In a despatch dated August 14, 1839, the Marquis of Normanby advises Captain Hobson, R.N., afterwards first Governor of New Zealand, of his appointment to the office of her Majesty's Consul for New Zealand, and he is instructed to obviate the danger of the acquisition of large tracts of country by mere land jobbers, and advises him it will be his duty to obtain, by fair and equal contracts with the natives, the cession to the Crown of such waste lands as may be progressively required for the occupation of settlers; and all such dealings are to be conducted on principles of sincerity, justice, and good faith.

Replying thereto, Hobson writes:— "I perceive no distinction is made between the Northern and Southern Islands, although their relations with Great Britain and respective advancements towards civilisation are essentially different." He adds: "With savages in the Southern Islands it appears scarcely possible to observe even the form of a Treaty, and there I might be permitted to plant the British flag. The Declaration of the Independence of New Zealand was signed by the united chiefs of the Northern part of that Island, and it was to them alone his late Majesty's letter was addressed on the presentation of their flag, and neither of these instruments had any application whatever to the Southern Island."

Normanby replies under date August 15, 1839:— "As you correctly suppose, my remarks apply to the North Island only. Our information respecting the South is too imperfect to admit of my addressing you any definite instructions as to the course to be pursued. If the country is really, as you suppose, uninhabited except by a very small number of persons in a savage state, incapable, from their ignorance, of entering intelligently into any Treaty with the Crown, I agree with you that the ceremonial of making such an engagement would be a mere delusion and pretence, which ought to be avoided. The circumstances noticed in my instructions may, perhaps, render the occupation of the South Island a matter of necessity or of duty to the natives. The only chance of an effective protection will probably be found in the establishment by Treaty, if that be possible, or, if not, then in the assertion, on the ground of discovery, of her Majesty's sovereign rights over the island. But, in my inevitable ignorance of the real state of the case, I must refer decision in the first instance to your discretion; indeed, by the advice you will receive from the Governor of New South Wales."

[Hobson recognised the dilemma, and in May following, pursuant to No-manby's instructions, took formal possession of the Middle Island, the proclamation thereof dated May, 1840, bearing that it had been so taken possession of "in virtue of the right of discovery." On June 17 another proclamation is made by Hobson, bearing that said territory, having been "ceded in sovereignty by different independent chiefs to Her Majesty, we have taken solemn possession thereof, etc." This second proclamation does not appear to have been an amendment of, but in supplement to the first. Having doubts how far possession of the Middle Island included Stewart Island, Hobson on the date mentioned dispatched H.M.S. Herald to the latter, when the ceremony of taking formal possession was repeated. Having doubts about the rights of discovery in the second proclamation, he introduced cession of the Native Rights, evidently relying on the Treaty of Waitangi, if the point came to be questioned.].

Government House, Sydney, 9 Feb., 1840.—My Lord,—In my despatch of the third January last, I reported to your Lordship the arrival in Sydney of Captain Hobson, in Her Majesty's ship Druid, commanded by Lord John Churchill, and that arrangements were in progress to forward him to New Zealand in Her Majesty's ship Herald. I have now further to inform your Lordship that the Herald sailed for the Bay of Islands on the 19th ultimo, page 37having on board Lieutenant-Governor Hobson and his suite. A vessel (the Westminster) has been hired to carry down supplies to Captain Hobson, and that she will be ready to sail as soon, as I shall have received from Captain Hobson the first accounts of his proceedings. I enclose for your Lordship's information, copies of proclamations, which by the advice of my Executive Council, I issued immediately on Captain Hobson's departure from New South Wales. The third proclamation was issued in order to put an end, as far as possible, to the speculations in New Zealand lands, which were then being openly carried on in Sydney; and I should explain to your Lordship, that for some few days after Captain Hobson's arrival, an auction of lands in New Zealand having been advertised to be held in Sydney, I sent an officer of this Government to warn all persons intending to become purchasers that they would do so at their own risk; a warning which had the immediate effect of stopping the sale.—I am, etc., Geo. Gipps, Governor.

