The New-Zealander. AUCKLAND, SATURDAY, DEC. 24, 1853.

New Zealander, Volume 9, Issue 803, 24 December 1853, Page 2

The New-Zealander.

AUCKLAND, SATURDAY, DEC. 24, 1853.

Be just and fear not: Let nil the ends thou aim’st at, be thy Country's, Thy God’s, and Truth’s.

By the Invincible , which arrived in our harbour on Thursday, we have received Melbourne Papers lo Ihe 2nd inst., being eight days later than those which furnished materials for the summary in our last number. There had been no arrival of English news within that period.

The Legislative Council had still been chiefly occupied in the consideration of the Gold Fields Management Bill, which had at length worked its way through Committee, and been read a third lime. The license fee for diggers had, after much altercation, been fixed at 1 1, for one month, 2/. for three months, 4/. for six months, and 81. for the entire year. A clause was also carried fixing the license fee for storekeepers at Ibl. per quarter, 25/. per half year, and 50/. per annum. In moving this latter taxation, the Attorney General staled that there were upwards of two thousand main and branch stores and refreshment tents on the diggings of the colony, and it was calculated that a revenue might be derived from this source amounting to between 50,000/. and 60,000/. On the third reading of the Bill, the AuditorGeneral announced that the Gold Export Duly Bill would be withdrawn, as, although the Government had not altered their opinion as to the general policy of the measure, they did not wish to press it against the strong objections urged in opposision to it from all sides of the House.

A sum of 10,000/. had been voted on the Supplementary Estimates, by a large majority, in aid of the funds appropriated for the purposes of National Education. On the question u Who is to be the new Governor If” th c Argus, in a general summary prepared for transmission to England by the Oman, has remarks conveying precisely the views we gave on Saturday as the prevailing opinions in Melbourne, especially as relates to the appreciation entertained there of Sir George Grey’s abilities . The journalist says, - - “A second Governor like Mr. Latrobe we should simply send hack; a military Governor of the Denison school would drive us into open rebellion; but a parliamentary Governor like Sir George Grey, or like the present Colonial Minister, —who would act in unison with the Legislature, and in sympathy with the people, would be the salvation of the colony. By unlocking the lands, promoting the settlement of the interior, extending the area of citizenship, organizing institutions of local self-government, throwing open the avenues to public life, and fostering a genuine parliamentary sentiment in the National Legislature, be would here lay the foundation of a second England.” It was reported that Mr. Childers, the Auditor-General, was to be Mr. Cassell’s successor as Collector of Customs. The Council had voted 500/. towards a fund for the erection of a testimonial to Mr. Cassell’s Memory. A Public Meeting had been held at Ballarat, at which strong resolutions were passed in support of the claims of diggers to representation in the Legislature, and a petition adopted praying that the elective franchise may be extended, and the lands thrown open to them, and that the Order in Council, granting leases of Crown Lands to squatters exclusively, may be rescinded. The commercial condition of Melbourne is thus described by the Argus in the general view of the state of the Colony above referred to: “ We have had a repetition of the Californian rush to Melbourne. * * * The consequence is that this market has been largely overstocked, and very serious embarrassment and great loss has been caused by the very heavy expenses of storage and other charges which have been incurred. We have heard of great sacrifices, especially of soft goods, and there has been a considerable loss also in flour, timber, and spirits, chiefly in consequence of heavy charges; at the same lime, so large is the consumption, so wealthy are many of the mei chants, and such the confidence in the market, that prices have not given way nearly so much as might have been expected.” ' , The Great Britain was announced to sail punctually at daylight on Sunday morning the 4lh inst. Sydney news to the 20th nil. had been received at Melbourne. We transfer to another column the usual commercial news, taken from the Sydney papers; but we may introduce here a passage taken from the letter of the Sydney correspondent of the Argus :—- “The advices per the Chusan have caused very considerable anxiety - and excitement

