THE NELSON EXAMINER. Nelson, May 6, 1843.

Nelson Examiner and New Zealand Chronicle, Volume II, Issue 61, 6 May 1843, Page 242

THE NELSON EXAMINER. Nelson, May 6, 1843.

Les journaux deviennent plus necessaire* a mesure que lea hommes sont plus- egaux, et I' individualisme pins a 'craindre. Cc serait diminuer leur importance que de croire qu' ill ne servent qu' a. garantir la liberte : il» maintiennent la civilisation. De Tocqueville. De la Democratic en Amerique, tome 4, p. 920. Journal* become more necessary a* men become more equal, and individualism more to be feared. It would be to underrate cheir importance to suppose that they serve only to secure liberty : they maintain civilization. ' De TocaußviLLß. Of Democracy in America, vol. 4, p.SO3.

We congratulate such of the inhabitants of Nelson as are willing to take to themselves the congratulation, upon the at length approaching prospect of a sitting of the County Court being actually had and held here. His Honour the Chief Justice, in his exceedingly pop visit, has gone through the usual adjurations with his Honour of the County Court of the district of Nelson ; and the first sitting will, we believe, be held on the third Tuesday in June, so as to leave

time for the preliminary proceedings before the day of hearing. We should hardly be doing our duty, if we did not,,at the same time condole with that portion of the community who are unwilling to put in for a share in the congratulation. We wish the lawyers as little to do as possible, and good pay and quick for what they do do. This County Court will, for the present, have only jurisdiction in civil cases, in which it is limited to the settlement of claims for not more than £20. In criminal cases, of course a jury is required, and a jury, unfortunately, cannot be got, there being no jury list, nor any means of making one. The new Jury Ordinance enacts that " every man, except as hereinafter excepted, between the ages of twenty-one years and sixty years, who shall have to his own use a freehold estate in lands and tenements within the colony, and who shall reside within the same, shall be qualified and liable to serve as a juror therein ;" and then come the excepted and the disqualified. Here are these unhappy titles (no-titles) again to prevent us from taking even the most necessary steps to Itrsure peace and good order. There are no men who " have to their own use a freehojd^ estate in lands and tenements.", No one has any title. It is a -delightful state of things, certainly ; and the usual mode of obtaining relief from such unforeseen difficulties is also denied us, since it is the opinion of the Solicitor- General, upon the wording of the act of Parliament accompanying the charter of the colony, that the Officer at present administering the Government has no power to convene a Legislative Council. It appears to us that it would have been worth while to have run the risk of a misconstruction, and have trusted to' the evident necessity for the step to secure a bill of indemnity, or some retrospective equivalent for such, and at once, when the difficulty as to the juries arose, to have convened a Council for the express purpose of conferring a title on the owners of town land, or at all events making some provision for the formation of a jury list. At Wellington, the jury list was made out unifier, the old ordinance, which continued in force as far as relates to juries until the Ist of last March, when the new ordinance came into force (or would have come into force, if there had been any titles), and the juries there have been summoned from among those on the lists so made, that is, from among all men between twenty-one and sixty living within fifty miles of the 9>wn, and being of good fame and character* This, of course, was not intended ; but it is an expedient which luckily remained to be taken advantage of, and of which, as no jury list was made out here, we cannot avail ourselves. We are in the predicament of one who, intending to trim his lamp, fetches another very carefully, with the intention of keeping a light, but, unfortunately, forgets to light the second until, having extinguished the first, he finds himself in the dark. Among the plans that have been proposed, one is to send the prisoners committed for grave offences to Wellington, there to be tried. Of course> ■ prosecutors and witnesses must go also. The expense is enough to frighten one a little, and we are not too rich, it would seem. The best thing to be said appears to be to pray for the speedy arrival of a Governor, who will have the power, with the assistance of the Council, to give us a temporary stepping-stone out of the slough into which we are fallen ; and the best thing to be done is to keep our eyes open, that no contretemps of so serious a nature be allowed to occur again. But these^ titles, these titles, when are they to be settled? Oh, Mr. Commissioner, Mr. Commissioner, we have the greatest possible respect for you and for the office you fill ; but if, instead of being paid %y «alary, you were paid by a charge in the nature of an average, the charge lessening from month to month on the land to which the claims remained unadjusted, we cannot but think the thing would have been quicker if nut better done, and at

least well enough for us to have had a jury list, and to have cleared our gaol by better means than by taking insufficient bail, or by letting the prisoners'squeeze out between the bars.

