Colonial Despatches

I have to acknowledge your letter of 11th instant, with an extract of a Despatch from the Governor of British Columbia, enclosing a Proclamation to repeal the Proclamation granting privileges to Military and Naval Officers in the acquisition of Lands and to substitute other regulations for those contained in it.

2. When the price of Land was fixed in British Columbia at £1 an acre a remission in money was granted to Military and Naval Officers calculated with reference to that price. When the price was reduced to 4s/2d an Acre that remission was practically increased fivefold. To prevent the evils which would thus be caused the present proclamation substitutes for a remission in money a grant of a fixed extent—commencing with 600 Acres to a Field Officer of 25 years Service and ending with 200 to a Subaltern of 7 years. The Proclamation requires that persons taking advantage of it shall be actually resident on their Land for two years before they can obtain a grant—it excludes Town and suburban Lots from selection—and it requires the Settler to stake out and record with the nearest Magistrate the Land which he claims to occupy. In other respects the Proclamation is with a few unimportant verbal alterations identical with the Proclamation which it repeals.

3. As a general rule it is more convenient to give Military and Naval Officers a remission in money rather than a fixed quantity of Land, because a remission allows them to become purchasers at Sales by Auction when the price may be run up beyond the upset price. But in a Colony where the price is in an unsettled state, as at present in B. Columbia, there is no doubt a difficulty in fixing what the remission should be without the risk of having to alter it so frequently as to introduce confusion and uncertainty into the system. In such a case a fixed quantity is more convenient both to the Government and the Settler. I would accordingly recommend that this alteration of the system should be sanctioned, and that the Proclamation now transmitted by Governor Douglas should be approved in the usual manner.