The New-Zealander. SATURDAY, JULY 24, 1847.

New Zealander, Volume 3, Issue 120, 24 July 1847, Page 2

The New-Zealander. SATURDAY, JULY 24, 18 4 7.

He just and fear not: Let all the ends thoii aims't at, be thy Country's, Thy God's, anil Truth's.

' Ondc c a notnre cho ncl ptjrliarc uno stnto, dcbbo occupatorc di csso discorrerc tuttc quello ofl'ose chc gli <• nooessnrio fare, c tutte farlo a un tratto per non lo wre a rinnovarc ogni di, c potero non le innovando asbicurarcgli uoinini, eguadagnurseli con bcncficarli." Jbs Excellency hns forgotten his Machiavelli ; V suing possibly long since thrown it aside, as j» mute elementary work, a manual for beginn> is in the art of government. £et the book of the wily old Italian might \r reperused with some ndvnntnge, more espe ,-\Uy by a man able to cull the many wise and i Airing maxims of statecraft to be found i vein from amongst others of a darker taint \nd that which has been cited above is not ,'"nc least worthy of practical observance. " From this we conclude that a ruler, so ;j. ,u as he comes into power, should enforce vl at once whatever painful measures he may mi end, and so be enabled, by discontinuance ■>i injury, < to reassure men's minds, and win i)>em round again by favours," Yet, in contravention of this most sagacious incept, Captain Grey seems inclined to drone ■out his unplensantry at intervals, as if he were :conomising it for future use ; dealing it o:it fr m while to while, as if for the express pur,vio of keeping up that feeling of irritation ,t;-, linst himself, which might otherwise, Enough simple lapse of lime, have died away. However far from his wishes such result " y be, it is naturally consequent upon his ( '.ruliar style of conducting our affaiis ; and that most clearly with regard to the tedious ileluy of a definitive adjustment of the land jlaims. '"he whole matter is long since virtually at *r. end ; the thing is settled, in private at all .r /-nts, if not in public; and it is little enough condensation that the claimants may now exj.. ct to get for their outlay of money, of time, "ncl of labour, But why can he not speak his rtun.d, and let them know the worst at once ? Woy should he annoy them more than he can <;rf];> ? If his measure must be carried out-*— nui we willingly allow tbat he himself, at 'hM, has thought it of necessity — why not • ?t over it, wiih as little heart-burning as posti'hl", and do his best to be friends again ? • n, is as if he were courting unpopularity, •vh;ch, for the sake of his lloyal Mistress, it ■d\<^ us pain to see. It' anything were to be gained by the 'iViiulenance of this suspense — anything "lore than the iudulgenco of that morbid -h -.inclination to declare liimsslf, the sole effpot of which has been to call up correspond* i )" mistrust— we would not press release from •» "/on him; but we are bound to do so, « ' *<! we see that such suspense, without profit b h.raaelf, involves a distinct injury to the loh.v* Either his perception of the value of Jaic mutt be dull, or he must be unaware k \-- nuiqji time he is now causiug to be thrown iway ; for all those who are affected by the .Jo judgment are now laying on their oars, /'i.' r in almost absolute inaction, and will i " ",'ili, in fallacious but natural hope, until i.i'V -how (he worst. Meanwhile the indus•y y uioie men, and their enterprise, is being ss i> the country as well as to themselves ; ' -\ Uic very idleness, which this procrasti- . s\ iortes on them, gives leisure to nurse .- 1 -'Ogry feelings, from which active occu- ..'- r. :iight divert the mind. v ' i f -''elyacknowledge the difficulties which > '•>■ question, but certainly had expected, " % ti*an of his ability, to have seen them ■ ' i ercome. He has been able to find . f nit beyond certain legal technicalities . •:.*, ;:nd a new source, insignificantly small, - - -im. Instead of looking at its ultimate j >V/ <>n the prosperity of the country, he M.;,iiod on the opportunity of forcing 7.1.011011S to the public purse, fixing his »> ; hat single object, and sacrificing . i r > lure interest to the attainment of it. , j% i-ucceeded, certainly ; in gaiuing iso/.jt'ci.s, he is always likely to succeed, i , ii.^tM.uity is great; but the cost of that ( -i iis another consideration. " Le jeu ne valait pas h chnndelle.' 1

