THE CANTERBURY SETTLEMENT

Lyttelton Times, Volume III, Issue 126, 4 June 1853, Page 7

THE CANTERBURY SETTLEMENT

TO THE EDITOR OP THE TIMES

Sib, —Some time ago, The Times accused the Canterbury Association of misappropriation of their ecclesiastical fund. I denied this charge, and appealed against it to the Government audit of our accounts. The audit has since been had, and I enclose to you for publication the auditor's report, with the statement of accounts on which it is founded.

I send these papers to you, because, as I entirely admit, the report is by no means so favourable as I fully expected'it would be; and that being so," I feel bound to let it appear in the same columns in which my appeal to it was published. I shall be allowed, however, as I hope, to add a few words in explanation.

The important items in Mr. Wedgwood's report, and those upon which the question raised by him turns, are the successive appropriations of land made in favour of the trustees of the ecclesiastical and educational fund. Notwithstanding the censure expressed by the auditor, I must still hold that the ecclesiastical fund has not been misappropriated ; and I would observe—

1. That investments of this kind—viz., in land—are not unusual, especially in the infancy of colonies ; and that colonial land has, in like cases,' been taken as a security' by the trustees of the Colonial Bishoprics'! Fund.

2. That though the charter is silent on the point, such appropriations are expressly authorized by the act of Parliament obtained by the Association in 1851, to which the auditor does not refer, but which was, in fact, the ground of the whole transaction.

3. That the whole question turns upon whether the lands are valuable or not, and the committee acted on the belief that, as a permanent endowment for religious uses, they constituted the best form of investment.

4.—That the colonists themselves had to some extent recommended such investments, and have expressed their satisfaction at hearing that they have been made. I have no desire to attempt any further vindication of the expediency of our proceedings, which is a fair subject of criticism on the part of any one who takes interest in the matter. But I have felt bound to endeavour to sustain what I before said, that the Association was not liable to the charge of fraudulent misappropriation. One other point I must notice in the auditor's report. He speaks of comparatively small demands in the infancy of the colony for ecclesiastical and educational purposes. I have no doubt that this was good-natur-edly meant by Mr. Wedgwood as a palliation for what he considered wrong in our proceedings, but it is an apology which it would be highly discreditable to us to adopt. We are quite aware, and we much regret, that several objects of much importance, which were properly chargeable on the ecclesiastical fund, have not been so provided for, as we found ourselves unable to do so.

I regret to have to ask for so much of your space on a subject in which the public probably take no great interest, and of which I can hardly hope that any one can correctly judge without much more detail than it is possible to give in this place. For some further detail, however, I beg to refer to a letter by Mr. Selfe, a member of the Association, which appeared in the Australian Gazette of the 13th of November last. I am, Sir, Your obedient servant, Lttteltok. Hagley, Stourbridge, Jan. 25.

" Report of the Government Inspector,

"42, Chester-terrace, Dec. 14, 1852.

" Sir, —I beg to inform you that, in pursuance of their Lordships' directions, I have inspected the accounts of the Canterbury Association, and I enclose a balance-sheet of the expenditure in this country since the last audit, and a similar sheet of the expenditure in the colony from the first commencement up to the close of 1851, the latest period to which complete accounts have been received. " On the face of these accounts it appears that the gross amount for which the Association are chargeable for land sales, pasturage, and timber-cutting licenses, amounts to £34,98S

Is. Id., the proportion of which accruing to the Crown and the miscellaneous fund is £5,831 6s. lOd. each, and to the ecclesiastical and educational fund and the emigration fund, £11,662 13s. Bd., each. .

" The expenditure in the colony on the first establishment of the settlement for roads, buildings, surveys, and other items coining under the miscellaneous division, were necessarily very large, and the total net expenditure under this head, in this country and in the colony, amounted together to £16,841 Os. 10d., being £11,010 14s. in excess of the proportion allowed by the charter.

