NEW ZEALAND COMPANY.

New Zealander, Volume 9, Issue 725, 26 March 1853, Page 3

NEW ZEALAND COMPANY.

[From the “ Times,” October B.]

Yesterday afternoon a general meeting of the shareholders and directors in this company was held at the company’s premises, Old Broad-street, for the purpose of receiving and considering a statement setting forth the present position of the undertaking in reference to tlie Colonial Government at home and the Canterbury Assuciatmu. and also to detennine the best means of meeting the liabilities due by the company on account of the Canterbury Associa ion in December next. Mr, G. Lyall,jun., took the chair. The minutes of foimer meetings having been read, The Si-cretary presented the following document as the report of the directors ; “Thelasi session of Parliament was productive of a legislative measure likely to exercise the most important influence upon the welfare of the colonial communities which the New Zealand Company has been int-tru-mental in establishing. Retaining the deepest interest in that welfaie, but feeling at the same lime that questions of a political character are foreign to the object for which you are here this day assembled, we propose on the present occasion to confine ourselves to matters in which tne shmeholdcrs of this company are more immediately interested. Following for this purpose the division laid down in our leport for last year, the three subjects to which we have again to draw your attention are thes**;— “ 1. The claims of the company upon her Majesty’s Government ; “ 2. The engagements entered into on account of the Canterbury Association ; and “3. The current expenses and other liabilities outstanding. “ Upon neither of these, we regret to say, is it in our power to present a report in any degree satisfactory to ourselves. “ The claims of the company upon the Government have, as you know, been the subject of discussion in both Houses of Parliament. It being determined, in granting a representative constitution to the colony of New Zealand, to grant also to the local Legislature ihe power of regulating ihe future administration of the waste lands, and the det>* of the Crown to the company being secured upon the proceeds of the sales of such lands, it became necessary to make provision with regard to that debt in anticipation of the contemplated change in the administration, 'i he security previously existing was contained in the 20th section of the Act of 184-7, 10th ami 11th of Victoria, cap. 112, printed in the Appendix to our 23id Report. The provisions of that section had come into force upon our giving the notice of discontinuance, resolved on at the adjourned annual meeting held jii this place on the 4 th of July, 1830. But in carrying those provisions into effect, it had been found that the wording of the Act (owing, no doubt, to the gi>-at haste in wh ch it had of necessity been prepared and passed) Heft room for two important and unforeseen'questionsthe first, as to the proportion of proceeds of* Crown sales which ought to accrue to the company ; the second, as to the dbligatiou to pay over to the'compauy any portion whatever of proceeds arising from ( rovvn lands in any manner other thgii npo.i sales. Both questions had been maters of correspondence .with the late Government. Upon the former, it had been agreed with Earl Grey that in all peris of New Zealand not affected by the company’s special arrangements, the proportion to bp paid to the company should beooefo.urth of the gross proceeds; upon the latter, no definitive arrangement had been come to. In Parliament, as you are doubtless aware, different individuals advocated very different views.' Your directors, finding it impossible to give effect to their own convictions in regard to the just claims of the company, deemed it desirable that that arrangement should he adopted which promised to give greatest freedom of action to the colonists ; but, as declared by some of their body, in their places, they determined to leave the decision of the question entirely a the bunds of the Government and Parliament, Sir