The evil arising from the remote situation of the seat of Government, and the imperfect manner in which government itself is carried on in consequence, were exemplified at the adjourned licensing meeting on Tuesday. The fourteenth clause of the Licensing Ordinance enacts that the certificates granted/* by the magistrates at licensing meetings shall be null .and void, unless the same, with the money for the license, be lodged in the office of the Colonial Treasurer, or in j the office of the Treasurer for the County or District, " on or before the 30th day of June next following the annual licensing meeting." In consequence of there being no treasurer appointed to this county or district, the parties to whom certificates had been granted were informed, to their great astonishment, that, unless they paid their thirty or forty pounds into the bank that day, in order that a receipt for the same might be sent to Auckland in time by the brig, about to sail that night (there being no certainty that another opportunity would offer), their licenses would riot be issued, and that they would be compelled to take out a provisional one, at an additional tax of £10. As the cost of a license is in. itself high, this necessity of paying so large a sum two months in advance, because the Government have failed in appointing the officers which the ordinance contemplated, is really too bad, particularly as half the day was passed before the publicans were made acquainted with the dilemma in which' they were placed. The police magistrate considerately pointed out the only means by which it appeared to him they could escape the payment of the additional £10, if they were then unprepared with their license money, namely, by writing to the Colonial Treasurer, and stating that the money should be paid into the Union Bank by the day required, and requesting that the licenses should be sent down conditionally on such payment. This, we believe, - was the plan adopted. But, in the first place, it is quite doubtful whether the Treasurer may see fit to comply with the request, which will be acting contrary to his orders ; and, in the second place, if he should, and the publicans thus avoid the threatened inconvenience, how lowering is it for the. Executive of a Government to be continually driven to these miserable shifts and expedients, from the want of an ordinary foresight.

It is much to be regretted that so few persons have taken the trouble to ascertain the amount of produce which a given quantity of land has yielded of anything which has been grown in this settlement during the past year. This is extraordinary, as every one has noticed, with some degree of astonishment, the general luxuriance of all vegetation. The only case which has come to our knowledge where this much desired matter has been attended to, is highly satisi factory. In the valley of the Takaka, at Massacre Bay, a gentleman surveying planted a few rods of potatoes, in fern land, which had been previously wooded, without any preparation of the ground beyond a slight digging, and the produce was at the rate of sixteen tons to the acre.

It gives us great pleasure to hear that the suburban land at the Moutere is likely to prove of far greater value than was estimated at the distribution. The gentlemen who selected there, and who have commenced preparations for cultivation, express themselves highly pleased with the soil, and consider it superior for grain to land which is generally thought first rate, and which, in fact, lias produced fine crops. We attach the more importance to this opinion as being that of thoroughly practical men.

It appears that the valley of the Takalja. will fully bear out the estimate ma^e by the Company's Surveyor of its extent. One of the gentlemen on the survey has been nine miles up, without seeing any indication of its termination. This district is spoken of in the highest terms by all who have visited it. Independently of its value for the abundance of coal and limestone found in the neighbourhood, the timber is

represented as being remarkably fine. It is believed that this valley alone will give 25,000 acres of as fine land as any in the Hutt, or any valley land in New Zealand.

It is worthy of notice to state the number of carts now worked in this settlement, as showing that something is doing both in town and country. They amount altogether to twenty- two, of which eleven are'firawn by teams of four bullocks, six by two bullocks, and the remaining five by horses. Theiarge majority belong of course to the agriculturists, and are only seen in Nelson occasionally, when they come for goods or provisions : the remainder are used in the town for general purposes.

