In the case of New South Wales a sum of £724,733 was spent on immigration before the inauguration of the General Loan Account, but it is not included in the above table. The total expenditure on immigration in the states comprising the Commonwealth was, therefore, £4,117,186, and for Australasia, £6,265,045.

The subjoined table shows the expenditure per inhabitant on the basis of the figures given in the table on page 1045 ::

EXPENDITURE BY THE GOVERNMENT AND LOCAL BODIES.

The question of Local Government is dealt with in another chapter. It is well, however, to give here a statement of the total amount which passes through the hands of the general and local governments. The sum can in no sense be taken as the cost of governing the various states; as will appear from page 1013, this may be taken as £16,894,874 for the six Commonwealth states, or £20,936,328 for the whole of Australasia.

The total sum expended by the general and local governments of the Commonwealth states during the year 1901-2 was £41,465,629, or £10 16s. 5d. per head, and for Australasia £51,969,820, or £11 4s. 9d. per head. Of these large sums, £29,240,334, or £7 12s. 7d. per inhabitant, was spent by the general governments of the six Commonwealth states from their revenues, and £9,443,130, or £2 9s. 4d. per inhabitant, from loans; the local expenditure-exclusive, of course, of a sum equal to the Government endowment-was £2,782,165, or 14s. 6d. per inhabitant. For the six Commonwealth states and New Zealand the

expenditure by the general government from revenue was £35,155,249. or £7 12s. Od. per inhabitant, and from loans £12,728,062, or £2 15s. 1d. per inhabitant; while the local expenditure, exclusive of government endowment, amounted to £4,086,509, or 17s. 8d. per inhabitant.

The following table shows the general, loan, and local expenditure for each state

The expenditure per inhabitant, under the same classification, will be found below. The distribution of the expenditure for New South Wales, between general and local government, is to some extent misleading, as nearly 40 per cent. of the population live outside the boundaries of the municipalities:

1049

ITi

COMMERCE.

Tis reasonable to expect that the trade of the states which now form the Commonwealth of Australia, and the colony of New Zealand would increase as quickly as the population; but as a matter of fact its growth for many years was much more rapid, and at the present time the total commerce of Australasia per head of population is exceeded by that of no country except Belgium, half of whose trade consists of goods in course of transit to and from the north-western and central parts of the continent of Europe. Below will be found a statement of the trade of Australasia for various periods since the year 1825, prior to which date no information is available :-

It will be seen that the average value of trade per inhabitant increased by £1 17s. 1d. during the twenty years extending from 1871

to 1891, of which the period from 1881 to 1891 accounted for no less than £1 2s. 4d. This, however, does not show the full extent of the growth in trade, for the prices of produce-especially of wool, which has been the staple product since very early years-had fallen heavily during the same period. From 1891 till 1894, the trade of Australasia seriously declined, a state of affairs partly brought about by the continued fall in prices and partly resulting from the financial crisis of 1893. Since 1894, however, as shown by the table, the value has steadily increased, reaching its maximum in 1901 with à sum of £167,663,713, the largest total yet recorded, and thus proving that the states have now shaken off to a great extent the ill effects of the period of depression.

The following series of tables shows the distribution of the total trade of Australasia, and also of the Australian Commonwealth, for the years 1881, 1891, and 1901, with the average value per head of population. The first table represents the imports :

The values of the total exports for the same years were as given

below:

----

The total trade, similarly classified, was as follows:

The point most notable in this series of tables is the very marked impetus which the trade of South Australia received during the period 1881-91-a trade of £64 3s. 4d. per inhabitant, the value transacted by that state during 1891, being almost without parallel in any important country. This huge trade was, however, not drawn altogether from its own territory, for in 1891 more than £5,731,000, or about £17 15s. per inhabitant, and in 1901, £2,589,188, or £7 2s. 7d. per inhabitant, was due to the Barrier District of New South Wales, of which South Australia is the natural outlet; and it must also be remembered that considerable quantities of goods on their way to Broken Hill are entered as imports in South Australia when they arrive in that state, and as exports to New South Wales when they cross the border. Of the total shrinkage of £21 3s. 9d. per head from 1891 to 1901, £7 3s. 3d. must be attributed to the falling-off in the Barrier trade. The large production of the gold-fields is the chief cause of the enormous increase in the trade of Western Australia, which will be noticed when comparing the years 1891 and 1901.

The trade of New South Wales in 1891 was valued at no less than £51,327,417. Five years later, owing in great measure to the same influences as affected the trade of Australia generally, the total had fallen to £43,571,859; but for 1901, the last year shown in the table, the total stood at £54,279,342, the largest amount yet recorded. In 1901, the returns for imports, exports, and total trade are in every