" “ ILr "” ' - ■ ■ r_ iMifi among commercial circles. There can be no doubt that the quantities of goods of all descriptions shipped from England to these colonies during the months of July and August have been enormous, while the remains of consignments, the freight of which has been already contracted for, are fearfully extensive. “ The prices at which, under the improved slate of trade, these consignments have been shipped, added to the excessive rate of freight, leaves very little room in any, and none iti some, for profit to the consignee here; and however large transactions may be, or appear to be, the participators in them will not make much out of them.” By the Overland Mail we have received Wellington papers to the 261h ult. They do not bring us actually later news than was already in our possession, but we have now our complete file of the Spectator , which had not before reached us. That of the Independent is still defective. Amongst the missing numbers of the latter journal is that of the 12th ult., which we learn, contained a letter from Mr.Sewell to the Duke of Newcastle, which was divided into no less than three hundred and forty-one paragraphs, and occupied rather more than 31 columns of the paper! Mr. Sewell must surely have got over the hurry in which he confessedly drew up his first manifestoes in the colony when he elaborated that prodiction,—especially as be found leisure to come to Wellington that it might be published there , at a lime when, as legal adviser in the Province of Canterbury, his presence at Christchurch might have been deemed eminently necessary, seeing that the Council was in Session, and lhalHis Honour the Superintendent was taking upon himself the responsibility of impugning the legality of the Governor’s transfer of the Provincial Revenues to the Provincial Councils We cannot say that wcgreally regret our not having received Mr. Sewell’s letter of three hundred and forty-one paragraphs, abusing Sir George Grey and his policy; for. had we received it, we might have fell it a duly to wade through it, and we have full, as w r ell as better, occupation afforded just now by local matters of general interest. We are content for the present to take its character on the evidence of .our Wellington contemporaries. The Spectator says,

“ This voluminous appeal to the Colonial Minister is, in fact, nothing more or less than an elaborate attack on the Governor; a feeling of undisguised inveterate hostility to His Excellency seems to have been the ruling idea, the chief motive by which it has been prompted. We do not propose to enter into a lengthened examination of the misrepresentations and false assumptions with which this letter abounds, and which seem pul forth with the intention of misleading the judgment of those who should unwarily place any reliance in its statements ; the whole aim and object of the writer is apparent in every line of this letter, and every artifice is resorted to which will assist in promoting this object ; every statement pul forth is coloured to suit his particular view." To this we shall add the pithy summary of the purport of the letter given by a correspondent of the Independent , who—after expressing bis belief that it. was a joint production of Mr. Gibbon Wakefield and the ostensible writer, —continues,— “Having premised so much, need I add, that the whole purport of the said document throughout its 341 clauses, only lends to one real purpose, divided into three sections, viz,: — “4. That E. G. Wakefield, Esq., is the only person fit to be the Governor of New Zealand. “2. That Henry Sewell, Esq,, is the right man for either Secretary, Treasurer, or Attorney-General, or all three ; and “3. That a high price, or as the great schemer terms it, a sufficient price is the proper price for New Zealand land ! 1 - “ This is really the entire pith of Mr. Sewell’s long-winded epistle.” A Government Gazette, dated the 421h nit., notified that the Civil Secretary’s Office and the Boohs of the Colonial Treasury at Wellington would be closed on the 13th Nov.: also that the Officers in charge of the Postoffice will in future be styled “ Post-mas-ters." The Spectator publishes an Address to Sir G. Grey from Ah uriri, “ signed by every adult male resident in the district,” tendering to His Excellency “their heart-felt thanks for his unwearied exertions to promote the prosperity of their adopted country and the interests of all classes under His Excellency’s Government.” There was intelligence from Otago to the Blh of October, which thus reaches us from Wellington, where it had been received via Lyttelton,—one of the many and constantly recurring illustrations of the irregularity and uncertainty of postal communication between the distant settlements. We learn now, and only now, the names of the three members returned by Otago to the House of Representatives. They are, Mr. John Cargill, son of Captain Cargill, the Superintendent of Otago; Mr. William Culten, son-in-law of' Captain Cargill, and Editor of the Otago Witness; and Mr. Janies McAndrew, of the firm of M‘Andrew & Co. of Dunedin. “All three,” says the Lyttelton Times, “ are staunch supporters of the ‘class’ character of the Free Kirk settlement.”