at the rate of 49 per cent., and that of sheep from 824,256 to 1,214.485. Manufactories and trades are progressively increasing in almost every branch. In 1835 the number of mills driven by water or wind was 47; in 1838, 51; and in place of one formerly driven by steam-power, there are now two.

PASSAGE.

Van Diemen's Land is sooner reached than New South Wales (the distance from Hobart Town to Sydney being about 800 miles); on which account the charge for passage to Hobart Town is in general several pounds less than to Sydney. For a single man in the cabin, inc.uding provisions, it is about £50 to the former, and VOL. II.-92

£55 to the latter; and in the steerage about £21 and £23: the difference, in short, is about £5 in the case of a cabin passenger, and from £2 to £3 in that of a steerage passenger-in both, the passage-money for a married couple is somewhat less than double. Each passenger is allowed a certain quantity of luggage freight free, generally about half a ton, although in this particular there is a considerable difference with different ships, some giving more, but a greater number less.

SUITABLE OCCUPATIONS.

We have no doubt that in time Van Diemen's Land will form a beautifully cultured and large food-producing country, perhaps as much so in proportion to its size as England. The present preventives of this desirable result are not natural but artificial. Nature has done much; man has done little. The greater part of the country is suitable for agriculture and cattle and sheep feeding. The nature of the choice between Australia and Van Diemen's Land seems to be this:-By going to Australia (almost any part of it), there is a wide scope for sheep and wool farming to capitalists: but those who engage in it have to proceed hundreds of miles into desolate wildernesses, and in a great measure bid adieu to society. Besides, the want of water is an evil of no mean character. Still, by enduring all this, money may be made. In other words, at great personal misery (to some) a fortune may be realized. In Van Diemen's Land, on the other hand, there is less scope for large sheep-farms than in Australia, and from the badness of the roads and deficiency of labourers, there is even at present little scope for agriculture. But then, Van Diemen's Land is more pleasant; it is more like what people have been accustomed to at home; labourers will by and by find their way to it; roads will surely be made some time or other; and if so, we cannot see why agriculture may not be pursued as advantageously as in Britain. Into all, the climate is unexceptionable, droughts being of comparatively rare occurrence. To persons of moderate views, and possessing a family, Van Diemen's Land is decidedly preferable. It is at all events worth remembering, that emigrants may have an opportunity of landing at and examining this colony on their way to Port Philip or Sydney, and if displeased with the prospect, they can easily find their way to a locality more suitable to their wants.

Supposing that emigrants settle here, the following is a sketch of rural operations and prospects. The greatest difficulty which the new settler will have to encounter in preparing his land, is from the trees with which he will find it encumbered. To free the land from these is an expensive, tedious, and exceedingly laborious process, but as it of course must be done, it had best be set about with cheerfulness, and kept at with unremitting perseverance. The settler must now cast his coat, and set fairly to work with his assistants. A great many settlers have contented themselves with cutting the trees a little way above the ground, leaving the stumps and roots to decay of themselves, without grubbing them out entirely, as they ought to be. This is a saving of labour and expense in the first instance, but it will not be found so in the long-run. These stumps take ten or twelve years to decay; and even in the state of decomposition to whicn they are then reduced, they still require to be taken up; and not having the tree to act as a lever in tearing them from the earth, they are often found more troublesome to root out than the whole tree itself would have been. While in the ground, too, they interfere sadly with the operations of both plough and harrow, deform the ridges interfere with proper draining, rendering it more expensive by making it more circuitous; and as neat and regular husbandry is always the more profitable, and as a crowd of blackened stumps sticking up in a field must entail the reverse, so must the farmer's profits be propo.

tionally lessened, to say nothing of the ungainly appear ance which they must present in a cultivated field. Besides forest land, however, the emigrant may obtain abundance of open pasture-ground, upon which he may either depasture sheep and cattle, or plough it up for the growth of grain.

Oxen are commonly employed in the plough, this animal being thought safer than the horse, where many Toots encumber the ground; but it is much slower, and costs more to feed than the horse does. Potatoes are eagerly cultivated in Van Diemen's Land, and it is said that they are equal to those produced in any other country in the world. They are exported in considerable quantities, along with grain, to the Australian colonies, to New Zealand, and also to Rio Janeiro, and are preferred to those grown in the above countries. In spite of the inhabitants being able to export grain, it still maintains a very high price in the island. The Hobart Town prices current states wheat to be from 10s. to 11s. per bushel; oats, 6s.; hay from £5 to £7 per ton; potatoes from £7 to £7, 10s. per ton.

The management of sheep and wool is much the same in Van Diemen's Land as in Australia, and a description of it need not here he repeated. To show the progress which this branch of industry is making in the country, it may be stated, that the amount of wool exported in 1836 was 1,983.786 lbs., and in 1837 this had increased to 2,453,610. From all we can learn, the increase of stock in Van Diemen's Land is much the same as in New South Wales, namely, 80 per cent., and the loss from deaths, &c., about 5 per cent.

