Poverty Bay, 12 Sept., 1866. My dear Mr. McLean, The Sturt came in about 9 and is off at 11 P.M. so I have not much time to write or to much news to send. I hope you have got something put on the estimates for the Natives on the East Coast for they are very badly off I allow the 20 Ngatiporous 150 lbs. of flour a week but that is not sufficient and all they have to depend upon besides is fern root. The last report here is that Aneru Matete is at Waikari Moana with 200 Waikatos but whether they come down here or on the Wairoa is not certain. Could you not manage to let the steamer with Percival stop here next trip a little longer than she does this time as we have some six months accounts to settle which cannot be done in so short a time. The government have stopped our having any more wine and spirits duty free I do not complain about the stoppage but I think it is hardly courteous to give us no other intimation of it than by sending back all our vouchers for the drawback for the last six month or more you know it is no pleasant thing to pay up an old acct. that one thought was all settled. Another thing I have to grumble about at Comds.H.B.V. I never had any intimation officially that they were to be disbanded. I am sorry to say Baker is very ill with Rheumatic Fever he is confined to his bed and hardly able to speak the disease having affected his heart. Ihaka has written to me for some powder for his rifles am I to give him any he is really in great fear of an attack and so are all his people, he is one of the few to be trusted. Yours in haste, Reginald Newton Biggs. I hope you will be able to make this out.