The New-Zealander.

New Zealander, Volume 7, Issue 577, 25 October 1851, Page 2

The New-Zealander.

Be just and fear not . Let All the ends thou aims't at, be thy Country's, Thy God's, and Truth's..

AUC K LAN D,"~ SATURD AT, OCT. 25, ] 851 .

The news from Canterbury brought by the ship, Bulce of Portland, which sailed from Port Lyttelton on the 13th instant, is to a great extent of a political character — the young settlement of the " Pilgrims" seeming likely soon to attain a maturity in the arts of party agitation under the fostering and zealous care of Mr. Godley. The Quarterly General Meeting of Land Purchasers held at Cliristcliurch on the 2nd of October was a scene of much discussion on political matters. A Memorial designed to counteract the influence of that sent home by the Legislative Council was agreed to. We can only mid room to-day for a single paragraph from this document, which we select as illustrative of the gi< r, t uls taken by the Memorialists, and of the spirit in which they represent their case. We deeply grieve to be compelled thus to point out the inaccuracies and misstatements which have been conveyed to your Majesty, the more so that these misstatements hare received the sanction of the highest authority in this colony. But we cannot do this without most respectfully representing to your Majesty that the General Legislative Council of New Zealand, in which these attacks have been made, not being elected by the inhabitants, but being nominated by bis Excellency the Governor-in-Cbief, do not possess the confidence and do not speak the sentiments of the inhabitants of this colony. That they are not autboiized to represent the inhabitants of New Zealand in any manner whatsoever, and that their lepresentation of the feelings of the settleis is one upon which no reliance can be placed. Another subject which engaged attention at the Meeting was the appointments to public offices by the Colonial Government. A correspondence had taken place between the Government and My. Brittan (on the part of the Society of Land Purchasers). The following letter is the most important, and possesses a general interest for this colony : — Colonial Secretary's Office, Wellington, September 2nd, 1851. Sin,— l am directed by the Governor-in-Chief to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 18 th ultimo upon the question of public appointments in the Canterbury Settlement ; and in reply, lam to remark that his Excellency feels great difficulty in corresponding with a body such as the Council of the Society of Land Purchasers, when they claim to express the general opinion of all the Canterbury settlers, as his Excellency is by no means aware that they represent the whole of the interests in that settlement. But as the communications they have addressed to him have been so unobjectionable in. themselves, and relate to subjects regarding which, by whatever denomination they style themselves, they must naturally feel a deep interest, His Excellency altogether waives for the present what is now a mere matter of form, in order that a substantial advantage may bp gained ; and has therefore instructed me to convey to you for the information of the Council of the Society, the following obseivations upon their communication made through you. Representative institutions being now about to be introduced into the colony, it is piobable, in consequence of recommendations which his Excellency has made, that he will shortly be relieved altogether from the onerous and extiemely unpleasant duty of making ap. pointments to what may be properly termed Provincial Offices, which duty his Excellency presumes will devolve upon the Governments of the provinces ; until, however, such is the case, Ins Excellency will, in as far as practicable, fill up the appointments alluded to either from pwsons resident in the piovince, or who have come out from England with the intention of settling there. But I am further to remark, that there is another class of appointments connected with the General Government of the country, such as the Customs Department, the Post-Office, and Land Departments, for the proper administration of the pationage of which his Excellency will be responsible to the General Legislature, and not to any Provincial Council, and the persons nominated to fill the higher situations in which will be tho'-e entitled to such appointments by long service and experience in public business. The junior offices in these departments, will, as a general rule, be filled up in the provinces in which they occur, and if a vacancy in the senior blanches of a depaitment takes place in one piovince, and is filled by the promotion of an officer from another province, the vacancy caused tn junior branches by the piomotion winch will take place will be filled up by a candidate from the province in which the first vacancy occuireil. In conclusion, I am d^siied to add, that his Excellency mu'-t be understood as only stating a general mle, which it may - rD" possible always to observe : and furthei, it musr bu understood, that his Excellency has no powcM in any way to bind his* successor, or to abridge any power** with which he may be entiusted. 1 have the honour to be, Sir, I Your most obedient servant, Aljrid DoMtrr, Colonial Secretary. W. G. Bum-Mi, Esq., J.P., &,c, Canterbuiy.

A meeting was held on the' 11th, to petition aojiiiibt the continuance of Transportation to the Austialian Colonies. The population had been increased so rapidly by the arrival of emigrant ships from England (of which the Midlothian was the fifteenth), that'as might naturally have been expected, food was scarce and dear; although, according to the Times, the iuconvenience was not so great as night have been apprehended, taking into account the failure of the crops in the Australian colonies, and the effects of the discovery of gold in New South "Wales aiid Victoria. The Times argues against a proposition that the Canterbury Association should itself import food, so as to lower the market, on the ground that such interference Would create a permanent evil by driving merchants out of the market. The remedy our contemporary recommends is industrious efforts to make the country produce a supply for its own inhabitants ; till the accomplishment of which object, they must only submit to the present drainage of capital in return for food The importations of stock »§£ni Port Phillip had been resumed, and some of the sheop and calves recently imported are described as very superior to any previously brought into the colony. The following statement, which we give as we find it is made the introduction to an article in which the Lyttelton Times calls upon the New Zealand public to resist any attempt to enforce payment of that claim of £268,000 by the New Zealand Company, to which we adverted in our last. We have received private letters from England stat. ing that a npgociation is m progress between the New Zealand Company and the Government, for transferring the Company'-* debt of £268,000 from the Land Fund to the General Colonial Revenue, Tbis is a matter in nhich all the se' tiers in New Zealand are equally concerned with ourselves : we therefore lose no time in wiving it all the publicity in our power, and in calling the attention of our contemporaries to the subject. To the entire accuracy of the intelligence, we pledge ourselves. It h a fact that the Colonial Office in England is now engaged in perpetrating, or, perhaps, is alreadyguilty of having perpetrated, one of the most daring acts of fraud and injuetice which has erer yet been attempted upon a colonial community. We had hoped to obtain later English papers by this arrival than those brought by the Cashmere ; we have only received our back files for the month of May. ; We have received from Lyttelton a pamphlet of thirty-eight octavo pages, entitled, "A Letter to His Excellency Sir George Grey, X.C.8., in reply to his Attacks on the Canterbury Association and Settlement, by Edward JERNINGHAM Wakefield, Esq." The title sufficiently explains the object of the production, but we have not yet had time to even glance at its pages.