Settlement.

The colonisation of New Zealand may be said to date from the year 1840. In 1887 an association which had for its object the setting-up of a New Zealand land company made unsuccessful application for a royal charter. In 1839 the company was formed without a charter. John Lambton, Earl of Durham, was its governor, and Mr. Joseph Somes was deputy-governor. The ship Tory left England under the company's auspices on the 12th of May, 1839, and arrived in Queen Charlotte's Sound on the 17th of August. Colonel William Wakefield, who was on board as the agent of the company, bought land of the Natives at Port Nicholson, and on the 30th of September the New Zealand flag was hoisted, a royal salute (iced, and formal possession taken in the name of the company. In this month of September the pioneer settlers sailed from Gravesend in four ships—the Cuba, the Aurora, the Oriental, and the Adelaide—bound for Port Nicholson. The Aurora arrived first, on the 22nd of January, 1840. The first settlement, which bore the name of Britannia, was at Pito-one (i.a., end of the beach, now erroneously written Petone). After suffering some inconvenience from a flood consequent on the rising of the Hutt River, the new-comers removed to the present site of the City of Wellington, which was named in honour of England's greatest military commander. The memories of the early days are preserved in such names as Somes Island, Lambton Quay, Tory Street, Cuba Street, Aurora Terrace, Adelaide Road, and Oriental Bay.

The New Zealand flag was not the symbol of royal authority. New Zealand was not then recognised as part of Her Majesty's dominions. In 1769 Captain Cook had taken possession in the name of King George the Third; and in 1787 the commission of Captain Philip, appointing him Governor of New South Wales and its dependencies, so defined the limits of that colony as to include New Zealand. But there were several Acts of the Parliament of Great Britain in which New Zealand was referred to as a foreign land; and King William the. Fourth, having received from a number of Native chiefs a letter begging page 127him to afford them protection against neighbouring tribes and British subjects who had taken up their abode here, Mr. Busby had been sent out in 1832 as British Resident, bearing a letter to the chiefs in which the King was made to address them as an independent people who might be benefited by "the friendship and alliance of Great Britain." The British Resident was regarded as an officer of the Colony of New South Wales. He proposed that the tribes of New Zealand, "in their collective capacity," should have a national flag, and his proposal was approved by the British Government in 1834. It was this flag that was hoisted in 1840 at Britannia.

The Wellington settlers had no legal powers of self-government, and there was among them no representative of the British Government. Further, the company's private purchase of land from the Natives was opposed to the views of the Government of the day. The provision of settled government for British subjects resident in New Zealand, and the ascertaining of their titles to the lands they held, were problems that had been for some time under consideration. In 1836 the missionaries addressed a petition to the Crown, and the London merchants and others concerned in the South Sea trade presented a memorial, directing attention to the state of confusion arising from the haphazard settlement of Europeans here and there upon the coast of New Zealand, and from their relations with the Natives. Captain Hobson, R.N., in command of H.M.S. Rattlesnake, was sent by Governor Bourke, of New South Wales, to protect British subjects, and to report upon the situation, His report, made in August, 1837, excited much interest. In May, 1838, when the Europeans at Kororareka numbered perhaps a thousand, a society called the Kororareka Association was formed for the protection of life and property. In December, 1838, Lord Glenclg officially intimated to Lord Palmerston his opinion that the time had come for the appointment of a British Consul to reside in New Zealand. To this office Captain Hobson was appointed on the 30th of July, 1839, before the Aurora and her sister-ships left England. He was also made Lieutenant-Governor in and over any territory "that is or may be acquired in sovereignty by Her Majesty" in any part of New Zealand. The "former page 128boundaries of the colony of New South Wales "were, by letters patent of the 15th of June, so extended as to comprehend any territory so acquired in New Zealand. In the instructions given to Captain Hobson on the 14th of August, 1839, these words occur: "It is impossible to confide to an indiscriminate body of persons, who have voluntarily settled themselves in the immediate vicinity of the numerous population of New Zealand, those large and irresponsible powers which belong to the representative system of Colonial Government"; and these: "Her Majesty will not acknowledge as valid any title to land which either has been, or hereafter shall be, acquired in that country which is not cither derived from, or confirmed by, a grant to be made in Her Majesty's name and on her behalf."