Neither does Captain Grey appear to have noticed the true cause of the present unhealthy state of this colony. And we have a fair right to assume that lie has not, because he has unwittingly aggravated the evil which lies at the bottom of all. The prosperity of New Zealand is fictitious ; all confess the slate of it to be unsound. Wealth is increasing— if coin be wealth — but solely because it is being poured, in abundant stream, from the mother country into this. We are living upon the taxation of England. As wo have heard it wittily observed, "To find the levenue of New Zealand, enquire the gross Commissariat expenditure ; charge upon that the Customs* duties percentage, and the result will bo the amount required." And the joke is too near the truth to be pleasant ; for Eng« land, in addition to the large subvention, pays to our own collectors the very revenue supposed to be contributed by ourselves. For this colony wants what every colony must ultimately depend on, bona fide settlers, tied to the soil. There arc men in numbers licie, each night going to rest more wealthy than they rose ; but, for the most pint, they are birds of passage, free to dcpnrt at will, ablo, when satisfied with accumulating, to button up their store, and return to any place in which it may be more pleasantly enjoyed. Not so the seltler ; he may be well to do in the world, possibly iich ; but he is rich only within the country ; he cannot realize except at an enormous sacrifice ; he must remain, be he never so little inclined. And that man is not without his value, or undeserving the gratitude of the state. Let us now consider, without prejudice and dispassionately, the real operation of Captain Fitz Hoy's waiver of the Crown's right, with reference to this most crying evil. We all know why that waiver was proclaimed ; through the great, and perhaps undue influence which the wishes of the natives and of their protectors had upon his mind. We think that he judged wrongly, in subverting a principle, which we still maintain to have been a good one; the purchase of all new land directly from the Queen, at a reasonable rate — at the real worth of it, which would never have been grudged : we think that he was wrong, in motive as well as in deed ; but, as often happens, luck in that case did more than judgment. For Captain Fitzßoy's measure was practically productive of /sood. It roused an immediate spirit of adventure, which, for once, was directed into a channel profitable to the state. The old agricultural settlers, crippled in their means, overborne by their early losses, had lapsed into apathy. Fresh blood was wanted in the country, — a reinforcement of cultivators, with unembarasscd resources ; and cheap land was held out as a bait, to tempt town settlers into it. Not that Captain Fitzßoy meant it for a bait ; he had another j end in view : not that it was ever anything much better than a bait> for there is no greater mistake than to suppose that these lands were bought for a song, or that a Maorie will now part with anything for less than its worth ; but it proved to be a bait, and was bitten at by numbers. Men rushed info farming enternrize— we know how infectious is speculation in a colony ; neighbour against neighbour, it was who should get in most acres of corn ; for there is a fashion in enterprize, and a rivalry. Population was being withdrawn from the town ; storekeepers woe becoming farmers, engaging in an occupation much more profitable to the communityi and much less so to themselves ; the spreading of settlers — a very different thing from the spreading of settlements — was being brought about at last. Then was the time to have let well alone ; to have returned quietly to the principle which had been sacrificed by Captain Fitzßoy, but at the same time to have waived all technical and trifling considerations, and have taken all advantage of his temporary departure from it. ' That was the liberal view which Lord Stanley, with the instinct of a gentleman, took of the matter : Confirm the purchases, but allow no j more. And, when this view was represented in answer to have been the wrong view, Lord Stanley again, with the instinct of a statesman, deferred to local knowledge and the prestige of fore-gone success. The purchases were disallowed, and a year's crop lost to the community from off those lands. More than that again, the bringing into cultivation, at great original outlay, of much land that would never afterwards have been suffered to be idle, for the simple reason that it had already been fenced and broken up. The produce of the earth— no mere transfer, but a real and substantial increase of wealth to the empiie— has been neglected and abandoned, for the sake of a more showy fiscal return. With regard to the individual interests of the claimants, it may sound paradoxical to suggest the possibility of their being ultimately benefited by the present injury. That five years hence, a man deprived of his farm today, may find himself the gainer by having been relieved from all temptation to cultivate ; and having, therefore, been able to apply undivided attention to securing his portion of that wealth, now so lavishly poured in from home. If it be better for the community that they should be country settlers, it is better for