[The auction sale of land advertisement referred to is published in the Morning Herald (Sydney), and reads as follows:—New Zealand Estate—Mr S. Lyons is instructed to sell by auction at his temporary rooms, George street, Sydney, March 27, 1840, at 11 o'clock precisely—12 important estates on the banks of the river Tetowis in the middle island of New Zealand, having a frontage of one mile to the river by 20 miles in depth, and containing 20 sections or 12,800 acres each lot. The Tetowis river is of considerable magnitude, which empties itself into Foveaux Straits, and is within three or four miles of the secure and well-known harbour of the Bluff, in and around which several whaling stations have for some time been establised. It is likewise in the vicinity of Jacobs River, where several large estates have been lately purchased and improvements commenced. In fact the fine harbours on this coast, the richness of the soil, and level character of the country, leave no doubt but that it will become one of the most thriving positions in New Zealand. This land was purchased from Tewiki (Tuhawaiki) chief of the southern parts of New Zealand, and duly conveyed by Deed of Feoffment, dated the 8th day of December, 1838, and therefore comes within the proclamation. The original title deeds are left with the auctioneer for inspection, and the purchaser will receive a conveyance in conformity there with. The buyers will be let into immediate possession of the land upon payment of the purchase money. Terms at sale. For further information see under "Mataura."]

Copy of Treasury Minute, 19th July, 1839, sanctioning an advance from the Revenue of New South Wales, on account of the officer about to proceed to New Zealand, as Consul, etc., (return to an order of the House of Commons). My Lords have again before them a letter from Mr Stephen, of 13th ult., adverting to circumstances which had appeared to the Marquis of Normanby, and to Viscount Palmerston, to force upon Her Majesty's Government the adoption of measures for establishing some British authority in New Zealand for the government of the Queen's subjects, resident in, or resorting to those islands, and with that view proposing that a British Consul should forthwith be despatched to New Zealand; and that, upon cession being obtained froms the native chiefs of the sovereignty of such territories therein as may be possessed of British subjects, those territories should be added to the colony of New South Wales, as a dependency of that Government; and likewise proposing that the officer about to proceed to New Zealand as Consul should be appointed Lieutenant-Governor of this, dependency; and that the expenses which must necessarily be incurred for his passage, and for the purchase of articles which will be required for his immediate use in the public service, or for presents to the native chiefs, should be defrayed by advances from the funds of the Government of New South Wales, to be hereafter repaid from such revenue as may be raised within the ceded territory, by virtue of ordinances to be issued for the purpose by the Governor and Council page 38of New South Wales, from which revenue also all other expenses relating to the Government of this dependency are to be provided for. My Lords also refer to the opinion of Her Majesty's officers of the law, that any territory in New Zealand, of which the sovereignty may be acquired by the British Crown may lawfully be annexed to the colony of New South Wales, and that the legislative authority of New South, Wales, created by the Act of 9th George IV., chap. 83, may then be exercised over British subjects inhabiting that territory; and: my Lords likewise refer to the provision made in the estimate for Consular services, now before the House of Commons, for the salary of a Consul at New Zealand. My Lords also read their minute of 21st ult., expressing their concurrence in opinion with her Majesty's Secretary of State as to the necessity of establishing some competent control over British subjects in the New Zealand Islands, and further stating that this board would be prepared upon the contemplated cession in sovereignty to the British Crown of territories within those islands, which have been or may be acquired by her Majesty's subjects, under grants from the different chiefs, being obtained, to concur in the proposed arrangements for the Government of the ceded territory, and for raising a revenue to defray the expenses of the establishment it would be necessary to maintain for this purpose. Write to Mr Stephen, and, in reply to his further communication of 4th inst., now before this board, request that he will signify to the Marquis of Normanby my Lords' sanction for the advance by the Agent-general for New South Wales from funds appertaining to the Government of that colony, of the amount required to defray the expenses of the officer proceeding to New Zealand, as specified in the Estimate furnished by Captain Hobson, and submitted to my Lords in Mr Stephens's letter, with the understanding that such advance is to be repaid from the revenues of the territory it is proposed to annex to that Government. But Mr Stephen will at the same time state to the Marquis of Normanby that as the proceedings about to be adopted in regard to New Zealand, in the event of failure of the anticipated cession of sovereignty and of the contemplated revenue, may involve further expenditure from the funds of this country beyond the salary of the Consul, already included in the Estimate of Consular services for the current year, my Lords have considered it necessary that the arrangement should be brought under the cognisance of Parliament; and they have therefore directed that a copy of their minute, giving the sanction now notified to Lord Normanby shall be laid before the House of Commons.

