Copy of a Report by Walter Mantell, Esq., on the Right of the Ngatitoa to dispose of Land, North of Kaiapoi.

In making the following Report, I have the advantage of the information contained in Lieutenant Servantes's Report on the subject, dated Auckland, 4th September, in which he states the claims of the Ngatitoa.

The grounds on which the Ngaitahu claim compensation, as stated in my letter to the Private Secretary, dated Akaroa, 21st September, 1848, are:—

• "First,—That the land was never occupied by the Ngatitoa.
• "Secondly,—That the Ngaitahu have never ceased to live at, or near the disputed land.
• "Thirdly,—That subsequently to the last inroad of the Ngatitoa, the Ngaitahu successfully conducted an expedition against that tribe, which was never avenged."

These were more fully stated In a letter of Matiaha Tiramorehu, published some time since in the New Zealand ectator.

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Regarding the Wairau, as having by Native custom become the property of the Ngatitoa, I restrict my remarks to lands south of it (to Kaiapoi), and, in so doing, most state a third view of the case. That this land was, on the assertion of British supremacy in 1840, waste, unoccupied; and belonged neither to the tribes who, in an expedition for revenge and pounamu (not land) abandoned it after destroying the inhabitants; nor to the small and scattered remnant of those inhabitants who, but for the arrival of Europeans would not for many generations have had land, or been able to occupy it, but possessed a portion of the vast tracts in the Middle Island, which have no owner but the Crown. Of these three claims, that of the Crown (setting aside the purchase from the Ngatitoa) is in my opinion the only valid one.

If the case rest between those of the Ngaitahu and Ngatitoa, I must, with equal confidence, give my opinion in favour of the former, as they are by the precedent established by Captain Fitzroy, in the repurchases at New Plymouth, and which the Ngaitahu have more than once quoted in support of their demands.

In any case, Matiaha Tiramorehu, and not Tikao and the other Natives, whose names he has attached to the enclosed letter, is the principal claimant.