Jolm Pakington decided, and this decision Parliament supported, to adhere to the proportion of one-fourth, as agreed by Earl Grey, with regard to sales; and to extend the same proportion to all other alienations of waste lands of the Crown, except for pastoral purposes under licences not exceeding seven years in duration, and except for certain specified public objects leaving the regulation of tie price, however, to the local Legislature. Such accordingly is the tenor of the act loth and 16th Victoria, cap. 72, an extract of which is annexed to this report. “This decision, as we have already stated, we cannot regard as satisfying the equitable claims of the company. We have always thought, and with deference to our opponents we continue to think still, that in common justice this company is entitled to larger and much more favourable terms than any that, except in one quarter (to be adverted to immediately), have as yet been recognized. Seeing the great hi nefits which it has procured for the public, the difficull.es and opposition which in pursuit of those benefits it has itself had to encounter, the energy and painstaking with which it has administered the means by which the effects of that opposition were intended to be repaired, and the prosperity of all except its own shareholders which has been the result of that administration —the least which, in our opinion, it had in such circumstances a right to expect, was an extension to it (or rather to the colony of New Zealand, to which the advantage would have been as great as to the company itself) of such a guarantee by the Bri ish Government of the interest upon the capital expended by the company on colonization as had already been granted with the sanction of Parliament in the cases of South Australia, Canada, and the British colonies on the continent of South America, in the West Indies, and the Mauritius. (See the respective acts, 4th Victoria, cap. 13 ; sth and 6th Victoria, cap. 61; sth and 6th Victoria, cap, 108; and 11th and 12th Victoria, cap. 130.) For the recog. nit ion, before alluded to, of the claims of the colony of New Zealaud and the New Zealand Company to such a guarantee, and the forcible advocacy of the same by Governor Sir George Grey, we beg to refer you to his despatch of the 6th of January, 1852, printed at pages 60. 61, of the New Zealand papers, presented to Parliament on the 14th of last May. These views, however, not being en ertained by those who alone had power to give them * ffe ■!, it only remained for us to pursue the course which has been indicated above. “ In so doing, we gave also such answers as the oc casion admitted, to the accusations of misrepresentation and fraud, with which, as you are aware, the company was assailed in quarters from which such injustice was lea.'t to have been anticipated. To those accusations yet fuller and more conclusive answers will be supplied by the papers which were moved for, and ordered by the House of Commons to be printed. Until those papers are made public, we do not propose to enter further into the matter, but are, of course, at all times ready to afford you every information that you desire. “ By the annual statement which has been put into your hands, mad ’ up, as usual, to the sth of April, you have been apprised that the position of the Crown debt w is on that date as follows :—The amount of interest due to the company, under the provisions of the act of 1847. was £16.437 14s. 2d. Of this, the amount actually paid was £8.179 ’ 4s. 2d. The difference, £8,258, added to the principal sum of £268,370 15s. left a balance then owing to the company, upon this account, of £276,628 13s. The said sum of £8.179 14s. 2d. bad ac:rned wholly from the one-sixth (applicable to the said Crown debt of £268.370 15s and interest) of the proceeds of Canteibury land sales effected, to the amount of £49,078 ss. Id., between the sth of July, 1850. and the sth of October, 1851 ; and was exclusive of the sum of £4,325 claimed by Her Majesty’s Government, upon sales effected, to the amount of £25,950, between the 22nd of April and the 4th of July, 18511. Between the 6th of October, 1851, and the Ist March, 1852, a further sum of 44,215 35., applicable to the same debt, has accrued Com further sales effected to the amount of £25,29° las * 3(, -> hut has not yet been paid over by the Canterbury Association, under the circumstances which will be ttaud presently. A sum of £1,049 12s. 6d., applicable in like manner, has also accrued from Otago sales effected in this country to the amount of £4.198 1 s., between the sth of July, 1850, and the 30th of June. 1852; hiiherto this has remained in the hj inds of the Government, pending the decision of a question relating to the private estate heretofore acquired by the company in accordance with the Otago terms of purchase, and now- transferred to the Crown ; hut a portion of it. amounting to £472 15s. 9d. (less the income-tax) is now paid over. A third sum, of about £1,500, accrued Iron sales in the northern province of New Zealand, effected in the colony between the sth of July and the 31st of December, 1850, has not jet been remiued to England ; probably in consequence of the ncguciations between the Home Government and the company, which you will remember were conducted to a certain point, hut eventually failed, in the course of 1851. Other questions of claims and accounts between the companv and the Government are still the subjects of cotrespondence, and, we regret to say. remain still unadjusted, but it does not appear to be necessary or advisable to enter upon them at the present time. “ The same annual statement has apprised you also of the position of the account between the company and the Canterbury Association. The total original debt of the Association to the Company was £29,012 14s. lid. Deducting from this the sum of £6,252 7s received during two years from the one-twelfth (applicable to this debt and interest ) of ibe proceeds of Canterburyland sales from the 22nd of April, 1851, to the sth of October, 1851, and £4B 9s. 4d. received for sundries; and adding £1,704 18a. sd. as interest to the 31st of March, 18.02, the balance owing to the company, on the stli of last April, was £24,416 17s. Towards liquidation of this balance a sum of £2,120 17s. 7d. is or ought to be in the hands of the Association as the proportion applicable to this purpose of the proceeds of land sales effected between the 6th of October. 1851, and the Ist ot March, ; 852. But this sum has not been paid over to the company, the association assigning as a reason that the company has taken from the public objects for which sums advanced toil under Parliamentary authority were exclusively intended, and has applied to other pur poses a considerable portion of such advances. In consequence of this repudiation, your directors have filed a hill in Chancery to oblige the association to reader an account and payment; and pending the issue we refrain from making any remarks, with the exception—l. That the allegations made by the association are inconsistent with ttie fact; and 2, that even if those allegations were not only well founded, but fully established, they would not invalidate the company’s tight to repayment.