"The.net expenditure of the.emigration fund is also in excess of the legitimate proportion to the extent of £10,911 16s. lid. The land sales having almost wholly ceased, the Association were disappointed of the,funds on. which they had relied for the payment"of the second half of the freights becoming due on the arrival of the emigrant ships in the colony. " The comparatively small demands for ecclesiastical and educational purposes in the infancy of the colony had allowed a considerable balance to accumulate to the credit of that fund in the books of the Association at the commencement of the present year; but the whole available resources of the Association having been required to meet the excess of expenditure in the other departments, it was determined to make good the balance due to the ecclesiastical and educational fuud by an allotment of land. Such appropriations of land, to the value respectively of £6,900, £2,250, £750, and £300, were accordingly made in favour of the trustees for the ecclesiastical and educational fund. By this means the amount of land sales was apparently increased by the sum of £10,200, and the responsibilities of the Association proportionally augmented, while no addition was made to their actual resources by the transaction.

"It appears to me that such a proceeding was hardly in accordance with the spirit of the charter, which requires that one-third of the land-sales should be appropriated for ecclesiastical and educational purposes.. But here the whole proceeds of the land sales had already been expended on other objects, and instead of money a tract of land, which may remain for an indefinite period .before it acquires a saleable value, was appropriated to the fund in question. " Doubtless, the money being spent, it was a choice of difficulties, and it is not easy to see out of what fund the balance could have been recovered under any circumstances. '' I have the honour to be, Sir, " Your obedient servant,. " H. Wedgwood." " James Booth, Esq.," &c. THE CANTERBURY ASSOCIATION. Balance sheet, from the 13th of November, 1851, to the Ist of December, 1852. Debtors. 1851. £. s. d. Nov. 13. By balance at the bankers' £10902 S 2 By cash in the house 54 11 3 . . 10,956 19 5 1852. Dec. 1. By land sales, 9,718 a. Ir. 7p ....29,161 18 3 By advance on mortgage of the ' miscellaneous reserves purchased by the Canterbury Association 10,000 .0 0 By passage-money and freight 4,727 11 4 By interest on cash deposited with the Colonial Bishopric Fund, &c 249 12 1 By subscriptions received by the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel 45 2 4 By J. J. Bulkelev, for the Rev. H. Jacobs ..'. 40 0 0 By sales of maps, books, &c 27 1 4 By purchasers in Gladstone for the sice of town 112 10 0 By J. R. Godley, for two bills debited to the Association in error, on the 3rd of May, 1851 ".. 1,000 .0 0 By subscriptions in aid of the Association's liabilities 5,032 2 0 £61,352 16 9

Creditors. 1852. £. s. d. Dec. 1. To payments on account, viz.:— The ecclesiastical and educational fund 11,512 9 2 The emigration fund 26,355 12 8 The miscellaneous fund , 4,361 10 4 To advance on guarantees invested in land, as per contra 12,000 0 0 To bills drawn from the colony 5,332 0 0 To the Crown balance, due from land sales to the sth of October, 1851 1,679 14 2 To promissory notes from last account 35 0 0 To balance at the bankers' £69 12 8 To petty cash in hand 6 17 9 76 10 5 £61,352 16 9 H. Wedgwood. Dec. 15,1852. COLONIAL ACCOUNTS. Balance-sheet from November, 1850, to the 31st of December, 1851. Receipts. 1851. £. s. d. Dec, 31. By the miscellaneous fund 2,529 11 0 By the emigration fund 3,166 12 5 By the ecclesiastical and educational fund 327 18 6 By land sales in the colony, viz.:— Town lands ...£4,071 10 0 '"-: 'T r * Rural land 1,050 0 0 — 5,121 10 0 By pasturage licenses 535 10 0 By timber-cutting licenses 223 14 0 By loans, viz.:— Local Government of New Zealand ......£2,400 0 0 J. R. Godley ... 120 19 6 _: . 2,520 19 6 By remittances from England, viz. :— In cash £520 0 0 By credit on the Union Bank for 3,000/., less the commission charged thereon £2,941 3 6 ■ 3,461 3 6 By bills drawn on England, viz. :— On the credit for 10,000/ £4,832 0 0 On the Rev.T. Jackson 500 0 0 5,332 0 0 £23,218 18 11 Payjients. !851. £. „ d . Dec. 31. To the miscellaneous fund 13,289 2 0 To the emigration fund 4,113 1 8 To the ecclesiastical and educational fund 3,918 15 8 lo the repayment of loans, viz. :— Local Government of New Zealand £1,600 o' 0 J. R. Godley ... 120 19 6 1,720 19 6 To advance on account of the Soames scholarship 7 5 10 To the Crown, amount due for timber-cutting licenses to the 7th of August, 1851 54 A 1 2 To the Rev. Thomas Jackson, for J. Baines 25 0 0 To balance in baud 90 3 J £23,218 18 11 „ H. Wedgwood. Dec. 15, 1852.

