THE HAWKE’S BAY TIMES. NAPIER, THURSDAY, JULY 24, 1862.

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume II, Issue 56, 24 July 1862, Page 2

THE HAWKE’S BAY TIMES. NAPIER, THURSDAY, JULY 24, 1862.

His Excellency’s Government has recently published for general information, a series of tables, ten in number, compiled from the census returns of the Colony, as taken at the close of 1861, and compared with similar returns taken in 1851 and 1858, being periods ■of ten and three years respectively. The information given in these tables is of such a nature as it was thought would be of most general interest, and desirable to place before the public at as early a period as practicable, more complete tables and fuller details of information being about to be given in a statistical volume, now in course of preparation for publication. Certain of these tables are of considerable value as showing the progress made by the Colony as a whole, and by the several Provinces individually, in population, material wealth, and agriculture, during the abovenamed periods, but it is particularly unfortunate for the Province of Hawke’s Bay, that these tables do not furnish any information from which even an approximation of its progress can he drawn, as its returns are included in the returns for the Wellington Province. However, as regards the Colony on the whole, the progress shown by these tables is certainly of a most striking character, showing a very extraordinary degree of progress, and this particularly during the last three years, during which time the Taranaki outbreak, and the unsettled state of the native question generally, has acted as counteracting influences of a most important kind. The general result of the increase of population (of European descent) for the seven years from 1851 to 1858, was a total of 32,547; the numbers being for 1851, 26,707; and for 1858, 29,254, being an average increase of about 17| per cent per annum, while for the last three years, viz., from 1858 to 1861, the proportionate annual increase has been much greater, amounting to about 221 per cent per annum, or including some 3,000 gold seekers, (believed to have been in the Province of Otago,) more than was enumerated in the census returns, to an annual increase of about 24 per cent. The total population of the Colony for 1861 was 98,915, or with the aforenamed correction for Otago, 101,915 ; to which, if the military and their, families, (which are not included in the above returns), be added, numbering 7,294, we have the entire European population of the Colony, 109,209. Satisfactory as the above results may appear to persons at a distance, or unacquainted with the progress of events in New Zealand, we have no hesitation in stating our conviction that they fall into utter insignificance as compared with what they ought to have been, and indeed but for the counteracting cause before referred to, might have been, nor can the fact be disguised that a very large proportion of the increase we have noted has been the result of the gold discoveries in Otago, rather than of any development of the spirit of colonization. This cannot be more strikingly shown than it is in the words of the Registrar-General, who informs us that “ the population of the single province of Otago” (corrected for the supposed 3,000 gold diggers) “ exceeded in 1861, that of the entire colony of New Zealand in 1851, by 3,456 souls,” and we may add that the average annual increase of the population there has been for the last three years no less than 106 per cent; the average for the preceding seven years having been been about 42£ per cent per annum. We have already said, that from the fact of the comparative returns relating to this Province being included in those of the Province of Wellington, we are unable, from this source, to discover to what extent Hawke’s Bay has participated in the advance of the

Colony, but from other sources we are well aware that for some time past our population has been decreasing, and there is only too much room to fear that this retrogressive movement will for some time to come proceed at an accelerated pace, the intelligence brought from the Northern Gold Field already acting in combination with a dearth of employment here, so as to cause an exodus of a great proportion of our laboring population, and no inducement seems to be offered by the local Government for its retention among us. It has, from the date of separation, been the fate of the Province to have its population regarded by its executive government as a secondary affair, none, or scarcely any provision ever having been made for the encouragement of immigration, it being too readily believed that a sufficiently rapid increase could be obtained from neighboring settlements, without independent action in the matter. Time has shown such an idea to be an entire fallacy, as while the forty-acre system has been the means of raising Auckland to near the highest rank as regards population (being second only to Otago, and this solely owing to the development of her Gold Fields first) and while the other provinces which have acted liberally towards immigration, have always reaped the advantages of their liberality, the niggardly spirit of the Hawke’s Bay, with a territorial estate that need not suffer by comparison with theirs, has not failed to reap the reward that should have been expected. And now that the whole available estate may be said to have passed from her hands, and, (from the present aspect of the native land question) but little hope remains of further acquisitions, we do not see any available source for funds fur the laudable object of encouraging immigration to the province. Amid the gloomy prospect that the native land question has of late afforded ; the ceding to the aboriginal population of the rights and privileges of freeholders—the relinquishment of the pre-emptive right of the Crown, and yielding to native councils the whole management of the waste lauds, there has at length appeared one ray of hope for the settler in the recent action taken by the Governor, regarding the block of land at Coromandel known as “Paul’s Land.” After having exhausted all means in his power to persuade the chief Te Hira to agree with his co-owners in the negotiations for the working of this block as a gold field, he has taken the only course open to him, and opened it to the diggers with leave ‘a la France .’ We await somewhat anxiously the comments on this act, that will be made by the indignant missionary and philo-maori party who so severely condemned the late Governor for a proceeding somewhat similar at Taranaki; and still more anxiously do we await the revelations of the real policy of Governor Grey towards the native race, which all parties expect will be made at Wellington, before the General Assembly. We may however, as it is, conclude from the Coromandel fact that the Governor is not, as the Fox party would persuade us, fully pledged to all the absurdities that have been promulgated of late as the true methodof dealing with the Maori, and from which"' such wonderful results were to have sprung, but which have, as far as we can judge from what we see in our own province, and learn from other parts, signally failed to produce a good result —rather, we may conclude that when he shall perceive the proper time for action has arrived, all those troublesome and meaningless—because useless and hopeless—negotiations, with a race of incorrigible rebels, will be at an end, and submission to the rule of law and order be enforced on them, whatever may be the benefits conferred on that small section who may remain faithful to the Queen and her people. It is of course useless to speculate on the doings at Wellington, in the Assembly, while we are without news from that quarter,— but when we remember how the conduct of Governor Browne, in the Waitara case, was criticised and condemned by Mr. Fox, and his coadjutors, we may at least in some de-

gree suppose the storm that is raging there now. It was not pretended even by “Kingi” himself, that he had any right to ‘‘Teira’s” land—while “Te Hira” is an acknowledged owner of “Paul's.” “Kingi” said “the land is Teira’s, but I will not let him sell it.” “Te Hira” may be supposed to say “the land is mine, and I will not let you have it.” Governor Browne did not act without the approval of his Ministry.—Governor Grey has acted in direct opposition to the views of his, and “in despite of their frowns. After all this, surely we are to conclude, that Mr. Fox with all his party have resigned their trusts into the hands of the Governor, and we may look for a new Ministry,—a “new native Policy,” and an altogether new arrangement of our colonial affairs, that have of late run into such confusion.