The Three Kings Institution.

(To the Editor.)

Sir—Will you allow me space for a few remarks on the articles you have lately published respecting the re-opening of the Three Kings Native Institution? You have evidently been influenced by some parties who have a strong animus against the Wesleyan body, and have induced you to misrepresent the facts of the case, and to scatter broadcast the gravest charges against your neighbours, and this under cover of fervent zeal for destitute children. I feel it to be my duty to enter my protest against the injustice clone to the trustees and the Wesleyan Conference in those articles, especially as I have been appointed to take charge of the institution. The questions you have raised are these:—1. What is the nature and what are the objects of the Trusts referred to? 2. Have the Trusts been faithfully administered? 3. Is the present action of the Wesleyan Conference in harmony with the Trusts?

1. As regards the nature and objects of the Trusts, these are to be ascertained from two sources: from the original grants, taken with Sir George Grey's letter and memo. of May 13, 1853, addressed to the late Rev. Walter Lawry, and setting forth the conditions on which grants of land and money would be made (a copy of which I now enclose). The first grants of land made by Governor Fitzroy were given for the exclusive purpose of a native training institution. I opened that institution and conducted it for several years. I had under my care about 20 young men; and page 12 I affirm that we contemplated at that time nothing beyond this; the idea of a general educational establishment had not entered into our plans. The Institution buildings at Grafton Road were erected by voluntary contributions raised in Auckland, and supplemented by Mission funds, and a grant of £200 per annum was received from the Wesleyan Missionary Society in aid of its operations, extending over a period of ten years. The Institution was publicly opened by Governor Pitzroy; the present Colonial Secretary, Dr. Pollen, with several other gentlemen, were present at the opening service, and can endorse my statement as to the object of the Institution. For a native training institution, then, and for no other object, we received the Grafton Road property, the 192 acres at Three Kings, on which the school buildings were erected, and the allotment in Parliament Street as a site for a native church to be connected with the Institution. The addition of a central school was a subsequent arrangement, and arose out of a proposal made by Sir George Grey, who, on visiting the training institution, said, "You are doing well; I will make yon further grants, and give what aid I can, if you will extend your operations and open a central school." For this object the grants made by Sir George were received on the conditions expressed in the memo. What are these conditions ?—the schools were to be of three kinds: colleges, central schools, primary schools. These were to be open to "Maori half-caste children of the Pacific, and orphans or destitute Europeans, upon such conditions as might be determined by the Auckland District Meeting." The funds granted were to provide education in colleges, central schools, and primary schools, and to "qualify native teachers for the ministry," and to be "administered by the Auckland District Meeting." Annual reports of the state of the distribution of the funds were to be "furnished to the Governor." These, then, were the conditions on which the grants in question were made to the Wesleyan Church.

2. And now, have the Trusts been faithfully kept? You affirm they have not, but "for years have been almost completely disregarded." You speak of "the unquestionable laches of the trustees," and charge them with "for years having steadily dis-regarded the claims and rights of destitute humanity," and "misapplied the funds for purposes entirely foreign to the objects of the Trusts." Sir, these are grave charges to prefer against respectable men, men of known probity and honour in the mercantile circles of Auckland. Surely you ought to have more thoroughly acquainted yourself with the history of the case before you held up those gentlemen to public reprobation. Common courtesy, not to say ordinary candour, not to mention the claims page 13 of justice, required this at your hands. "What has been the course pursued by the trustees in conjunction with the Auckland District Meeting?" "Have the three kinds of schools required been established ?" The Three Kings partook of the nature of both a College and Central School; native teachers and ministers were trained, and as many as 150 pupils were at one time under education and boarded in the institution. A Central School existed at Taranaki, and primary schools were opened at Mokau, Kawhia, Aotea, Raglan, Waipa, Kaipara and Hokianga. "Were the schools open to all the children specified in the memo. ?" Yes, so far as the trustees had funds at command. There were sometimes as many as 24 European children at Three Kings, with Maori and half-castes. Funds were not unlimited, and during the early years the land produced nothing but a few potatoes. Government grants were supplemented by grants from the Wesleyan Missionary Society, which supplied £200 per annum for first four years, and £500 per annum for the next six years; with these means the trustees did what they could. "Were the funds administered as required?" Yes. The different schools were expected to raise all they could on the lands connected with them, and the grants of money were distributed amongst them according to their respective claims. The land at Three Kings was fanned, and a regular account kept of farm produce sold for the support of the school. "Were annual reports and accounts furnished to the Government?" Yes. Detailed accounts of receipts and expenditure were annually furnished. You wish to have an opportunity of examining the details of expenditure, etc. These accounts are published in Government papers, and I must refer you to those papers; it is rather too much to ask us to lay before you the accounts that were rendered to the proper authorities, the correctness of which was never once questioned. As to reports, the schools were regularly inspected by gentlemen appointed by the Government, You have referred to one report, that of Mr. Rolleston, which is the only depreciatory report ever made of the state of the school. If you had been sufficiently candid, you would have looked at the reports for a period of years; had you done this, you would have found reports of a very different character from the pen of Hugh Carleton, Esq., H. Taylor, Esq, and others. All I have to say of Mr. Rolleston's report is, that it should be read with the protest entered by the Rev. James Buller against its unfairness. As to educational results, it is difficult to tabulate these. Teachers have been trained, who for years rendered good service in the primary schools. Native ministers hare been raised who have laboured successfully as evangelists among the native tribes. To sneer at Maori preacher training may be according to your taste, but many of those Maori page 14 preachers could give a clear and Scriptural "reason of the hope that is in them," and an intelligent Scriptural answer to any man asking the all-important question, "What must I do to be saved?" Many of the men of this class are dead—five still remain—faithful men, some of whom have rendered no small service to the Government of the country during the native troubles. And many native youths may be found in the country who can read and speak the English language, who received their education in these schools As to the closing of the Three Kings School, the trustees and District Meeting had to yield to the inevitable. Native relations with the Government became disturbed, and the pupils were gradually withdrawn, until the native war compelled the closing of the establishment. I had left Auckland when this crisis came, and am not able to speak from personal knowledge of the last few years, but I believe the proceeds of those properties have been faithfully applied in aid of schools and native work in different parts of the Auckland district.