On Lord Lyttelton's letter and the accompanying accounts, the Times makes the following remarks : " Our readers will remember that on more than one occasion we have, though we fear in vain, emphatically warned intending emigrants against the manifold delusions and absurdities of the Canterbury Settlement system. We fear that we warned in vain, for religious enthusiasm, picturing to herself the revival in the nineteenth century of the manners and usages of primitive Christianity, and the love of good society captivated by the prospect of a colony in which all the refinements of an old country were to be associated with all the freshness and abundance of a new one determined to be genteel or die, irresistably pleaded against us. English gentlemen, such as they were in the happy, merry days of the Stuarts and Tudors, and a Church pure and merciful as the hierarchy over which Laud presided, were to render the fern-clad mountains and swampy plains of New Zealand an earthly elysinm. Purified from the dross of modern liberalism, uncontaminated by the slightest vestige of the commercial spirit, the English character was to regain all that two busy centuries have stolen from it. Stately cavaliers were to bow to the toilsome but not ignoble labour of agriculture, and lovely dames condescend to a supervision, such as their great grandmothers might have practised, of the details of domestic economy. Imported bees were to buzz in the tangled forests, real British trout of the purest breed were to dart athwart the mountain torrents, the genuine British thrush and robin redbreast were to enliven the woods with their well-known notes, and everything, under a brighter sky and a purer air, was to recall the image of England, not, as now, stifled by steam and besmirched with smoke, whirling with locomotives and clattering with the sounds of innumerable factories, but such as she was in the glorious middle ages, when our old nobility was intact, and arts and commerce could not die, because they had never begun to live. " There is, unhappily, no reasoning with the imagination. Persons possessed with these beatific visions were raised far above the considerations which affect the ordinary race of mortals ; and to this, rather than to any defect in our own logic, we are self-satisfied enough to attribute our total inability to make any impression on these sentimental pilgrims. The basis of the whole speculation, we showed, was the possibility of selling land for three pounds an acre while land of equally good quality could be obtained for a tenth part of the price. We showed that, whatever might be the disposition of enthusiastic persons to purchase in England, as a commercial speculation land at such a price would never be sold, and that the purposes to which the land fund was to be appropriated were found by experience in no degree to affect the value of land. We further pointed out that the site was in many respects ill-chosen, being separated from the sea by a high mountain, and consisting of land which, in rainy seasons, is little better than a morass. Further, we showed that the agricultural pursuits on which the colony relied must be crippled for want of labour, which was sure to be attracted by higher wages obtainable on the continent of Australia. We went further, and accused the Association, composed as it undoubtedly is of persons of the highest character and most elevated station, of having misappropriated the funds placed at their disposal, and that in a manner more than ordinarily discreditable. The leading feature of the Canterbury plan was, undoubtedly, the religious one. A third of the land fund was to be appropriated to the purposes of education and religion; deans and chapters, Greek iambics, choirs, choristers, organs, carved screens, and other ecclesiastical luxuries danced before the vision of the enraptured land purchaser. We accused the Canterbury Association of failing in this, the most vital point—of laying their hands on the money devoted to ecclesiastical purposes, of misappropriating it to secular objects, in direct violation of their duty, and of concealing this fraud on the sanctuary by a nominal sale to the Church of their own unsaleable land at its imaginary price. This accusation drew a letter from Lord Lyttelton, in which, after giving something like the lie direct to our statements, he referred us, in proof of the falsehood of our assertions, to the forthcoming report of the Government auditor. We did not speak without good information, but having no access to the accounts of the Company, we were obliged to