“ In connexion with this subject there is another painful matter to wiiich also it is our duty briefly toadvert. in the correspondence which took place between the association and the company, in the months of March and April. 1848, and in the ‘ plan of colonisation agreed upon’ between the two bodies, which was annexed to the pamphlet issued by the association on the

st of December in the same year, it was provided that within six months from the dates therein respectively mentioned land should be sold by the association to the value 0f.€30'),00 i. In Angus , at the instance of the Association, this quantity was reduced to land of the value of £IOO,OOO only ; ami the reduced amount was made the basis of the agreement entered into by the association and the company on the Ist of December, 1849. In April, 185(1, on the further representation of the association, an additional modification was mud , and the provi-ion lor the sale of a given quantity of land by a given date was omitted altogether. In consenting to this omission, we stipulated that in case t he quantity of land sold on or before the 30th of June following should be less than,£loo OUO worth,the company should be placed inthe same position with respect to the financial engagements between the company and the association us if the whole £IOO,OOO wo th had teen sold under the waved provision. A guarantee, intended to give effect to this stipulation , was accordingly placed in our hands in the following month of May, 1860, of which guarantee the t dlowing is a copy : “ 4 In consideration of the New Zealand Company having waved the provision in their agreement with the Canterbury As ociation, whereby the latter are required to .sell £ 100,000 worth of land onor beforetheSOth of April, the undersigned pronrise to pay to the company (each to be liable only to the amount or in the proportion of the sum set below opposite to his name) on the 31st of Decemner, 1861. any deficiency then remaining unpaid in the sum which the company are entitled (under the present agreement between the two bodies) to receive from the association on the 30th day of April, 1860 ; but if the company re-enter on the Canterbury district before the 3lst of December, 1851, all money received by them as the price of lat d shall be considered to diminish the amount to which the undersigned will then become liable under this guarantee. (Signed) “ ‘ Lyttelton . . £3,750 “ ‘ Richard Cavendish 3,750 ‘John Simeon . 3.750 “ * K. G. Wakefield 3,750 *“ Total . • £15,000’ Under the agreement of the lit of December, 1849, herein referred to, the company would have been enti-

