The Daily Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1861-01-12 00:00:00

COTTON IN QUEENSLAND.

The following letter has been addressed by T. M.
Mackay, Esq., of this town, to the editor of the Times :
The secession of South Carolina marks the impend-
ing disruption of the United States of America, and
along with it the possible unhinging of the Negro mind
in the slave States, a contingency which might produce
tremendous misery in our manufacturing districts. It
is, therefore, high time to make our casts in every direc-
tion for the cultivation of the cotton-plant, and I look
upon the covenant in the treaty with China for legali-
sing emigration a most Providential arrangement in
furtherance of this object. Sir Charles Nicholson, than
whom no higher opinion can be cited, writes me in
reference to Queensland of follows : '

"The capabilities of Queensland are unsurpassed—
perhaps scarcely equalled—by those of any other colony,
comprising an immense area of magnificent pastoral and
alluvial lands ;itis on the table-land of the interior,
and en the alluvial banks of the rivers, fitted alike for
sheep farming and the growth of all tropical produce.
The river Fitzroy is the largest navigable stream yet
discovered in Australia ; the tide rises at the township
of Rockhampton (50 miles from the seat) 14 feet, and
there is no bar to its mouth ; it receives a number of
affluents, such as the Dawson, the Travis, the Coquil,
and several others, all the valleys of which contain
auriferous deposits in greater or less quantity.
" I also believe that before long a settlement will be
formed at the head of the Gulf of Carpentaria, that great
Mediterranean lake, which will afford us such a ready
transit to India and the Dutch colonies. .

" You see how sanguine I lain as to the avenir ' of
the new colony."
This is very encouraging for the cost of bringing
coolies from China to Moreton Bay or Port Curtis
would only be a few pounds a-head during the favour-
able monsoon, and a beginning could be made at once.
Already one or two farmers have been raising small
quantities of cotton, and its quality is excellent, but this
is a cultivation for which the European emigrant is not
a match, and with the countless millions of Chinese
ready to work for a small wage, it would be madness to
think of any other class of labour.
I hope the Manchester Growing Association will turn
its attention to this new field without any further delay.
It can be tested on a sufficient scale for a moderate
outlay, and, if successful, the result would be incaculable

THE LATE ACCIDENT ON THE LONDON AND NORTH-
WESTERN RAILWAY.—A most remarkable instance of
the benefit of accidental insurance has occurred in the
above accident. A gentleman named Kelly was found
under the first-class carriage in which he had been
travelling, which had broken 'away from the rest of the
train near Primrose-bill Tunnell. He was dead and
fearfully mutilated, and a wife and six children were at
once plunged from comparative affluence into misery, as
his income was at an end with his life. Before com-
mencing the journey, however, he had taken one of the
insurance tickets of the Railway Passenger Assurance
Company, for which he paid only 6d., and enclosed it in
an envelope to his wife. By this trifling outlay he has
secured the large sum of £l,OOO for his bereaved family,
who would otherwise have been left destitute.