submit to this peremptory contradiction, until the lapse of time and the report of the auditor should do us justice. That report, and a letter from Lord Lyttelton, will be found in another column, and in them a confirmation of all that we asserted.

" The auditor, evidently unwilling to state the case in all its force against the managers of the Canterbury Association, says,—' the small demands for educational and ecclesiastical purposes in the infancy of the colony had allowed a considerable balance to accumulate to the credit of the fund in the books of the Association at the commencement of the present year.' It would have been more correct to say that this accumulation of a balance in the books of the Company was owing to the utter neglect by the Association to perform their contracts and to execute their trusts, so that eighteen months after the foundation of the colony the emigrants were obliged to subscribe for the building of a church, having been during all this time left in this model settlement without any proper place for Divine worship. " The whole available resources of the Association," continues the Government auditor, "having been required to meet the excess of expenditure in the other departments, it was determined to make good the balance due to the educational and ecclesiastical fund by an allotment of land"—that is, the money having been misappropriated, it was determined to give by way of repayment worthless laud, instead of the solid cash of which, in defiance of good faith and honesty, the church had been deprived. "By this means," says the courteous auditor, " the amount of land sales was apparently increased by the sum of ten thousand two hundred pounds, and the responsibilities of the Association proportionably augmented, while no addition was made to their actual resources by the transaction.'' Well may he add—" It appears to me that such a proceeding was hardly in accordance with the spirit of the charter, which requires that one-third of the land sales should be appropriated to educational and ecclesiastical purposes. But here the whole proceeds of the land sales had already been expended on other objects, and instead of money a tract of land, which may remain for an indefinite period before it acquires a saleable value, was appropriated to the fund in question. " Doubtless," as he naively concludes, " the money being spent, it was a choice of difficulties."

. "Yes, that is just it. When an apprentice borrows a small sum, received on his master's account, the money being spent, he, too, has a "choice of difficulties"—such difficulties as thicken round the path of any man who, in whatever sphere of life, permits himself, under any circumstances whatever, to lay his hands on that which is not his own. We cannot conceive how, with the full consciousness of these facts, Lord Lyttelton could have addressed to us the abrupt and categorical denial with which he met our charges. Those charges he no longer denies, but seeks to extenuate in the following manner. First, he says, investments of this kind are not uncommon, and that colonial land has before been taken in this way. But then, we suspect, it was taken at its market value, and not at a nominal price agreed between the seller and the purchaser, they being in reality the same person.. Next, he urges, that the act obtained by the Company in 1851. legalizes the proceeding: if so, the trustees have an answer to a bill in Chancery ; but this merely legal defence cannot absolve them in a court of conscience. Thirdly, that the committee believed an investment in land proved by experience utterly unsaleable to be the best way of disposing of the fund; that is, to place money in land which cannot be resold, and yields no rent, was considered by the committee the best way of spending it for the interests of the church to which it was dedicating it. Fourthly, that the colonists themselves to some extent ratified the proceeding. Of this we can only say, that we can hardly imagine that the colonists authorized the Association to misappropriate to secular uses the funds consecrated to the building of a church in order that they might have the gratification of erecting one themselves by private subscription. It is quite clear to us that, though the Association cannot undo the past, they are bound in honour, and very probably in strict law, to made ample reparation, and that it would well become them to restore to sacred purposes the funds which they have diverted to secular uses instead of colouring this misappropriation by the unavailing transfer of worthless land."