Petition From The City Of London.

Petition of the undersigned merchants, bankers and ship-owners of the City of London and others humbly showeth:

That the exclusive British possession of the group of islands commonly called New Zealand is an object of the deepest importance to her Majesty's colonists in Australia, whose great and rapidly increasing trade with each other and with the Mother Country would, in case of war, be at the mercy of a foreign Power established in their neighbourhood, and in the direct tract of Homeward bound vessels, and that the establishment of colonies by more than one Sovereign Power in a country not so large as Great Britain would, to judge from all experience, have a direct tendency to produce wars between the parent States by means of intercolonial jealousies and collisions. That the said islands comprise a territory nearly as large as Great Britain, rich in natural productions, blessed with the happiest climate, intersected by numerous rivers, abounding in convenient harbours, and thinly inhabited by a race of savage tribes, without any regular form of government, continually at war with each other, and, as your petitioners are informed, so destitute of nationality as to have no name in their language for the country that they inhabit. That the said islands (although the northern extremity of one of them page 39may have been seen at a distance by Abel Jansen Tasman in 1642) were, in fact, originally discovered by the illustrious British navigator, Captain Cook, who circumnavigated them in 1769, touched at numerous places, and, in pursuance of a commission from King George the Third, took formal possession of them in the name of the Crown by acts performed in each of the two principal islands. That in the year 1787, when the British Government determined to colonise the barbarous lands discovered by Captain Cook, a Royal Commission was granted to Captain Philip appointing him, in pursuance of the British Sovereignty in possession which Captain Cook had established, to be Captain-general and Governor-in-chief in and over the territory of New South Wales and its dependencies, which territory was described in the said commission as "extending from Cape York (latitude 11 degrees and 37 minutes) to the South Cape (latitude 43 degrees and 30 minutes), and inland to the west-ward as far as 135 degrees east longtitude, comprehending all the islands adjacent to the Pacific Ocean, within the latitudes of the above-named capes." That the islands of New Zealand form part of the territory described in the said commission in the same way as Norfolk Island and Van Dieman's Land, neither of which, any more than New Zealand, was specifically named in the said commission; and that this commission, founded on the previous acts of Captain Cook, which was published to the world, and immediately carried into effect, without impediment or question from any Sovereign Power, constitutes, as your petitioners believe, the sole and sufficient title of the British Crown, as against all foreign Powers, except the natives, to the territories of New South Wales, and to the dependencies thereof, such as New Zealand and Norfolk Island and Van Dieman's Land. That, in pursuance of such British Sovereignty in New Zealand, the Captain-general and Governor-in-chief of New South Wales and its dependencies did, as your petitioners are informed, on the 9th of November, 1814, by public proclamation and by regular commissions of dedimus potestatum, appoint certain persons, some of them being aboriginal natives of New Zealand, to be Justices of the Peace in and for those islands, as a dependency of his government, by name and that the said persons, as well as others subsequently appointed by similar commissions, acted on the commissions within New Zealand, by apprehending offenders against the law of England and sending them as prisoners for trial at the seat of such government in New South Wales. That, by means of the various acts whereby New Zealand had thus come to form part of the British dominions in the Southern Pacific, numbers of persons were encouraged to settle there, and more especially at the Bay of Islands, where missionary settlements were founded in the year 1814; and that, in consequence thereof, the means of administering the law of England by the appointment of natives and settlers as Justices of the Peace, according to the proclamation whereby those appointments were announced, "to protect the natives of New Zealand and the Bay of Islands in their just rights and privileges, as those of any other dependency of the territory of New South Wales," were soon found wholly inadequate to the maintenance of order, and