Letters have been received from the Wairoo, which state that the natives are assem-* bling there, and threatening to stop the surveys and burn down the houses erected by the surveyors. The only mischief they had yet ventured on was to pull down the surveyors' flags, which was not done openly, but after dark. Raupero, Rangihaiata, and other chiefs, are said to be expected. When are these titles to be settled, that both natives and Europeans may take peaceable possession of the land to which they are rightfully entitled, and the law allowed to punish those who molest them ?

./ft is gratifying to see how large a number of our labourers are gone into the bush, * either as purchasers or tenants of pieces of land, varying from four to ten acres. Many, we believe, have been deterred from doing so on account of the limited number of sections which could be sold in allotments, or let with purchasing clauses, the proprietors being absent, and having sent no powers to their agents. The opportunity afforded by the sale by auction of a ' suburban section, in five-acre allotments, situate in one of the best districts, advertised in our paper of to-day, will not be lost sight of by those who desire to cultivate that only which they .can call their own. It has the advantage of being within a mo- ! derate distance of the town, with a good road the whole way.

Many of our readers will recollect signing a requisition, about twelve months since, to the General Assembly of Scotland, to send out a minister of their church to .this settlement. The memorial was intrusted to the Rev. J. Macfarlaue, the resident Scotch minister at Wellington, who has published the following answer from the Rev. Dr. Welsh, in the New Zealand Gazette of the 12th ult. : — Edinburgh, Nov. 15, 1842. My dear Sir — I was favoured with your letter of the 28th May, about three weeks ago, and laid it before the colonial committee, at their last meeting. Your communications are always received with very deep interest; and you have our best wishes and earnest prayers that you may enjoy the divine presence and direction and support amidst all your trials and labours; and it gives us great satisfaction to think that our beloved countrymen in so distant a region should enjoy the privilege of religious ordinances under your ministration. It has been the anxious wish of the committee for a considerable time past to send out to you a fellow-labourer, who might cheer your heart by his presence, and strengthen your hands by his counsel and cooperation. I regret, however, to say that hitherto the state of our funds has put this altogether out of our power. Notwithstanding the great interest that has been expressed by the religious public in your communications as they have appeared in the Record, and the. repeated appeals that have been made in our reports and otherwise, a sufficient sum for sending out a missionary has not been realized, la these circumstances, the application from Nelson, which you inclose, cannot be met. We beg, however, that you will express to the subscribers the warm sympathy of the committee under their destitution of spiritual privileges, and their anxious hope that a time may soon come when they may be able to send { out a minister. It might accelerate matters, if ; the people of Nelson were to come under an j obligation to give some assistance towards the I support of a minister, according to their ability; and, in the mean time, we would recommend > that some arrangement should be made for re- * ligious meetings on sabbaths, under the conduct ' of men of godliness and influence, who might be selected with your advice and assistance. I - i shall, probably, soon write to you again; and, longing always to hear of your welfare and success, I remain, Dear sir, Yours very faithfully, ! (Signed) David Welsh. To the Rev. John Macfarlane.

On Sunday night last, two prisoners, named Bright and Turner, made their escape from gaol, by loosening one of the window bars, which enabled them to withdraw it and get through. The constables have been employed during the week in seeking them, but no clue has yet been discovered which cr.n give any hopes of their apprehension. Two other prisoners slept in the same cell,

who deny any knowledge of how the escape was effected. It may appear strange that the whole did not make off together ; but those wdo remained had only a short time of their term of imprisonment to serve, while Bright and Turner were committed for trial.

The barque Essex, ten days from Port Phillip, arrived on Sunday last with 127 head of cattle. Instead of coming into the harbour, she ran up to the mouth of the Waimea, to land them at the spot where the Brilliant landed her last cargo, which offers peculiar facilities. We have heard these cattle spoken of in the highest terms, being well bred and in good condition. From proper care having been taken with them, only one, we believe, was lost during the voyage.