tied to receive from the association, on the 30lh of April, 1850, upon sales of land to the value of £IOO,OOO. two sums amounting together to £5,000. Ihe sums actually paid over by the association to the Government and the company up to the 31st December, 1851, from the proceeds of land sales, amounting in all to £18,757 Is. 2d. only, application was made to the four guarantors on the Ist of January, 1852, for payment of the difference, £6,242 18s. l()d. After a correspondence, which ended, we are sorry to say, in a virtual adoption by these four gentlemen of the reasons for nonpayment assigned by the association as ahovementioned, we have been compelled to institute legal proceedings against them, in addition to those in Chancery against the association. Pending such proceedings we abstain from further remark. “ The correspondence on the several subjects connected with Canterbury is too voluminous to print, hut is now upon the table and open to the perusal of any shareholder who may desire it. In addition to the information supplied by such correspondence, a notification, dated the 15th of July last, has been inserted in the public newspapers, whereby the association announce that they have resolved to carry into prompt effect the power of transferring their functions which has been conferred by the act of last session above mentioned ; and, further, that from and after the 30th of September, 1852, they will no longer dispose of land in this country, or carry on any other functions under their charter, except so far as may bo necessary with reference to pending transactions. “ Upon the power of the association thus to terminate their operations, or upon the probable effect of such a proceeding, if ultimately carried out, we forbear to offer any opinion until favoured with n reply to our inquiry as to the sentiments of Her Majesty’s Government. “ Out of the suras received from Canterbury during the past financial year, amounting to £11,193 os. 6cL, we have been enabled to set apart a sum of £662 14s. sd. due to the Government on account of that settlement ; and also to pay off the debenture for £ 10,000 mentioned in our last report as having been borrowed from the Baton de Goldsmid on the same account; but the interest on this debenture is still unpaid. “ For the bills held by the Union Bank of Australia, drawn on account of the Canterbury Settlement, and amounting to £14,987 Ids. 2d., exclusive of interest, 26 members of the company have given, as collateral se> curity, their personal promissory notes, to the amount of £ 14,460, falling due on the Ist of next December. Before that date, it is obvious that effective provision for meeting the said notes must be made. For such provision we cannot di-guhe from you that, failing every other resource, (if such failure shall actually he experienced) we shall be compelled to make a call upon the unpaid-up capital of the company. To this step we need scarcely state your directors will have recourse with the utmost reluctance, and only under the pressure of absolute necessity. “ The other outstanding liabilities, as slated in the annual account, amount to £4,057 Is. 2d,, exclusive of the sura of £556 1 Is. 4d. considered by us to be chargeable to the Government, but as yet not admitted by the latter. Against these can be placed, at present, only such portion of the sums ahovementioned as may not be applied to the liabilities incurred on account of Canter bury, and such sums as may be eventually allowed by the Government towards the expenses incurred bv the company between the slh of July, 1850, and the 30th of September, 1851, the latest date recognized by the Lords of the Treasury. This is one ol the questions before alluded to as being not yet finally adjusted. “ Since the date of our last report two of our body, Sir Ralph Howard and Lord Courtenay, we regret to say, have resigned their seats in the direction. “ The notice of the 7th of May last has apprised you that Mr. Gowen, Mr. Pilcher, and the Baroa de Goldsmid, go out of office this year by rotation, and are recommended for re-election. “ New Zealand House, 9, Broocl-street-buildings, London, October, 1852.” The Chairman moved the adoption of this report. Mr. Counsel thought that the meeting had better not proceed to that step on the present occasion. The document which bad just been read was ot a most important nature, and required the moot minure consideration on behalf of all concerned in the company. The report might simply be received ; but keeping in view the liabilities which won d shortly become due, they had better take time for further consideration. They had better wait until they could see what would be done in Parliament, and wbateffectihe actsalready passed would have on their interests. One effect af the recent act hud been entirely to stop all their sales of land, and there was, besides this another impor ant point affecting them. Under the late act there was nothing to prevent the Legislative Council of the colony, whenever it should be appointed, from selling land at 2a. 6d. per acre, and as the Under-Secretary for the Colonies had said they would no doubt do so, of what use was their attempting to dispose of their property at 31. per acre when this was carried out ? Another thing which many of the shareholders who were not present would have to consider was the probability of a call, and he knew, as a member of the Canterbury Association, that this must be productive of great discontent. Mr. Currie, M.P., thought that the report might be at once adopted, and the discussion carried on at another time.