that, while the property and lives of the settlers were insecure, the most atrocious crimes against the natives were committed by the masters of trading vessels and runaway sailors, or convicts who had escaped from New South Wales and Van Dieman's Land, and these evils were found to arise chiefly from the character of the government of New Zealand, as a distinct dependency of the territory of New South Wales, and, of course, the great want of a sufficient authority on the spot. That, in order to put a stop to these evils, an attempt was made in 1835 to place New Zealand under a kind of National Government, by means of forming a confederation of chiefs residing at or near the Bay of Islands, to whom an officer of the British Crown (who had been appointed to reside there) presented a flag, intended to express New Zealand nationality; but that, in point of fact, this attempt to establish a National Government for New Zealand utterly failed, in consequence of the incapacity of the native chiefs to act either as a legislature or am executive, and that, page 40accordingly, the only means by which order has been in any degree maintained in New Zealand down to the time of the latest accounts has been the occasional visits of British ships of war, whose captains have administered a sort of rude justice in the name of the Crown by determining disputes among the settlers, and now and then inflicting punishment on offenders against the law of England. That, notwithstanding the absence of any regular government in New Zealand, the fine soil and climate of the islands, their valuable natural productions, and their admirable position as a centre of maritime trade, have attracted hither several thousands of her Majesty's subjects, including about 1200 persons who have emigrated directly from the United Kingdom during the past year in ten vessels, proceeding from the ports of London, Glasgow, and Plymouth, and that other bodies of persons are preparing to emigrate thither from the United Kingdom during the present year. That frequent and urgent applications have of late years been made to her Majesty's Executive Government, as well as by settlers in the islands and by bodies of British merchants, praying them to establish a proper authority in New Zealand for the protection and restraint both of British subjects and of the native races inhabiting the country, but that all such applications have hitherto been without effect. That, in consequence of the want of a regular authority in New Zealand, emigrants to that country have had no means of acquiring land for settlement except by effecting purchases from the barbarous natives of the country—a practice which is forbidden by every other civilised Government having relations with savages, and which is calculated not only to produce great uncertainty and endless litigation with respect to titles of land, but also to render impossible the adoption of any judicious system in the disposal of waste land by competent authority for the purposes of colonisation; and is also most injurious to the native inhabitants, by preventing any general and systematic reserves of land for their use, so that tribe after tribe is gradually deprived of its ordinary means of subsistence. That it appears by a Minute of her Majesty's Treasury, bearing date 19th July, 1839, that a sort of diplomatic agent has been appointed, with the title of Consul, who has been instructed to obtain cession of sovereignty from the native chiefs, in order that the territory ceded may become a part of the colony of New South Wales, but whose authority to treat appears to be confined to such territories as are possessed by British subjects. That, according to the principles hitherto recognised by colonising States, and which, as your petitioners believe, form a part of the established law of nations, Great Britain, as the discovering Power, has, from the year 1769 downwards, possessed the sole right of acquiring territory from the natives of New Zealand aa against all foreign Powers whatever, and therefore neither the presentation of the national flag to a small number of chiefs in one corner of one of the islands, nor the appointment of a consul, instructed to treat for cession of Sovereignty in any way resemble an abandonment or repudiation of the right of Great Britain to exercise dominion before all foreign Powers, but are to be regarded simply as acts which the Crown has performed for regulating the political relations which it alone is entitled to hold with the native chiefs. That shortly after the departure of the said Consul in her Majesty's ship Druid, and the publication of a portion of his instructions, together with