218

440

His Grace
The Duke of Newcastle K.G.
&c. &c. &c.

grateful thanks to your Grace
for your authoritative confirmation
of the views which I had already
formed and acted upon, as
to the constitution of the Legislative
Council in this Colony. Your
Grace's lucid exposition of the
intentions of Her Majesty's Government
will enable me to settle
without difficulty any further
questions which may be raised
on this subject.

I have &c.
Signed / G.F. Bowen.

No. 20.

Government House,
Brisbane, Queensland
16th April 1861.

My Lord Duke,

A great impulse has
naturally been given to the
existing projects for the cultivation
of cotton in Queensland by the
news, which reached Australia
by the last mail, of probable
disturbances in the United States
of America, and of consequent
insecurity in the supply of cotton
from that Country.

2. I beg to solicit attention
to the report on the subject
of cotton submitted more than
a year ago, in my despatch
No 11 of 6th January, 1860; and
which your Grace caued to
be

441

be published in the "Cotton Supply
Reported," and in the annual
volume of the Emigration Commissioners.
It is there mentioned that, soon
after my assumption of office
here, I urged the Cotton Supply
Association, (through Mr. Bazley,
M.P. for Manchester,) to send
out forthwith to Queensland an
Agent, empowered to negotiate
with the Colonial Legislature, to
select land for purchase or
lease, and to make all other
arrangements necessary for the
establishment of cotton plantations
on an extensive scale. I further
stated that should the
manufacturing interest in England
do me the honor of adopting
this suggestion, their Agent would,
on his arrival at Brisbane,
receive every personal attention
from myself, and every
facility from my Government
towards carrying out an
object so beneficial both to
the Colony and to the Mother-
Country.

3. From intelligence
received by the March mail,
it appears that the principal
Manufacturers of Lancashire are
at length fully alive to the
peril of their hitherto almost
exclusive reliance, for their
raw material, upon the
Slave States of America. It
is obvious that if my suggestion
had been acted on a year ago,
the