Captain Hohson, having been sworn in before the Governor of New South Wales, arrived at Kororareka on the 29th of January, 1840, and on the next day issued a proclamation of his assumption of the duties of the office of Lieutenant-Governor, and another proclamation announcing that all claims to land would have to be submitted to the judgment of a Commission, and that any purchase of land made direct from the Maoris after that date would be null and void. Six days after this he met the northern chiefs at Waitangi, and presented for their approval the famous Treaty of Waitangi, of which the three items are—(1) that the chiefs cede their rights of sovereignty to Her Majesty the Queen; (2) that they retain possession of their lands, and yield to Her Majesty the right of pre-emption over any lands they may wish to sell; (3) that Her Majesty extends to the New Zealand Natives her protection, and imparts to them all the rights of British subjects. On the 21st of May, 1840, Lieutenant-Governor Hobson proclaimed the Queen's sovereignty over the North Island by virtue of the Treaty of Waitangi, and over the South Island by right of discovery. On the 11th of August, 1840, Captain Stanley, of H.M.S. Britomart, acting under instructions from Governor Hobson, landed at Akaroa, hoisted the British flag, and held a Court, as a sign of British authority. This step was taken in anticipation of the arrival of French emigrants. On the 15th of August a French frigate entered the harbour, having been four days off the point; and on the page break

Auckland Hospital.

page 12916th a French whaler, with fifty-seven emigrants on board, came in, and found the British flag flying.

On the 16th of November, 1840, New Zealand was created a separate colony, and the proclamation of the change was made in Auckland on the 3rd of May, 1841. To Kororareka, the first seat of government, the name of Russell was given, in honour of the celebrated Whig statesman, Lord John (afterwards Earl) Russell, who then led the House of Commons, Lord Melbourne being Prime Minister. In January, 1841, Governor Hobson removed to Auckland, which he had selected a few months before as the site for the future capital, the area of suitable land for settlement at the Bay of Islands being considered too small. He named it Auckland in honour of Lord Auckland, First Lord of the Admiralty and Governor-General of India. Lord Auckland's family name was Eden. The earliest direct emigrant ships to arrive at Auckland appear to be the Duchess of Argyle and the Jane Gifford, which landed 560 passengers in October, 1842.

The New Zealand Company soon followed up the colonisation of Wellington by a settlement under the name of Petre, at Wanganui. The name of Petre was given to it in honour of Lord Petre, one of the directors of the company, but it has fallen out of use. Almost at the same time a society was formed in the West of England under the name of "The New Plymouth Association." The first settlers sailed from Plymouth on the 19th of November, 1840, in the ship William Bryan, and reached New Plymouth on the 28th of March, 1841.

In February, 1841, the New Zealand Company obtained a charter, and in the same year the company began to settle another district, to which was given the name of Nelson, in honour of the greatest of sea captains. The street names of Nile and Trafalgar commemorate Nelson's great victories, and that of St. Vincent another great victory in which he was largely concerned; the Vanguard was his flagship at the battle of Copenhagen; and such names as Collingwood and Hardy remind us of his famous lieutenants. Captain Arthur Wakefield was the leader of the Nelson settlement. He was one of the victims in the Wairau massacre in 1843.

In 1843 plans were on foot for the establishment of a settlement in New Zealand to consist chiefly of members of the Free Church of Scotland, and of another that should be a southern home for members of the Church of England. But during that year, and for several years after, hostilities between the Natives and the European settlers stood in the way of such projects as these. In 1843 the white population did not amount to 12,000, while the Natives were probably not fewer than 56,000, and in troublous times this disparity tended to check the ardour of intending immigrants. But in 1848 the Eree Church settlement was planted at Port Otakou, which received a new name—Port Chalmers—in honour of the Rev. Dr. Chalmers, the celebrated Scottish divine, and leader of the Free Church party at the disruption. The name of Otakou was transformed into Otago. The chief town was named Dunedin, in honour of the Scottish capital, Dunedin being the Celtic form of Edwin's borough or Edinburgh.^* Captain Cargill, a military officer, was the leader of the Otago colonists.