The Chairman said that they had adjourned very frequently already, chiefly in consequence of the absence of so large a number of the directors and shareholders. They now came before the meeting with their report and accounts settled for the inspection of all ; and would it be right to continue those adjournments without strong ground to the contrary ? If they received the report at once, there was nothing contained in it which bound them to any particular line of conduct. They only received and adopted it, and there was nothing likely to occur in Parliament or elsewhere which could affect them from their having done so.

Mr. Counsel said that there were items in the accounts which he should like to discuss, and he believed that General Briggs was anxious to do the same. Mr. Laver said, that when this meeting was adjourned to the 7th of October he understood that it was for the purpose of ascertaining how much of their debt they were likely to recover from the Canterbury Association before any call was made. The Chairman admitted that this was so, and the matter was taken into the consideration of the directors. They had that morning received a letter from the Colonial Office on the subject. Mr. Counsel wished that letter to be rend. They were all, no doubt, aware that the Canterbury Association had ceased its functions. The following letter from Sir J. Pakington, M.P., was then read : Downing-street. Oct. 4, 1852, “ Sir,—T am directed by Secretary Sir John Pakington to acknowledge your two letters of the 31st August one providing certain correspondence with the New Zealand Company, the other stating t hat the associaiion bad resolved on discontinuing operations in this country on and from the 30th ult. and on transferring, with 'he least possible delay, their powers and authorities to the colonists. “ 2. And that with reference to this intended step tha committee of management suggest that instructions should he sent to the Governor of New Zealand, enabling him to stipulate on behalf of the New Zealand Company for such terms to secure their interests as Her Majesty’s Government may think just and fair. “3- Sir John Pakington will not here enter on the question whether or not the contemplated cessation of proceedings by the association, before anybody is in existence to which the transfer of its functions can he made is in legal accordance with the terms of the agreement and acts of Parliament under which they subsist. He assumes that the committee of management have satisfied themselves and the association on that point. But he is bound, on the part of Her Majesty’s Government, to state that if legal, such a course of proceeding is by no means what was contemplated on their part, when, at the strong instance of parties representing the association, this power of transfer was introduced into the recent act for the government of New Zealand Sir John Pakington was fully under the impression that the power of transfer was intended to he exercised with due deliberation, and not until the body, to which it was to be made, was actually constituted, and its composition and character known. Had not such been his impression, it would have been impossible for him to consent to the introduction of each a power into the bill, least of all had he been aware that it would be exercised pending litigation, with the New Zealand Company ns to the extent of the association’s liability to that body. “4. It is, therefore, impossible for him now to make Her Majesty’s Govenimeut parties to any such transfer as they would become by issuing the instructions asked for to the Governor j but be is bound to state, in addition, that be does not believe such a course would ho attended with any advantage. In the present slate of affairs between the company and the association, it is very iinprobacle that any terms insisted on by the Governor could be acceptable to all parties concerned, and certain that, by insisting on unacceptable terms, the local Government would become involved in differ-