themselves that they should be town settlers. They will be gainers, eventually ; but the country will lose ; it will have lost their productive labour. Not one penny less would have been thrown into the colony from home, had these men been suffered to improve their farms ; but many pounds would have been retained within it, which now are sent to pay for the produce of other countries' carth • Setting aside all considerations of justice and fair dealing, looking at the question, as a question of expediency alone ; wo, who do not own one acre of such land — without personal interest, direct or indirect, to pervert our judgment in the matter — are honestly convinced that Captain Grey's measure is a polical mistake. It would be labour lost on his part to try to persuade us that he could not help himself; it would be acting thrown away to sit, like King Crocodile, with a tear of condolement in his eye for the hard measure the law of the land has driven him to deal. He has no need to tell us, that " the law is paramount ;" of course, it is ; but the law would have been altered to suit the exigency, had it not been for his own bias to the contrary. We grant him his full measure of ability — which no man lins a livelier perception of than himself—but he has not yet enough to persuade us that he uacd the law as anything more than a stalking-horse to fire from behind. Where there is a will, there is a way ; hnd he but been so in earnest minded, it would have cost him less trouble to have secured their purchases to the claimants, than to have upset them. It raises the bile of even his professed adherents to find their own peiceptivc powers set so utterly at nought ; to be met with what the French would call, urn manvaisc pluisanterid. His (measure was well meant, of course; but none (he less short-sighted for that. A few acres of land, more or less, which the purchasers ,were encouraged— and, in more than one case, even urged by Captain Fitzßoy to buy ; what is the worth of them to the Crown, after all ? What if the titles of the claimants were defective by strict letter of law j it is not in that huxtering style that a great nation deals with her dependants. It is not for England to descend to sharp practice, snapping at advantages — even where a few pounds are to be made by it. She has misled us, through her own appointed agent ; she has misled us more than onee — for Captain Grey likewise mistook the bearings of the question at first — and ought herself to bear the trfling loss. It is Lilliputian policy, to estrange the minds of men for an object so small. But there is more concerned in the question than the absolute value of the acres them* selves. It is one step in that cyclic recurrence of change, which has been, from the earliest beginning, so depressing to the interests of this colony. If, like Benjamin, the youngest son, it is of late allowed a quintuple portion at mess ; still, like Reuben, unstable as water, it is fated not to excel. It is only too apparent that a general feeling of insecurity, and distrust in Government — an uneasy fear of being outwitted by Government, has been bred in the place, cramping the operations of the settlers, disinclining them to look beyond immediate advantage, and limiting their exertions to a mere rival pecking at Commissariat expenditure. And to past change Captain Grey superadds future uncertainty, caiclully conce< ling from them the issue of a question on which their arrangernen's and their projects so much depend ; holding their interests in abeyance, that he might hold themselves in awe. When shall wo have leave to know what we are about ? Even while we write, we learn that a despatch has gone forth in the Gazette, which, if acted upon, will alter again the monetary system of the place. It may be for good ; it may be for ill ; but the constant fire of innovation is still kept up. For rapid succession of change, we know of no parallel to this colony, save Florence in the days of Dante, who compares his native city, with bitter invective against her ceaseless mutation of laws, of government, even of currency, to a, sick person tossing on the bed, seeking a momentary relief by turning from one to the other side. " Quante volte dal tempo che rimembre Legge, moneta, c ulJicio, o costume llai tv mutato, c rinnovato inembrc ? E, so ben ti ricorda o vedi hunc, Vedrai to simigliante a quella infer ma, Che non puo troviir posa in su le piuinc, Ma con dar volta suo dolorc sccrma."

In the Gazette published last night, is to be found a plan for the regulation, or rather reconstruction of the monetary system of the colouy. This is truly an experiment of moment ; the more so that we do not know one man in the colony capable of handling so grave and difficult a subject, lie that has ever attempted, as we did once ourselves, to fathom the mysteries of the currency question, is too well aware of the complexity of its phenomena, to hazard loose, off-hand opinions upon it. It has been a battle-ground for argument since the d-ys of Mr. Pitt, not yet, perhaps, distinctly won by either party engnged upon it. It seems that we are to return to paper currency agaio, regulated on the same prin-

