A VALUABLE WORK OF REFERENCE.

Evening Star, Volume IX, Issue 2630, 22 July 1871, Page 3

A VALUABLE WORK OF REFERENCE.

The amount of ignorance displayed by English writers when treating of Australian events has frequently been remarked. Not simply-iu newsp.pers, where the compilation of articles and pai agraphs is necessarily very hurried ; but in magazines and books professe lly written as works of reference, do we find the grossest geographical and historical blunders, which are remarkable, considering that there arc many works available to authors from which really authentic information can be obtained. In the Corporation Library of the City of London we doubt not there arc many such works ; yet here is a s ecimeu of the historical and geographical knowledge of its librarian. The passage occurs in a work entitled, “ The Dictionary of Chronology ; or a Historical and Statistical Registry,” compiled and edited by William Henry Overall, F.G. A., Librarian to the Corporation of the City of London j—“ New Zealand discovere I by Tii sman, 1042 ; Captain Cook visited the island, 1700 and 1774; first settlement made by the English, 1815 5 Government established, 1838 ; New Zealand Company formed, 1837 ; received its charter, 1830 ; dissolved, 1851 ; made a colony by charter, November 15, 1840; separated from New South Wales, May 3, 1841 ; Captain Hobson, the founder, and Governor, from January, 1840, to September, 1842 ; Bishopric established, 1843 ; war declared aga ust the Kaffirs, April 4, 1840; Legislative Council opened by Sir George Grey, December 20, 1848 ; a representative constitution granted to the Colony by 15 and 16 Vic,, c. 72, June 30, 1852