ences to which it is, in his opinion, very important that it should continue a stranger. “5. And, in the next place, it appears from the correspondence now before Sir John Pakington, that the directors of the company have distinctly refused on their part to assent to any such transfer unless certain specified liabilities are first discharged by the association. Without prejudging the questions at issue between the association and the company, it appears to Sir J. Pakington that it would not be just on the part of Her Majesty’s Government to make themselves parties to a transfer which the latter regard as prejudical to their interests as actual litigants. “6. Being therefore obliged to decline the proposal of the committee, it becomes necessary for Sir John Pakington to state the course which Her Majesty’s Government have to put sue. “7. That course was already indicated in Mr. Elliott’s letter of the 11th ult., as correctly quoted in your present communications. “8. 1 am, therefore, to request that you will inform the committee that Sir John Pakington feels it necessary to call upon them for payment of the amount due to the Crown in respect of the Is. 6d. received by the association on land sales. A formal notice to pay this sum by a specified time will he duly addressed to the committee, and on failure to make such payment Sir John Pakinglon will feel it his duty to exercise the power placed in his hands of putting a stop to the land selling functions of the ass ciation, or of its delegates in the colony, while it will be necessary, at the same time, for Her Majesty’s Government to take such steps as they may be advised for the recovery of the debt. “9. I am.to remind you that this is a determination which Sir John Pakington is compelled to adopt in consequence of ihe refusal of the associaiion to fulfil a condition of their constitution. Mot being able to accede to the terms on which yon propose to make the payment he has no resource but to require it unconditionally. He has been advised by the present law officers of the Crown —fully coinciding with their predecessors —that while the right of the Crown to this sum is undoubted, the Crown is equally bound to pay it over to the New Zealand Company as soon as received, in reduction of the debt created by the 10th and llih of Victoria, chap. 112. “ 10. And this being the case, he must distinctly warn the committee that if the result of these proceedings is the termination of their fane ions, this consequence is wholly attribu'able to themselves, and is not voluntarily brought on by Her Majesty’s Government To avert it the association having nothing to do but to make payment of a debt which they have repeatedly acknowledged to be due. They do not contest the right of the Crown to the sum in question ; they object only to the manner in which the Crown—acting under legal advice—feels itself bound to apply it. “11. If, on the other hand, the committee of management make the payment in question, then, while they in no degree prejudice the alleged right of the association in its present litigation with the New Zealand Company, the committee, will place it out of the power of Her Majesty’s Government, as it is certainly against their inclination to interfere with the association’s lawful proceedings. Sir John Pakington has already expressed his own opinion as to the time and circumstances under which the committee of manage ment propose to make their intended transfer; it was necessary for the purpose of this letter that he should do so, bat Lis disapproval could in no degree arrest the associauon in taking the course which they consider right and expedient. It rests with themselves to ray whether, by paying their admitted debt to the Crown, they will place themselves in a position to go on with a scheme which they appear to regard as so essential to the prosperity of the settlement under their change. “ 12. If they should persist in their refusal to do so it only remains for Sir John Pakington to state that although, under other circumstances, he could not but have greatly regretted the termination of a scheme in which uo great an interest has been taken by eminent friends of New Zealand and promoters of British colonization, yet he will be belter reconciled to it at present from his conviction of the great improbability of its long continuance, in combination with the powers intrusted to the general Legislature of New Zealand over the public land of the colony at large. “ 13. Every attention will be paid, in the event of this termination, both to the interests and the convenience t.f parties engaged in land purchasing negotiations with the association, and Sir John Pakington will be obliged bv any suggestions which may be made on this behalt in addition to those already conveyed by your letter of the 2nd ult. “ I have, &c., “ 11. Merivale.” The Chairman said that this was all the information I hey were at present in a position to give to the shareholders Mr. Laver asked whether the act passed last year did not give to the Legislative Assembly of New Zealand power to sell land at reduced prices ? The Chairman.—The wasie lands were at the disposal of that body as soon as it was created, but onefourth of the proceeds of such sales would be appropriated to the payment of the New Zealand Company’s debt. Mr. Harrington.—The secretary said that he believed that private instructions bad gone out to the colony for the purpose of constituting a legislative body as soon as it might be deemed expedient, and he did not think that any delay would be allowed to take place on the formation of that body. Such a delay could hardly be expected, considering the extreme popularity of the measure.

