Note XXVI. p. 22.

It is equally a failure, whether regarded in a colonizing or a military aspect. In the former case, we have less than 1700 emigrants, including women and children, introduced at a local cost of 59,000l., in addition to the expense of their passage to the colony. This is at the rate of 35l. a head, including women, children, and infants, expended by Government after their arrival in the colony. Their houses alone cost 80l, per man. "Many of them," says Staff-surgeon Bacot, in his official report, "are of such advanced age and infirmities, as to be unfit either for page 38 labour or for military duty. At the end of their first year though their houses were built for them, their pensions continued, and regular wages paid them, they had cultivated less than a quarter of an acre per pensioner; while a few head of cattle, which are paraded in the first return, appear to have been all, or nearly all, bought for them by Government, at a cost of upwards of 800l, If we examine the experiment in a military aspect, it is equally a failure. What is the military value of a force, "many of whom are of such advanced age and infirmities as to be unfit either for labour or military duty?" On one occasion their efficacy has been tested. In April last, a large portion of armed natives entered the town of Auckland very early in the morning with hostile intentions. It was three o'clock in the afternoon before the pensioners could be got together, and brought into town; while its inhabitants, for nearly nine hours, would have been at the mercy of the natives, but for the presence of the regular forces stationed in it. This fact is stated in the Auckland newspapers of that date. A careful examination of the official documents above referred to, can lead to no other conclusion than that, either way, the experiment has been a costly failure, of having to pay for which the colonists may well complain.