No. 19.
J. W. Hamilton, Esq., to the Chief Commissioner of Land Purchase Department.

Sir,—

I have the honor to report, for His Excellency's information, that I have this day obtained the surrender to the Crown from the Maoris of their remaining possessions on Banks' Peninsula.

The skill with which Mr. Commissioner Johnson's previous negotiations were conducted had left me an easy task to perform. But, without the influence which Paora (Native Assessor) and the principal Maoris of Rapaki, Port Levy, and Kaiapoi, lent towards the settlement of this land question, it would probably have remained open for many years to come.

The Government are indebted to the Rev. Mr. Aldred, of the Wesleyan Mission, for the kindness with which he has lent his services as an Interpreter, and undertaken a tedious and troublesome journey to Akaroa, at a season when he could ill spare the time for it. No other competent Maori scholar can be found in this Province.

The arrangement with the Maoris is based on Mr. Johnson's Memorandum of 14th August last. They insisted however on retaining 400 acres for a reserve at Wairewa (Little River), and unanimously rejected, in the most positive terms, the £150 offered as payment, unless this reserve were to be made, as well as that at Onuku and Wainui.

The boundaries of the Reserves have been provisionally agreed to. They are to be finally decided upon on the ground itself:—and Mr. Davie, of the Surrey Department, who has been present at the meetings with the Maoris, is to survey them as soon as the lines are cut through the forest. I shall proceed to-morrow upon this service; owing, however, to the density of the forest, the mountainous character of the country, and the necessity for proceeding by water to the several reserves, it will be necessary to remain ten days or a fortnight in this neighborhood.

The crops new standing on lands not included in the reserves, are to be gathered in before any act of occupation is to be allowed to settlers.

I request leave to call your special attention to this fact;—and that you will move His, Excellency, previous to the signing of any Crown Grants for portions of this recent purchase, to cause the insertion of a condition guarding the Maori wheat crops to the end of March, and their potato crops to the end of May, 1857: or perhaps the Canterbury Land Department should be required to certify that no land so cropped is included in any Crown Grants sent up for His Excellency's, signature.

The Kaiapoi question I shall be unable to undertake till the end of January, when Mr. Aldred will be able to spare time for it. He apprehends no difficulty with it. I find, however, that Natives of Kaikoura, 80 miles north, are interested in it, and their consent will be indispensable.

In illustration of the forbearance the Maoris exercise towards us when trespassing on their land, I may observe that the whole of this newly purchased tract has long been let by the Crown, and occupied by cattle and sheep runs, and part of it positively sold as freehold. And it is a fact worthy of notice that so early as the year 1850, when the Canterbury Association's Surveyors first crossed the Ashley (Rakahauri), the Kaiapoi Natives complained to me that the land north of it had never been sold by them. The Kaikoura Maoris had previously asserted the same thing to me. I represented the matter officially to the New Zealand Company's Chief Agent. But until Mr. Johnson's arrival here no official enquiry into the case seems ever to have been made.