The New-Zealander. SATURDAY, OCT. 16, 1847.

New Zealander, Volume 3, Issue 144, 16 October 1847, Page 2

The New-Zealander. SATURDAY, OCT. 16, 1847.

Be just and fear not: Let all tie ends tliou aims't at, be thy Country's, Thy Gou's, and Truth's.

" Wisdom for a man's self is a desperate evil for a servant to a prince, or a citizen, in a republic ; for whatsoever affairs pass such a man's hands, he crooketh them to his own ends, which must needs be often eccentric to the ends of his master or state. • * Such men set a bias upon the bowl, of their own petty ends and envies, to the overthrow of their master's great and important affairs." —Lord Bacon.

We have to congratulate the pensioners upon the fortunate interference which has saved them, at the eleventh hour, from exile to the Keri Keri, or whatever other bush location might have been really intended for them. They would have had just cause of complaint ; against this Government, for the interpretation put upon Lord Grey's instructions, and against the Home Government, for sending out instructions so loosely worded as to be liable to misapprehension. To enveiple out from England men past the prime of life, under promise of comfortable homes, ready for them to step into on landing from the transport ship, with land of real and immediate value attached to those homrs; under full expectation of private employment at the high colonial rate of wages, and service open to their families besides— to construe j this agreement into the right of squatting them in any isolated outpost, would have merited no better name than kidnapping. Men of their age must have sunk under the endless Gibeonite work of subduing a New Zealand wilderness. However well such labour may be repaid in the" end, the task is too stubborn, the privation and exposure too great for any but young and hardy settlers ; and ev»n among them there are many who have not been able tully to bear up against such wearying toil, but still feel, and will feel the effect to the end of their lives. " Clearing" sounds romantic, in England; it is pleasant and exciting to read of enterprize and wild adventure, of risks well braved and difficulties oveicome ; it is pleasant by a warm fire and under a tight roof; but eight and forty hours of cold and wet would work a speedy change in such theoretic fancies. It is a great point gained, not only for the pensioners, but the town of Auckland besides. One mischievous uncertainty is done away with, for Auckland now becomes the acknowledged capital; whereas it was only capital before " under an acting order," We shall now hear no more of conferring that title upon Taupo, or the top ofjTongariro ; (for the first threat, there is authority; the second, we believe to be apocryphal, an invention of the enemy); Captain Hobson's original understanding with purchasers of town allotments, which had so long been virtually set aside, being now openly confirmed from home. One decision has settled two questions ; but the mystification which has been going on about the whole affair, from beginning to end. is amusing — and even more instructive We were first given to understand that the pensioners were to be settled at Onehunga j a good position, beyond a doubt,-ralthough outside the five mile circle within which they expected to be placed ; perhaps the best, being the key to Auckland, and the possible site of a seaport town on the West Coast. Everything went on smoothly for some time; sawn timber was contracted for— the cottages about to be built ; the new-comers had already obtained employment, and entered intd agreements with the old settlers ; when they were suddenly astonished by an intimation that an out-settlement had been resolved upon, and the Onehunga project abandoned. The steamer was called into requisition, and a somewhat expensive expedition made along the coast, in search ef a defensible position. Mahurangi, which would have proved a second Wanganui, was visited, and Matakana ; even so far as the Keri Keri, the coast was tried. Mr. Heki indulged in a little quiet swagger about the matter ; saying that he should tieat their arrival in certain districts, which he was considerate enough to indicate, as a declaration of war. But the satirical rogue, thinking, like Hamlet, " that old men have grey beards," afterwards assumed a tone of moderation, and promised to content himself with merely disarming them. His generosity was thrown away ; for in the most opportune moment, while surveyors and surveyor-general weie in full activity, while the pensioners were encouraging each other in dogged resolution not to re embark, the Minerva arrived from England direct, with those on board who were able to explain the ministerial views, and to expound by word of mouth Earl Grey's despatch, seemingly so difficult to understand in writing. It appeared that the plainest interpretation of it was the most correct ; that the pensioners were sent out distinctly for garrison duty, so as to render the whole force of regulars available ; that at one time it had even been in contemplation to arm them, not wilh percus-

