Wallingford Decr. 9th. 1868. My dear McLean, I have yours of the 7th. Decr. also Telegram of yesterday. By the latter I see that you have sent Weber up to arrange the Scouting for the Bush Road etc. I am glad also to see that ammunition will be sent to the Country districts. It will inspire confidence when the people know that these preparations are made. I have had nothing fresh from the Manawatu Bush since I wrote you last, but there is a great deal of feeling of uneasiness and insecurity among the people which I cannot allay. Of course I see nothing to cause alarm and agree thoroughly in your view of the case. But the people in the neighbourhood have got alarmed and there is no stopping it. The Dorangahau people have some cock and bull story about a track having been cut by Natives at the back of Akitio. Anything of this kind goes down just now and alarm follows. I enclose you a requisition I received from the Porangahau residents signed by the Hunters, Nairn, etc./asking me to call a meeting to consider the state of the District. Of course I called the meeting and on Tuesday I meet the people and will do what what I can to restore confidence. The object of the meeting is to get a Stockade for Porangahau they want a place of the kind somewhere on the Porangahau flat and apparently will not be satisfied without it. Will you either on Saturday on Monday telegraph to me what I can promise them. If they press for the Stockade on what terms will they get it - please inform me the Napier Volunteers are back again I see you are right tho' in thinking it creditable that they went - the fact was we were losing prestige among the Natives thro' the backwardness of our people. I note all the news by this mail and it has fallen like a wet blanket upon me. To you the trial must be great and I really wonder at your forbearance. After working as you have worked to see your plans and their termination checked and possibly upset thro' the jealous meddling of those incapable asses must be enough to drive you wild. It appears to me as if the whole expedition had collapsed and if Whitmore goes to Puketapu with his own men only, he is certain to meet with a reverse I think. From what I can gather however it is Ngatikahunghu that is leaving and if that be so and Ngatiporou can be got to stick to us we may do something yet. They are fine fellows those Ngatiporous and deserve well at our hands. They are the men who if you remember Stafford sneered at and blamed you for arming. What does Richmond say amidst all this and what about the West Coast? surely the risk run there must be great. If little W. could scarcely hold his own before, there, how can the present force manage. The more one tries to follow the acts of these Ministers the more ruinous they appear. I see Mr. Buchanan is showing his teeth and letter writing. I wonder the people dont put him down. I see you are going to act an my suggestions about the Militia in the out districts, it really needs doing and will be a fair and good move. I have little to say this week and feel depressed and not equal to writing cheerfully what little I have to write. Most fully do I recognize the difficulties of your position and what you are enduring from these people for the good of the Colony. There will be a day of reckoning some time. Never before do I remember feeling politically vindictive. Now I do and no mistake about it but we have to wait. I am still at work at my shearing business - it is a long job this year and the weather is broken and prolongs it. We have had a succession of fearful gales here lately and I fear you will have had them also in the neighbourhood of Napier - but now good night. Always, Yours very truly, J.D. Ormond. I enclose a letter from Tannner. I think he deserves thanks for doing what he did lately. The memorial about Whitmore I did not sign I got all the people here to sign but thought our connection made it undesirable I should. J.D.O.