3. And now, "Is the present action of the Wesleyan Conference in harmony with the specified Trusts?" You have characterised it as "a flagrant proceeding;" charged the Wesleyan body with "proposing to alienate the property from its original objects," and threatened us with the Supreme Court, and other dreadful consequences. I take exception to your hasty conclusions. Your premises are false, and your conclusions must fall to the ground. What is there so "flagrant" in the training of "teachers and preachers" when some of the property was received in trust for this special object, and no other, and the rest of the grants included it? In what way is it now proposed to alienate the property from its original objects? What great crime is the Wesleyan body about to commit in taking the first opportunity that has presented to reopen the institution for its original work, and so meet the demands that are being made upon it by its native churches? Sir, we yield to no class of men in reference to a due regard for the destitute, and with sufficient means should be as ready as you can be to render help. Rut you argue as though the Three Kings estate were vested in the trustees for the exclusive benefit of destitute Europeans, which I have clearly shown is not the fact. The best and most valuable properties are held for the very object for which the Wesleyan Conference proposes to use them; and as I fully endorse your own doctrine, viz., "Diversion of special Public Trusts from the objects for which such trusts were established, is a process which ought to be persistently resisted," I ask you if it is not the duty of the Wesleyan body persistently to resist the attempt you are now making to have the Trusts in question diverted from the training of native page 15 teachers to the support of destitute Europeans, and if such diversion would not be a malversation of Trusts? Sir George Grey's memorandum directs how the grants he made were to be appropriated. Several objects are provided for: one is the training of native teachers and ministers, the application of funds to the several objects is to be determined by the Auckland District Meeting; that meeting has determined according to the memo, to reopen the institution for the training of teachers, this being in its judgment the work at present required to be done in the interests of religious education among the native tribes. "Wherein has that body departed from the straight line of honesty in so doing?" It had not funds to enable it to embrace all the objects, it has selected what it deems at this time to be of most importance. Is it, then, guilty of violating "not only truth and justice and humanity, but law also?" Shame on the pen that imputed such conduct to honest men. The proposal of the Auckland Circuit to subscribe £150 per annum towards the funds of the institution on condition of receiving the Sunday services of the Principal and the students, you have also perverted, and treat it as though the officials of the Circuit sought to secure an advantage at the expense of the destitute. Is this candid?—is it just? 1 regard the proposal as highly creditable to those officials, who, instead of applying their funds to increase their pastoral staff, make some sacrifice of Circuit interest to aid the Three Kings by contributing £150 per annum to its funds, only asking in return Sunday services. Ought you to insinuate that those gentlemen are particepes criminis in a great public wrong for such an offer as this ? Nor have you fairly represented the proposal to receive English students into the institution. No part of the expense connected with these is to come from the institution funds; their support will be obtained from other sources. But you have presented this part of the plans to your readers in a way adapted to leave the impression that we are going to rob the destitute in order to secure means to train our ministers. Another proof of the animus that runs through the whole of your articles. The object of training the natives and Europeans in the same institution is to make them mutually helpful to each other. It is hoped that the Europeans will assist the natives in their English studies, and that the natives will help the Europeans in acquiring the Maori tongue, while one minister will be able to superintend the studies of both.

And now, sir, I must apologise for the length of my communication. I hope the information I have supplied may guide candid minds to right conclusions, and show the public that the Wesleyans in Auckland are not such a corrupt body as you have page 16 represented them to be; if they were, I should be sorry to be named as one of their ministers.