sion lock musquets, but flint, as being equally effective for garrison duty ; that the whole system of military defence devised at home for the colony would be turned upside down if the newly raised body were sent to the frontier. Had they now been sent away, serious responsibility — a much more effectual check, when clear and distinct, than any Legislative Council with a sure official majority — would have been incurred ; no stalkinghorse was at hand to shoot from behind, or cat's paw to be thrust among the coals j ♦' no loop, no starting hole, no device" was there ; nothing was left for it but to send the Government brig to catch the Government schooner, to recal the Surveyor-General, who had been despatched to the North but just before to make arrangements with all convenient speed for their reception, and to constitute himself a polar star for them to steer by—the Cynosure of the Royal New Zealand Fencibles. We are lorry for the anti climax ; but the upshot of all, is that the site originally fixed upon for the first village of our new friends, has been again chosen. All this in^rmity of purpose, as might be supposed, «irrfd up au infinite variety of conjectures among the colonists. There was a problem to solve, a knotty point to unloose, for loiterers in the market-place. Some set it down to the scere of personal feeling ; to a special dislike which they supposed Captain Grey to entertain towards the inhabitants of Auckland, instancing certain hasty and indiscreet expressions ia proof, which had better have been long since forgotten. Others declared their belief, that His Excellency had never intended to send the pensioners away from the capital at all ; that he was simply amusing himself, for some inscrutable purpose, with throwing dust into the eyes of the settlers. And they, too, brought parallel instances of such manceuvreing in support and colour of their views. Many took upon themselves to affirm, that the whole affair was a covert hit at the land claimants ; that it was intended to convey the impression of a complaint that the whole country had been seized upon by them for miles around, not leaving a spare acre to be had for the Queen's Pensioners. And when it was urged in answer that there was available land # in abundance, on which account the impression that there was none could never have been sought to have been conveyed—that lack of cause for such complaint was conclusive evidence of its not having been ever made— they absolutely professed themselves unable to perceive the torce of the argument* On the contrary, instead of dialectically supporting their own solution of the difficulty, modo et figura, with the scrupulous adherence of a Conradus Crambe to forms of syllogistic reasoning, they laughed outright ; jesting irreverently upon the sudden discovery of lands, immediately after the arrival of the new general, which even the keen sight of His Excellency had been unable to perceive immediately before — leaving it a moot point whether, like Deloß, or Sabrina island, they had not suddenly risen from the sea; or now again contrasting Harry the ntih, who " could not see many a fair French city for one fair French maid|that stood in his way," with a Governor, who was uuable to see many a broad acre for a certain dislike that blinded his eye. Others there were again,— tell it not in Gath, publish it not in the streets of Askelon, —who were sorry, that so glaring a mistake as they called it, had not been actually made ; who hinted, rather maliciously, that the error would have been ultimately productive of good to the community, with certainty proportionate to its magnitude ; who gave out that the surest way of "securing the mistake," was to brave government into execution of its designs. We might make a fair guess at their object, < but deem it more prudent to decline offering solution of the riddle. [ It would have been hard upon the pensionj ers, however, to have been sacrificed to such a ! political game ; they might have answered, I as did the frogs in the fable to the boys who were pelting them with stones, "what is sport to you is death to us."

The last sitting but one of Council has been the longest, and the roost interesting. In sudden transitions from fair weather to foul, and back to fair again, it was like an April day ; jokes, taunts, and reproaches flying across the table in beautiful confusion, and more subjects touched upon, we really believe, than during the whole of the rest of the session beside. The Attorney General began by moving the second reading of the bill for conferring an annuity upon Thomas Waka Nene, in consideration of the services rendered by him to the colony from its earliest establishment in the island. Mr. Brown rose in answer, and although he admitted the full value of Wakas services, and the justice of offering him a reward, still believed that Council were establishing a bad precedent in saddling the revenue of the colony with a pension list; that the services in question bad been rendered to the Grown, and that the Crown should therefore pay for them. He said that the community entirely agreed with him in estimation of those services, and had long bad it in contemplation to offer adequate reward ; be believed that five pounds would be raised less grudgingly by subscription for this object, than five shillings by compulsion $

