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on the 31st December - when I fear the Colony will be in debt at least $50,000
if no land sale takes place.
9.
In reference to that point, the recent extensive fire in the Chinese Quarter has diverted the capital that might have been expended on the purchase of land in that neighborhood, to rebuilding 136 houses on the space unfortunately cleared. This calamity therefore, combined with the general dearth of money in the present depressed condition of trade, renders it highly inexpedient to offer any Government land for Sale this year.
Vide Governor to Secretary of State, 155 of 24 November 1866.
The $40,000 of Revenue anticipated under that head will not be forthcoming, whilst, although the Commission of Inquiry on the mint has not yet reported, there is so little likelihood of the estimated profit, or any considerable fraction of it being realized from the mint next year, that the total deficiency of $100,000 on the estimated Revenue under those two heads only, between this and the end of 1867, is a contingency too probable to be safely pushed on one side. Therefore, for the present, it appears to me more prudent to act as though such deficiency were a certainty, and even if further retrenchment be necessary, it must be carried out.