The Sun.
London, England, 1859-10-19 00:00:00

AUSIRALI.AN COLONIES.

The growing wealth, prosperity, and impertanee
of the Australian Colonies form one of the most in-
teres(ing and gratifying features of the present
time. The checks which they hive occasionally
experienced seem to have rendered their ()ward
”rog,ress er4 the more sure and solid. From each
proofs of energy and enter-
prise, and of the success which waits upon these
qualities, arc showered upon us by every mail.
Sixty years ago the c )lony of Victoria had not been
discovered, and even after colonisation had nomi-
nally commenced so much neglected was it, that
the population two-and-twenty years ago numbered
only 500 scads. It now amouets to between five
and six hundred thousand, and is steadily in-
creasing. The productive and trading. capacity of
the colony may be estimated from the fact that. the
aggregate exports from Victorian ports in the first
half of the present year reached thirteen million
stealing, and- that during the last four years the
shipments ur gold produced there hava ranged from
ten to twelve millions annually. Its consuming
capacity is attested by the magnitude of the im-
ports, which in the first half of the present year are
stated at an aggregate of £13,500,000, although
allowance must of course be made for the amount
transhipped to other markets. The ordinary re-
venue of Victoria for the year ending the 30th of
June last exceeded three millions sterling. In proof
of the vast extent of its general business, reference
may be made to the aggregate results of the re-
turns furnished by the nine Joint Stock Banks
existing in the colony. The active circulation
amounted to close upon £2,000,000, and the de-
posits to no less than £6,332,020, of which
£4,902,578 bore interest. The coin and bullion
held amounted to £2,766,344, and the paid-up capi-
tal of the nine establishments to £5,853,134.
The other colonies of the Australian group have
made relatively less rapid progress, yet have al-
ready achieved a degree of prosperity otherwise
unparalleled in the annals of colonisation. The
official estimate of the produce of the Customs at
Sydney for. the current year reaches the sum of
£572,250. The Sydnep Mint is coining at the rate
of £1,500,000 a year. From the Ist of January to
the middle of August the colony has shipped, al-
most exclusively to England, in addition to gold
and a large quantity of other produce, 37,303 bales
of wool, being 5,456 bales more than the quantity
shipped in the same period from Melbourne. In
the year 1858 the supply of wool imported into
Great British from British possessions, principally
from Australia, amounted to 69 per cent. of the en-
tire coantity imported. Many of the banking and
steam navigation companies in New South Wales
are paying dividends at the rate of ten and twenty
per cent, per annum. Of the liberality of spirit by
which the Legislature is actuated no further proof
is needed than their grant of .+:50,000 a year for the
establishment of another mail service, and of £20,000
for the purchase of the flock of alpacas lately intro-.
dined. For one year-1858—the colonial Legisla-
ture authorised the expenditure of no less a sum
than £BO,OOO on the main trunk lines of road. The
large and increasing production of coal now forms
one of the most important elements of the prosperity
of this colony.

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