ciple as the issues of the Bank of-EngJand, but on a more perfect system, (so at least Lord Grey assures us), and simpler. The despatch is not perfectly clear in itself, more particularly with regard to the difference in the management of the fixed amount of paper issue, and of the fluctuating surplus. The- latter portion, we are told, is always payable in gold or silver; but that the whole is so payable, we are left to assume. The despatcli appears to be best explained by reference to the system of management of the Bank of England, under its present term of Charter. The •' Issuing ' and "Banking" functions of that establishment are now placed under the direction of distinct establishments. The rules with respect to the department of Issue arc as follows : — That the notes issued shall represent either bullion or securities? The debt due to the bank by Government is about eleven millions, and to the extent of this sum there may be an issue in securities. There may also be an issue beyond this eleven millions, to tho extent, of whatever bullion and coin the bank may have in its possession. Thus, if the bullion be then there may be a total issue of £623,000,000 ; but, if the directors think fit, they may increase the issue on securities by the sum of three millions, i.e., from eleven tofourteen millions. So that, if the bullion be .£12,000,000, the total issue may be either 23, 24, or 25 millions. The main ditference between this system and that proposed by Lord Grey for New Zealand, appears to be the absence of any discretionary power in the latter to increase what corresponds to the issue on securities of the Bank of England. With us, the amount will be fixed ; in England, it may fluctuate within the limits of three millions, We fear to enter into detail until we shall have better digested the despatch;* but can already foresee some difficulties in bringing the project to work, and one of the first will hinge upon the value of the silver coin of foreign nations, when made a legal tender. As to assigning a value to it by proclamation — that, from its infinite variety, from its occasional debasement, and other causes, we deem to be nearly an impossibility, With respect to the investment of the specie received in exchange (or paper, it is suggested that the best arrangement would probably be that it should be transmitted to Sydney, and there deposited on sufficient security, with one of the principal banking establishments of that town. What security in a colony can be strictly called sufficient, if sufficient mean perfect, it would not be quite easy to say. In England, landed security is good ; but certainly not equally so out here. And, unless the security were perfect, in a commercial crisis, the State itself might be in danger. There is likewise some obscurity with respect to that part of the despatch which proposes to obviate difficulties with the Natives, by making the substitution of the colonial paper money for specie, more gradual than had been at first recommended. By this, of coursp, more specie will be left in the hands of individuals, to offer to the Natives, if they please to offer it ; but it appears to us, unless we misapprehend the paragraph, that such paper, however small in amount, which may be in circulation, will be still a legal tender, and may be forced upon the Native.*?. All bargains made with Natives are not ready money bargains, which can be broken off, if specie be not pioduced; but debts are paid, and damages awarded by Resident Magi a* t rates. One thing seems certain enough, that money will become more plentiful,— for the specie taken by Government, in exchange for paper, w ; th the exception of one-fourth, is not to be locked up— and therefore cheaper. With cheaper money, come higher prices, pressing on those who live upon fixed incomes. But, it must be observed, that Lord Grey has not on that account thrown out the smallest hint of raising official salaries. We are afraid that the Home Goternment will never have done practising legislation upon us — learning to shave upon our chins. But we must grin and bear it* " Fiat experimentum in aniina vili."

We are glud to see that His Excellency is about to bring a bill before the Council to prohibit the sale of spirits, &c, to the native race. It is with puiii that every person interested in their welfare has observed the habit of drunkenness increasing month by month in a race} that not bo long ago could hardly be persuaded to touch strong drink. It will be recollected that in the year 1544, an ordinance was passed to repeal a fottner ordinance which prohibited the distillation of spirits within the colony. During the time of its progress through the Council, a mej morial was presented by the Temperance Social ety in Auckland, praying that such repeal might not be sufTeied to pass. Their prayer was disregarded by the Council, and the ordinance was passed ; but on this occasion the home Government stood the colony's friend. The enactment has lain dormant— a »pecial clause having been introduced, which prohibited it coming into action until it should have been confirmed from home— and that confirmation Ims never yet arrived. Had the manufac'uro of spirits been permitted within the colony, the Natives would soon have learned the process themselves, and no efforts of their friends the Missionaries, or watchfulness

of excise-men, could then have prevented the complete degradation of the race. We have no doubt but that persons interested in the continuance of this evil, will excite the natives to complain of this measure, as partial and unfair We cannot ourselves see that there is any greater unfairness in forbidding the sale of spirits to them, than in forbidding that of .gunpowder ; the less so, that the one prohibition is exclusively for their own good, the other, chiefly for ours. The same principle will equally apply to both. We are sure that His Excellency will have the thanks of every right minded man in the colony for originating this measure.

LintJT.-GovERNOR Eyre. — His Excellency Governor Eyre takes his departure this day for Wellington, the seal of his future Government. During his stay at Auckland, Mr. Eyre has visited the surrounding country; and, in company with Captain Rough, crossed to the North Shore, and inspected the farms and improvements going forward in that locality. His Excellency expressed his satisfaction and delight at the beauty of the country in all districts he has visited, and was much pleased with the agricultural progress which has been made in so short a space of time as has elapsed since the establishment of the settlement.

Auckland Savings' Bank. — Dr. Campbell and Mr. Brown, the accountant and trustee in rotation, will attend this evening, from 7 to 8 o'clock, at -Mr. Monteftore's store, to receive deposits ; and Mr. Montcflore and Rev. J. F. Churton will be in attendance on Monday next, 26th inst, from 12 to 1 o'clock, forenoon.