Besides the growing of wool, there is another exceed ingly promising source of wealth open to the settler-this is the dairy, which seems to be strangely neglected in the colony, although the demand for this species of produce is great, and the prices even extravagantly high; butter readily bringing 2s. 6d. to 3s. per pound. and colonial cheese 1s. to 1s. 3d. per pound. Yet, with all its vast extent of rich pasturage, and its innumerable flocks and herds, Van Diemen's Land imports both of these articles from New South Wales and the Cape of Good Hope. Indeed in the former country, there is more than one person who, wisely devoting themselves to this profitable branch of farm-produce, are rapidly realizing fortunes. Any person, therefore, going out with a thorough knowledge of dairy matters, would assuredly find his account in it. The cattle in Van Diemen's Land are certainly much inferior in general to what they are in this country, and therefore a similar return as to quantity could not be expected, but still that return would be amply sufficient to realize a very handsome yearly profit to the dairyman. The person going out there, or indeed any other who intends grazing cattle, would do well to take with him a quantity of English grass-seeds of various kinds, and particularly Dutch clover, which, when once settled, he should always carry about with him, sprinkling it here and there as he goes over his pasture-lands, as the sameness of the grasses in Van Diemen's Land, notwithstanding their richness, has been found injurious to the health of the cattle. On reaching his destination, he will learn that a little salt also, placed in situations where it may be at once kept dry and be within the reach of his cattle, will be exceed ingly beneficial to them.

The manner of feeding and rearing cattle is in every respect exactly the same in Van Diemen's Land as in England and Scotland, and their farming is also nearly the same, differing only in so far as a greater degree of heat in summer requires that it should. There is an idea gone abroad. that all the good land in the island is already in the possession of settlers; but this report is incorrect: there are many millions of acres of fertile country still to dispose of. Probably by much the greater part of the best situated lands, in so far as a contiguity,

to market or to points of embarkation is concerned, is already in the possession of private persons; but there 14 much valuable ground in the interior unoccupied, particularly a fine newly-discovered tract at the back of Mount Wellington, which will alone afford excellent locations to all who may seek them for some years to come.

A recent writer in the Colonial Magazine, Mr. David Burd, a settler in Van Diemen's Land, says, that the spots occupied form a mere belt along the valley of the Derwent, and that there is abundance of land in other parts which has not been even surveyed. "There is much land, too, which has been despised for its sandy surface, but a stiff clay generally lies beneath, and it is well known what trenching such ground effects. There are other spots, covered with large surface stones, almost approaching to rocks, that, from the grievous want of labour, it becomes almost impossible to convert to a fitness for agricultural purposes, although, when so converted, they have yielded a most liberal return.” Land is sold in Van Diemen's Land by public auction, in lots of one square mile, or 640 acres, at an upset price of 12s. per acre.

The demand for mechanics is equally great in Van Diemen's Land as in Australia, and the encouragement the same. The description of mechanics most in demand here are coopers, ship and house carpenters, cabinetmakers, joiners, wheelwrights, brickmakers, sawyers, quarriers, stone-cutters, and masons. The wages which these receive vary from 5s. to 8s. per day, according to the ability of the workman. Living is said to be higher here than in New South Wales, but from all the inforination we have been able to procure, articles do not appear to he dearer in the one place than in the other. Beef sells at from 5d. to 8d. per lb.; mutton, 5d. to 6d.; veal, 8d.; ham, 10d. to 1s.; bread, 1s. 6d. per 4 lb. loaf; oatmeal, 6d. per lb.

Farm-servants and labourers are also greatly wanted in the colony, and readily obtain employment on good terms. Shepherds and good ploughmen receive from £15 to £25 per annum, with ample provisions, providing they be trustworthy, and well acquainted with their professions. Common labourers generally receive about Is. per day with provisions.

Both the mechanic and labourer should be informed, also, that the colonists pay as little in money to any of their workmen as they possibly can, always stipulating for a portion of their wages being taken in produce. This does not apply so much to their principal towns, such as Sydney, Hobart Town, Launceston, &c.; but in the country it is the universal practice. Money, in short, is an exceedingly scarce commodity in the colony, and its place is as far as possible supplied with the produce of the soil.

The following announcement, relative to the conveyance of tree emigrants from Britain to Van Diemen's Land, has recently been issued by the Colonial Secretary:-"1. That the sum of £40 be paid towards the defraying the passage of a man and his wife (and children under three years of age), provided the ages of the married couple do not exceed on embarkation thirty-five years respectively. 2. That the sum of £19 be paid towards defraying the passage of each female emigrant above eighteen years of age, and not exceeding thirty-five years, on arrival. 3. That the sum of £18 be paid towards defraying the passage of each female domestic above the age of seventeen years, and not exceeding thirty-five years, on arrival. 4. That the sum of £7 be paid for the passage of each child from three to ten years of age, and of £12 for lads between the ages of ten and eighteen, and females between ten and seventeen, respectively, for whose parents or parent the rate of bounty specified in No. 1. may be allowed. 5. That there be alved to the master of each vessel bringing out emi