System of immigration recommended; encouragement for emigration.

Still there can be no doubt, but that the evil complained of is considerable.  It is from this reason, and from my personal knowledge of the southern parts of the colony, that I should rejoice to see its flats and its valleys filled with an industrious population of a better description of farmers.  A hope might then be reasonably indulged, that the Home Government would not be backward in recognising, and in acting upon a principle, the soundness of which has been felt and acknowledged in all ages, but the chief difficulty of which rests in its judicious application.  I allude to a system of emigration.  Sure I am that if it were well organized, and care were taken to profit by the experience of the past in similar attempts, it could not fail to be attended with ultimate success.  The evils resulting from a surplus population in an old community, were never more seriously felt than in Great Britain at the present moment.  Assuming that the amount of surplus population is 2,000,000, the excess of labour and competition thus occasioned by diminishing profits and wages, creates, it has been said, an indirect tax to the enormous extent of 20,000,000 pounds per annum.  It has appeared to many experienced persons, that it is in emigration, we should best find the means of relief from this heavy pressure; particularly if the individuals encouraged to go out to the colonies were young persons of both sexes, from the industrious classes of the community.  Even if no more than three couples were induced to emigrate from each parish in England in ten years, the relief to the springs of industry would be very great.  Besides, the funds necessary for this purpose would revert to the country by a thousand indirect channels.  Persons unacquainted with our Australian colonies, whether Van Dieman’s Land or New South Wales, can form little idea of the increasing demand for, and consumption in them of every species of British manufacture.  The liberal encouragement given by government to every practicable scheme of emigration, and the sum advanced by it towards the expenses of the voyage to the labouring classes, sufficiently indicate the light in which the subject is viewed by the legislature; and the fact that no private family taking out servants to Sydney, has in any one instance been able to retain them, on account of offers more advantageous from other quarters, shows clearly the great demand for labour in the colony.  If I might judge of the feelings of the majority of respectable individuals there, from the assurances of the few, they would willingly defray any parochial expenses attendant on the voyage, provided the services of such individuals could be secured to them for a time sufficiently long to remunerate them for such pavement.  The tide of emigration should be directed to Sydney, Van Dieman’s Land, or Western Australia,