the said Treasury Minute, the public mind in France became suddenly excited on the subject of the acts of the British Government, and the departure of the said colonists from Great Britain, and that the result of this excitement has been the formation of a company, with a capital of one million francs, for forming a settlement in New Zealand, and the despatch of an expedition from Rochfort, charged (in violation, as your petitioners consider, of the law of nations) to effect a settlement at Banks Peninsula, in the South Island; which expedition is reported to have had an armament of forty sailors from the French navy, the aid of money from the French Government, by whom the leaders of the expedition are said to have been instructed to report on the fitness of Banks Peninsula as a place of transportation for convicts, and, at all events, to reserve for the use of the French Government one-fifth of the territory which they page 41might acquire in this part of the British dominions. That, even if France really possessed any right of colonisation, your petitioners would deprecate, in the strongest terms, her proposed establishment of a penal colony, it being evidently impossible that convict discipline can be maintained in the immediate vicinity of native tribes and native settlements; and the escape of the convicts must therefore be anticipated, who, associated with British runaway convicts from Australia, would gradually demoralise the whole country, preclude the possibility of its becoming the resort of respectable British emigrants, and exterminate the native inhabitants by taking part in their wars and teaching them only the vices of civilisation. That the ship in which the said Consul proceeded to his destination has been ordered to leave him there and proceed to China, and the Consul will therefore be destitute of all means not only of repelling foreign aggressions, but of affording any degree of protection to the orderly and well-disposed of her Majesty's subjects; while, under the present circumstances, it appears not at all improbable that hostile collision may take place between settlers from this country and the settlers who have emigrated from France. That unless immediate steps be taken to establish the complete administration of British law in New Zealand, it is greatly to be feared that the large and respectable body of her Majesty's subjects who have recently proceeded thither will be placed in a state of anarchy, and subjected to great evils accordingly. That the state of anarchy in New Zealand, against which no sufficient provision has been made by her Majesty's Government, cannot but be deeply injurious to the helpless natives when placed in contact with settlers from Europe, unrestrained by any law or any other authority than that which they may establish for their own defence. That unless an immediate stop be put to the acquisition of land from the barbarous natives of New Zealand by private persons, the most serious injury will ensue as well to the natives as to settlers from this country, and that it is indispensable to the well-being of all classes of her Majesty's subjects there, and to the future prosperity of the country, that decisive steps should be promptly taken to remedy the evils that have already arisen from the said private acquisitions of land. That, although the said Consul is instructed to act as Lieutenant-governor of any territory of which the Sovereignty may be ceded to him, still that his authority to treat for such cessions is encumbered with restrictions which may deprive it of all or of any considerable effect, inasmuch as possession of the land by British subjects is made a condition precedent of any attempt on his part to obtain cession of Sovereignty rights; and, furthermore, that, according to the said Treasury Minute and Instructions, any territory of which the Sovereignty may perchance be ceded, is to form part of the colony of New South Wales, and to be ruled by the Governor and Council of that colony as a distinct dependency, whereby the numerous evils which have already arisen from the distance between New Zealand and the seat of government cannot be remedied, but will be perpetuated. Your petitioners therefore humbly pray that your honourable House will be pleased to take the premises into your consideration, and by such measures as your wisdom may deem expedient, to preserve these valuable islands to her Majesty's dominion and establish throughout the same regular authority of British law, and a lawful system of colonisation under a distinct and sufficient colonial government. And your petitioners will ever pray, etc.

Colonel Wakefield's Review Of The Situation.

