PORT NICHOLSON.

Nelson Examiner and New Zealand Chronicle, Volume I, Issue 28, 17 September 1842, Page 111

PORT NICHOLSON.

We have received the New Zealand Gazette to the 10th of this month; and have been permitted by the civility of Mr. Perry to see the Colonists from the 19th of August to the 9th of September. The corporation seems to be the most engrossing topic : who shall be members of the council? — who mayor? — two questions not likely to be settled without considerable discussion, both by word of mouth and pen and ink. Much endeavour of various sorts — making of fresh accusations, upturning of old grievances, and recommendation and laudation on the other side to match, all doubtless with the best intention of obtaining the eventual good of all. Association of the class that provides for the community that essential element of prosperity — labour, for the purpose of seeing that their interests shall be justly represented. Appointment of committees to draw up lists of fit men, and meetings to canvass the merits of those on the list ; and much talk of having no preponderating interest in the council, whether of the Government, Company, landowners, merchants, money capitalists, or labour capitalists. Also a Thorndon Flat and aTe Aro Flat party, differing rather on the subject of the loaves and fishes which will have to be distributed in the shape of public buildings, &c. : — discordance enough to the eye without so much discordance at heart after all, and to end, it is to be hoped, in a good, sensible, practical, working council, who will take the talk that has preceded their election as enough to last for some time, and set to work and do somewhat. The Colonist and the Gazette have got into a discussion as to the sufficiency of the Native Reserves. The space occupied is considerable, and we are not quite clear that we have been able to arrive at the gist of the matter ; but, as it appears to us at present, the Colonist has mooted a question without any beneficial objectWe shall have more time in our next to get at the bottom of what now seems a useless argument, and to give what may be important as to it. Some remarks, apparently most unjustifiable, made by the Colonist in the course of the discussion, relative to the doings of the New Zealand Company and their Agent, have drawn a letter from Colonel Wakefield to the editor, which we shall give in our next. Twenty head of cattle, prime and in good condition, arrived from Sydney per Hannah, and were sold by auction the day after their landing, the highest at £15 10s. and the lowest at £10 10s. A useful roadster, with saddle and bridle complete, brought £31 10s. The Gazette seems to consider the prices realized as the present market prices of stock, with a probability of a rise as the settlers get located on their sections. A letter, written " by a gentleman at Auckland to a friend near Edinburgh," has most justly excited the indignation of the Wellington press. Misrepresentations of the description contained in this letter are at once wicked and ridiculous, and can by no possibility answer any end - advantageous to those who make them ; indeed the only mode of accounting for them is that a man of shortsighted mind and weak judgment is actuated by the motive attributed by the Colonist — " That any one, having the least regard for truth, should venture to put forth knowingly such false statements respecting our port and the surrounding districts, would surprise us, did we not know that the party in question has an interest in disparaging the Company's settlements, in order to enhance the value of his property at Auckland." The writer of this letter speaks of capper, sulphur* and manganese, as certain profitable exports from Auckland. All they want, he says, is labour. Let him then exercise his pen to procure that desideratum, and leave off the occupation of depreciating the resources of other settlements for the more respectable and profitable one of making the most of those of his own. There is important news from India, extracted from the Sydney papers ; but we have not room this week for more than that the losses of the Affghans have been considerable.

Discovery of America. — It is matter of historical proof, that the Normans of past ages not only discovered North America in the course of their bold expeditions across the high seas, but during the ninth, tenth, and eleventh' centuries — nay, even so late as the fourteenth, kept up an uninterrupted intercourse with the coasts along Lancaster Sound, Barrow's Straits, and southward as far as Florida, particularly with the people of the country which at present forms the states of Massachusetts and Rhode Island. This remarkable fact has been confirmed by several manuscripts and narratives of travel which have recently been brought to light, and the discovery of several remains in North America, which are incontestibly Norman in their origin. We ourselves possess genealogical tables, brought down to the present day, which show that there are many families still existing in Iceland, Norway, and Denmark, particularly that of Thorwaldsen, the sculptor, whose forefathers were chieftains of native races in North America, and were themselves born under that sky eight centuries back. It appears extremely probable that Columbus, who visited Iceland in the year 1477, was first made aware of the existence of another quarter of the globe by the people of that island, and that in this way the idea of making a voyage of discovery westwards, was first suggested to his active mind. — Christiana paper.