Major-General Briggs stid that he vas extremely disappointed that from time to time these meetings were rendered only formal, and that they were going on continually adjourning. It was a great disappointment to him to find that only three directors and a small number of shareholders were present. Among the questions raised in the report, and to which he wished to revert, was the probability of a call being made upon the shareholders. When they considered that the shareholders had been patiently submitting for the last nine years to Lave no dividend made to them, and that they had reposed every confidence in the directors. they certainly were entitled to the utmost consideration before such a call was made. In the first place they were not in possession of sufficient information to satisfy the shareholders of the necessity of this call. It was understood at the time when the company closed its proceedings in July, 1850, tl at there were then sufficient assets to meet all their liabilities, but since that time they had been going on expending money to some extent, ami yet those increased liabilities were not included in the present report. The repent, in his opinion, was incomplete and unsatisfactory, and before any demand whatever was made on the shareholders they should be convinced of the necessity of it. After the patience with which they had waited without dividend, electing the same directors over and over again during nine years, he thought that after augb an instance of confidence it became the daiy of the directors to show under what circumstances application was made to the Colonial Secretary to see if the directors could apply a part of the money furnished to them to carry on the concern of the New Zealand colony, as a loan to another company to survey lauds for their own purposes, and carry on their proceedings independently of any control of this company. In the answer to the letter of application sent by the directors he thought that the following words would be found: —“Lord Grey has no objection to the application of the money for such a purpose, provided that the directors abstain from contracting other engagements which would prevent their meeting the liabilities incurred by such grant out of the remaining balance of the advance to be made under the authority of the 10th an I 11th Victoria, chap. 112; and also that the expense of those operations shall be made a first charge on the land thus prepared for settlement.“ He understood that the money was advanced to the Canterbury Association, and, in addition to that, the directors had borrowed more money to lend to them when they required it. 1 hat money was borrowed without the sanction of the shareholders the shareholders knew nothing of the necessity for borrowing that money, and he held that the directors were not competent to borrow money, on the account of this or any other company, without the sanction of their proprietors. They might dispose of money which was in their hands—of any money which they held for the company, but they had no power to borrow more, without a proper authority for the purpose of lending it to other persons. The responsibility therefore, of this act, rested with the directors themselves, and it ought to bo most distinctly shown to the shareholders how far tiny were liable for such debts, how it was to be repaid, and from what source. Under these, circumstances, and before a call was made, it was advisable that ibey should have the information he sought, and he begged to move that this meeting be adjourned lor tiie production of it, and the considi ration of a l the circumstances it would reveal, it had been stated that 26 of the shareholders had join'd in giving a personal guarantee, nearly to the amount of the bonds which became due in D- cember for the liabilities incurred by the directors. One gentleman, however, had written i a letter, giving his reasons why he would not comply * with the request which had been made to him. He did

not ask for that letter on the present occasion, he did not wish those reasons to he read then, but it would be their duty on a future occasion to call for the letter of Mr. Buckle, as it might tend to give them valuable information on this important subject. Mr. Harrington said, that if the hon. proprietor would look at the bottom of the statment of accoui ts which had been presented he would find a statement th .t certain items of expenditure were not included. The eas >n of this was that some of the accounts had nut yet arrived from the colon*', or were not put in form, and others were at the colonial-office, having been, or being, audited by Mr. Cox, ibe Government agent. Over Mr. Cox’s proceedings they had no control, and they must wait until these accounts were returned. The resolution of the lion, proprietor denouced the statement of accounts as incomplete and imperfect, but this was not the case ; if it were so he could not present them officially, which he had done. Major-General Briggs said, that the time when a call would be made on the shareholders was fast approaching, and something must be done, if possible, to avtrt the necessity of it. The Chairman said, that the directors could not make a call without giving 21 days’ clear notice. Major-General Briggs inquired what expenses were going on?

Mr. Harrington said, hardly any. There were slight expenses, of coutse, in collecting the company’■ assets and winding up their affairs, but they were next to nothing. The only expense they would have to incur would he law expenses. It would be necessary to proceed against the Canterbury Association if they could recover their money in no other way, hut of course this would be an unavoidable expense. The company’s house would also be let in two or three months, and the offices removed to some other place, but upon this the directors had yet to decide. After some further conversation,

Major-General Briggs gave notice of a motion, which he handed in without reading.

The report was then adopted and ordered to be circulated, it being understood that the position of the corapany'novv rested in the hands of Her Majesty’s Govermnnt. The meeting then thanked the chairman and adjourned.