10,000 tons of pure copper in three years, and even better results were obtained from the Wallaroo and Moonta mines. For some time, the price of copper having fallen, the industry was practically non-existent, but the recent sharp revival has brought about a very different state of things. The two last-named properties are again working to a profit, and many old mines have been revived, and new ones opened in the Far North. Smelting is carried on very economically and profitably near the coast: and large quantities of refractory gold ores from Kalgoorlie have been sent here in preference to Cardiff, though, once on shipboard, their additional freight to Wales would have been of small moment.
There is a public debt of £23,000,000, which is at the rate of £62 per head of the population, and the annual interest-charge is £940,000. About £12,000,000 has been expended in railways and tramways, and there has also been large expenditure in harbour improvements and other public works. The colony bears its heavy burden manfully. There lies before it the hope of a steady and prosperous future; for, with its enormous areas of rich soil, it may expect to support a very large population in comfort, if not in affluence. The present population is about 320,000, but there would be no difficulty in feeding ten times as many in this fertile land. Yet there is no prospect, at present, of assisted immigration. This is a "means of betterment" which fails to appeal just now to the mind of the South Australian working-man. He sees in it, indeed, chiefly a means of increasing competition in his labour market. And upon the whole, the young adventurer, the capitalist, and the farmer who insists on changing his sky, will perhaps be wise if they give South Australia the go-by; not because it is not a