and that tbe colonists had only delayed putting their intention into execution, till they should know what steps Government itself meant to take. But he thought that Thomas Waka should not be singled out ; for there were other chiefs not much less deserving : among them be would particularly instance Moses Tawhai, whose remonstrances caused Col.Despard to countermand an intended assault upon the pah at Ruapekapeka, on the evening before the surprise, which it afterwards appeared, would have ended in * reverse equally sigual with that at Owaiawai. The Governor caught at the assertion— the accuracy of which, we are bound to admit, would find many supporters— with the practised readiness of an old debater ; he saw tbe advantage, and followed it up " doing his virtuous indignation" excellently well. Tbe bill was ultimately amended, by the introduction of the sum of £100 per annum for the use of Thomas Waka, and of a similar sum to remain in the hands of Government for distribution among meritorious 1 chiefs. Tbe Currency Bill was then passed through committee, the leport drawn up, and notice of the third reading given for to-day. We say nothing of this portion of the proceedings at present, as we shall be obliged to return to it on a future occasion. Mr. Merriman and 'Mf. Brown expressed a desire for certain returns} 1 which the Governor promised should be mad«) out. The remainder of the sitting was taken up by long and desultory conversation, upon a great variety of topics, which ended in an animated discussion on tbe subject of free trade, brought on by Mr Brown, who considered that a revenue might be more advantageously raised in the shape of a ptoperty tax, than of customs duties. Tuft Governor reminded Mr. Brown of the ill-success of the free trade measure which he had ,per- ( suaded Captain Fitzroy to try j but the ho». member did not stem the less disposed to renew his experiment on that account. The Governor stated that he should be unable, for many reasons,, to lay the estimates on the table j that as he was about to proclaim the new constitution^ he^ thought it better to let them lie over at pre* sent, that the legislature of each province should be able to discuss its own. Council then adjourned until three o'clock to day.

, Fo R t St r c c t.— This ktreet contains several extensive warehouses, and is necessarily, timclij resotied to by people in business, and it is,.. be*, sides, the principal place of embarkation, and debarkation to. and from vessels in the- barbdifr> ( yet it has been long suffered to remain in a very inefficient state. The authorities may not atthit time have it in* their power to mend its condition, but certainly the police might remove from it a standing nuisance, namely, a knot of idle and - disorderly persons that are always congregated at the corner of it and the lane that leads into" Shortland-street. A passenger is frequently obliged to force his way, with much difficulty, and for his pains is aisailed with a shower of very unpalatable epithets* j Several of the inhabitants of the town have expressed to us their hope that the Legislative Council would not separate without passing a short Apt, em« powering the Resident Magistrate to inflict a penalty on the occupant of any house the chimney of which is discovered to be on fire j but as the session is to be brouget to a close to day, the passing of an Ordinance on the subject at this time,! wiH be iraprac* ticable. However, we trust that the inhabitants will see the necessity of using evety precaution in their power to prevent fires of tins kind taking place; There is no doubt but that many of the cbimfaies^ especially those which have been erected for several years, are now very foul ; and should any of tbeni,~by accident, take fire on such a night as last, no exer-' tions could save the surrounding houses, or perhaps 1 the whole town, from swift destruction. We would;* therefore, advise every householder to- take the earliest opportunity of sweeping down their ehimuies''--an operation which can be readily with the help of a bunch of fern, anoTwitb. very little trouble. " ) 1 % >* v

The Pensioners.— Owing to the doubts of Governs ment with regard to the most appropriate .site for location of the Pensioners, the necessary accommodation for their reception had not been prepared on thek, arrival. The works, however, are now going on ffair..t r .. On Tuesday last, the Engineer department commenced the building of two temporary sheds, each a hundred feet long, which are now completed, and will shelter them from the inclemency of the weather, until the detacher cottages shall be built A hundred men are to be BU7 tioned at Onehunga, and an equal number, we believe* I are to be stationed at the Tamaki. '• -, .

I Wesleyan Missions.— Two Sermons WHl Ki pe preached to-morrow, and collections made in aid of these Missions, at the Wesleyan Chapel: andonMonday evening, the annual Missionary Meeting will bo held, in the same place, at which Alexander Shepherd, Esq., will preside. Several Missionarie» have come up to be present at the meeting.