Col. Wakefield reviews the situation at great length in a letter published in The Times (London). He writes:—Besides the evil of conflicting claims to land, there appears to be one very inconvenient circumstance, at least, which will also have arisen out of the repudiation of the sovereignty…. We find by the instructions to Captain Hobson that the question of titles to land is in every case to be determined by a tribunal or court which is to be created by the Legislature of New South Wales. And thus we find the Government in page 42this predicament: that while they repudiate the sovereignty down to the hour of the cession, Captain Hobson declares that the Legislature of New South Wales shall form a tribunal to go into all questions of title arising before there was any British jurisdiction—before any British rights had been established. And, in conjunction with that difficulty, there is another: that the Council of New South Wales is made the supreme Legislature for the new colony of New Zealand. Now, a great jealousy necessarily prevails on the part of an old colony when a new one arises near it and becomes its competitor at Home and abroad, both for capital and labour coming from other places. We know very well that the recent colony of South Australia was regarded with the utmost jealousy by the inhabitants of New South Wales; and if that colony had been subjected to the New South Wales Legislature or to a legislature representing the opinion and feeling of New South Wales, it would have been crushed in its infancy. The danger in this case seems to be that the new colony of New Zealand may come under the absolute power of a neighbouring legislature, the people of which neighbouring colony will regard the new colony with great jealousy and dislike. Another objection to the arrangement is that some at least of the members of the New South Wales Council are among the principal purchasers of land, or land-sharks, in New Zealand! and, therefore, persons have been selected to legislate upon this subject to make a law for the guidance of a commission upon this matter who have themselves a very great interest in defeating any effective measures for withdrawing these large possessions from the hands of persons who have acquired them improperly. That difficulty extends to a number of other matters of legislation, and to show how unfit the Legislature of New South Wales, the Governor and Council of New South Wales, are to make laws for the colony of New Zealand, I will describe a lawless practice with regard to New Zealand which has been going on under their eyes for years, but of which they have never taken any notice, because it happened to be for the interest of the merchants and persons represented in the Council that this practic should go on. The importation of commodities from New South Wales to this country is so great as, to excite surprise whenever it is mentioned. With a population of 120,000, the exports to New South Wales amount to about £1,600,000 a year, and the imports from New South Wales to about £1,200,000 a year. Among these is a very large importation of oil, which is brought into this country as New South Wales oil, paying a very moderate duty. A great part of this oil is, in point of fact, taken off the coasts of New Zealand, and if New Zealand be, as the Government contends that it is, a foreign country, it is foreign oil, and as foreign oil ought to pay a very heavy discriminating duty. The South Sea fishermen in London, and the merchants who fit out vessels for the South Sea in London, send their ships provisioned for three years, at very great cost, to catch fish in the South Sea, and they have to pay a heavy duty, while persons from Sydney employ what are called "shore parties" in New Zealand, who procure the oil at an infinitely less cost, without having to fit out the ship they employ, as the London merchant has to do. They put the oil into a colonial vessel and send it Home as New South Wales oil, gaining, therefore, an enormous advantage over the London merchant who fits out his ship in the Thames. This Legislature of a neighbouring colony, which has been allowing this practice to go on for a number of years, to the great detriment of the legitimate fishermen of the South Sea, is the Legislature which has been selected to govern New Zealand; because we can get at New Zealand, on the principle laid down by the Government of its being a foreign State, in no other way than by making it a dependency of New South Wales and bringing it under the New South Wales Act. This Legislature is now to make laws for New Zealand. Another great objection to that arrangement is the distance between New Zealand and New South Wales. It appears by the published correspondence in Governor Gipp's letter to Captain Hobson, recently laid before the committee, that everything of importance relating to New Zealand is to be done in New South Wales and through New South Wales. The length of the passage one page 43way is about ten days or a fortnight; that is, from New South Wales to New Zealand; but in consequence of the prevalence of westerly winds the passage the other way is very much longer, and sometimes extremely tedious, extending to two months. Another considerable objection to legislating for New Zealand by means of the Council of New South Wales is that there is a great resort of shipping to New Zealand for provisions and water, which is very much encouraged by the absence of port dues. The port dues of Sydney are very heavy indeed. It is for the immediate interest of the New South Wales people to levy heavy port dues in the New Zealand harbours; and the settlers in New Zealand, proceeding from this country to establish their town at Port Nicholson, will be at once subjected to taxation by a distant body