ny different provincial districts. Only very
gradually could these be assimilated, and it was not until the year
1892 that one land act could be said to contain the law on the
subject, and to be equally applicable to all New Zealand. In the
meantime the statute-books of 1877, 1878, 1883, 1885 and 1887 bore
elaborate evidence of the complexity of the agrarian question, and the
importance attached to it. On it more than on any other difference
party divisions were based. Over it feelings were stirred up which
were not merely personal, local, or sectional. It became, and over an
average of years remained, the matter of chief moment in the Colony's
politics. Finance, liquor reform, labour acts, franchise extension may
take first place in this or that session, but the land question, in
one or other of its branches, is always second. The discussions on it
roused an enduring interest in Parliament given to no other subject.
The Minister of Lands ranks with the Premier and the Treasurer as one
of the leaders in every Cabinet. Well may he do so. Many millions of
acres and many thousands of tenants are comprised in the Crown leases
alone. Outside these come the constant land sales, the purchases from
the Maori tribes, and in recent years the buying back of estates from
private owners, and the settlement thereof. These form most, though
not all, of the business of the Minister of Lands, his officers, and
the administrative district boards attached to his department. If
there were no land question in New Zealand, there might be no Liberal
Party. It was the transfer of the land from the Provinces to the
central Parliament in 1876 which chiefly helped Grey and his
lieutenants to get together a democratic following.

[Illustration: A NEW ZEALAND SETTLER'S HOME

Photo by WINCKLEMAN]

Slowly but surely the undying agrarian controversy passed with the
Colony's progress into new stages. In the early days we have seen the
battle between the "sufficient price" of Gibbon Wakefield and the
cheap land of Grey, the good and evil wrought by the former, the wide
and lasting mischief brought about by the latter. By 1876 price had
ceased to be the main point at issue. It was agreed on all hands that
town and suburban lands parted with by the Crown should be sold by
auction at fairly high upset prices; and that rural agricultural land
should be divided into classes--first, second, and third--and should
not be sold by auction, but applied for by w