It was not till 1850 that the Church of England settlement was founded by the Canterbury Association. The leader—John Robert Godley, whose statue stands in Cathedral Square, and whose name is given to the headland on which the lighthouse stands—arrived at Port Cooper in April, 1850. In September, 1850, the first lour ships left Plymouth, and on the 16th of December two of them—the Charlotte Jane and the Randolph—anchored in Port Cooper, a third—the George Seymour—coming in next day, and the Cressy a few days later. The new settlement was named Canterbury, after the cathedral city of Augustine and the page 131southern ecclesiastical province. One of the prominent members of the Canterbury Association was Lord Lyttel-ton, whose seat was at Hagley Park, near Christchurch, in Hampshire. It was thus that Port Cooper became Port Lyttelton, and the new city of the plains received the name of Christchurch. The streets that intersect at right angles in Christchurch and Lyttelton are named after bishops' sees in England, Wales, Ireland, and the colonies, and two of the three squares in Christchurch after the martyr bishops Cranmer and Latimer, the third being Cathedral Square. Originally Victoria Street and High Street, the two diagonal streets, bore the names of Sumner and Whateley, in honour of the Archbishops of Canterbury and Dublin, The name of the Waikirikiri River was changed to Selwyn in honour of New Zealand's first bishop.

Immediately before the passing of the Abolition of Provinces Act, in 1875, the form of government of the colony bore the marks of the separate origins of the several settlements. Auckland, Wellington, Taranaki (New Plymouth), Nelson, Canterbury, and Otago had their several Provincial Councils, or local Parliaments, in subordination to the General Assembly, yet with very considerable powers. Wa-nganui was part of the Province of Wellington. There were three other provinces similarly constituted—Marlborough, Hawke's Bay, and Westland. Marlborough and Hawke's Bay were offshoots from the original settlements of Nelson and Wellington respectively; Westland, the settlement of which originated in the discovery of gold about the year I 1864, was formed out of parts of Canterbury and Nelson. Marlborough is named in honour of the great duke, and the name of Blenheim commemorates his greatest victory. The name of Napier, the chief town of Hawke's Bay, commemorates the successes of Sir Charles Napier, the conqueror of Sindh. The hilly site of the town is called Seinde Island, and the name Meanee refers to the decisive battle of the Sindh campaign. Hastings and Clive, too, are names chosen with reference to the history of India. The street nomenclature of Napier indicates a desire to do honour to great literary names, such as. Shakespeare, Milton, Emerson, Tennyson. Southland, a part of Otago, was for a short time a separate province. Invercargill, its chief town, page 132is named after Captain Cargill, the leader of the Otago settlers.

Westland is not the only part of bhe country where settlement has been greatly promoted by the discovery of gold. There was a large accession to the population of Otago in 1862 on this account, and a similar rush to the Thames a few years later. In all such cases there were many new-comers from the Australian Colonies.

Many English geographical names in New Zealand date back to times prior to the era of settlement. Tasman was off Three Kings Island on the 6th of January, 1643—the Feast of the Epiphany—and it is said that he gave the name Three Kings with reference to the Magi and their visit to Bethlehem. Cook Strait was discovered by Captain Cook in his first voyage of circumnavigation; Endeavour Inlet was named after his ship; Queen Charlotte Sound after the consort of the reigning sovereign, George the Third; Banks Peninsula (then called Banks Island) and Solander Island after Sir Joseph Banks and Dr. Solander, who were naturalists attached to the expedition. Cook's voyages supply the key to the names of Poverty Bay and the Bay of Plenty, of the Bay of Islands, and of Mercury Bay, where he landed to take observations of a transit of Mercury. He named Hawke's Bay after Admiral Hawke, and Mount Egmont after the Earl of Egmont. To the great mountain mass that Tasman bad seen at his first approach to our coast Cook gave the name of the Southern Alps. Hicks Bay was named after Cook's first lieutenant. The Prench explorer D'Urville was the first to take a ship through the French Pass—the Pass of the French, as he called it—between the main land and D'Urville Island. His account of New Zealand as he found it in 1827 is a work of great interest and high authority. Foveaux Strait was discovered in the early part of this century by Captain Stewart, engaged in the seal-fishery, and his name was therefore given to the southern island.