having a rival and, perhaps, a contrary interest. There is a point, also, on the other hand, relating to New South Wales itself, upon which New South Wales is likely to be far more injured than it is possible to injure New Zealand by the state of things that seems likely to take place in New Zealand. It is a consideration, growing out of recent circumstances in the West Indies and other places, connected with the supply of labour. If the present state of property be allowed to continue in New Zealand, if all the land which has been sharked be allowed to remain in the hands of the sharks, land in New Zealand will be extremely cheap, and it will be impossible to apply any general system which will make land dear. It will remain extremely cheap, and not only will it remain extremely cheap, but, as it will not come under the supreme authority and be subjected to a general law for the disposal of it, it cannot be sold with a view to the creation of an emigration fund, so that there will be no emigration fund, speaking generally, for supplying New Zealand with labour. What is likely to happen? The capitalist who goes out from England to New Zealand gets his land very cheap, and he looks round him for labourers. There is no emigration fund for this colony, but he finds that New South Wales has an emigration fund, by which labourers are brought to the colony from England, and he will immediately invite the labourer who has been carried out at the expense of the New South Wales colony to come and work for him in New Zealand. That has already been done to a considerable extent. I received only yesterday an account of a number of poor emigrants who had gone out from this country at the public expense of New South Wales, and who were immediately engaged upon their arrival at Sydney by an ex-Wesleyan missionary, who is a landowner and cultivator in New Zealand, to proceed with him to Hokianga, in New Zealand, which they did without hestitation, New South Wales having paid for their importation. The emigration of labourers conveyed to New South Wales by the public funds of that colony to New Zealand for the purpose of supplying that urgent demand for labour will, I believe, go on to a very great extent. Another great evil will take place. The principal production of New South Wales so far resembles the principal production of the West Indies that it requires the employment of a large capital, and the combination of a considerable quantity of labour, in each particular work; I mean in the growth of wool. When the sheep labourer in New South Wales, who assists to produce the wool of that country, has saved enough to induce him to determine to set up for himself, he will never think of setting up as a wool grower, any more than the negro labourer in the West Indies, when he has saved enough out of his wages to set up for himself, will think of setting up as a sugar grower. In neither case is there capital enough. In the one case you must have large mills, boilers, and buildings; in the other case you must have large flocks and a number of shepherds. In such cases the desire of the labourer is to set up for himself as an agriculturist, in a pursuit in which he will provide, by the labour of his family, for the subsistence of his family. Now, in New South Wales, although he is in a country highly adapted for the production of wool and for the creating so very wealthy a society as has been brought into existence there, he is not in a very suitable country for agricultural operations; and it will immediately occur to him that New Zealand, which is not subject to drought, and where the land is much more productive as agricultural land, page 44having rivers and many advantages, is a much better country to live in than New South Wales; and that class of small capitalists, in consequence of the greater cheapness of land in New Zealand and the facilities it affords, will, I believe, emigrate thither to a very great extent. These two sorts of emigration going on together must, I think, have the effect of producing very great injury indeed to New South Wales; all of which would have been prevented if the Sovereignty of this country had never been abandoned. If the principle of the American law had been asserted, and all this land-sharking had been repudiated, and if Parliament had been applied to for a law to place the whole of the waste lands of New Zealand under a proper authority to dispose of them in a proper manner, so as to provide the country with its own emigration fund, and to carry a body of labour there, then the inconveniences which I have recited would not have occurred. In the present state of disorder which prevails upon that subject, it seems impossible that anything like a beneficial system of colonisation, either for New Zealand or the neighbouring colonies, should be adopted; for what prevails now is a system of disorder. The evil appears to me to have arisen directly and obviously from the disinclination of the Government to go to Parliament for necessary authority. Not choosing to do that for reasons which it is not my business to enter into, the Colonial Office has been driven to all sorts of devices and roundabout methods of accomplishing what might have been clone in a very straightforward way, and has been led into all these inconsistencies and difficulties; and how it is to get out of them I cannot conceive. I can state that the colonisation of the country may go on in a very bad way, in a way destructive to the natives and injurious to the neighbouring colonies, and not beneficial to the settlers from England, but how any adequate remedy is to be applied to the present state of disorder I cannot conceive without going to Parliament for the exercise of the supreme power of the Legislature on the whole subject.