VAN DIEMAN’S LAND.

New Zealand Colonist and Port Nicholson Advertiser, Volume I, Issue 31, 15 November 1842, Page 4

VAN DIEMAN’S LAND.

We have received English news to the 13th of June last. The new hill for the government of your colony was brought forward. It is similar to the one introduced by Lord John Russell last season, and withdrawn; but it provides for the establishment of municipal institutions. You will not be surprised to hear that Sir John Franklin’s successor was appointed; but on whom this government has been bestowed was not known to the subordinates in Downing-strcet. Sir John’s government has been throughout most conte&ptible, and something worse—it has been imbecile. Being a wQak-minded man, he has been the dupe of advisers, who have led him into all kinds of scrapes. He commenced his administration by discarding Machoniche —the tried friend of twenty years —whom he sought a quarrel with at Montagu’s instance; one of lii3 last acts is suspending the latter individual, who has gone to England to while his time in the " sighing rooms of the Colonial Office.” As with all men in authority who do not possess sufficient judgment in themselves, Sir John has bestowed his favouritism on a Dr. Mulligan —who he is nobody knows, and where he came from and what were his former occupations, arc all involved in mystery. To the surprise and astonishment of the whole colony, this person has been installed in the responsible charge and care of 7,000 convicts, under the name of “ Inspector of the department of Convict Discipline.” Remonstrances to this nomination by his Excellency’s friends have been vain ; for it is a proverb that lie is as obstinate as he is foolish. The appointment cannot last, unless the same Dr. Mulligan turns out able to undertake an office requiring abilities of no common order. Sir John Franklin has lately been astonishing the members of our quasi legislature, by assuming all the palaver, in imitation of Sir George Gipps, and he has made a lamentable exhibition of himself. To have seen the distortion of his features, and to have marked the bad feeling when he replied to the Catholics’ petition for an increased sum from the colonial fund, for building the chapel in Macquarie-street, was a scene only worthy a bigotted mind. It would he the extreme of bad taste in any person, however high his station in society, to tell a clergyman, of whatever religious denomination, that he made statements which were untrue. Sir John Franklin did this, in a manner the most offensive, to the Rev. Mr. Therry ; and what is worse than all, he proved from liis own mouth that the Catholics’ statement of their case was the true one.—“ lie that hideth hatred with lying lips, and he that uttereth a slander is a fool.” When his Excellency leaves our shores these acts of jobbery, with others, will not easily be forgotten.—“ The evil that men do lives after them.” The colonists with us arc generally of opinion that there is nothing would prove so beneficial to our best and dearest interests as passing a law to restrict the interest on money; and if the council were composed of responsible members, instead of Governmehjt nominees, such a law would pass by a great majority. The objectors to such a law are the foreign banks and the usurers themselves; with us the Union and Australasian banks are the most illiberal, and if there were any right feeling in the colonists these establishments would not have so much power. P.S. You must not expect any enlarged or liberal measures from Lord Stanley, as he has brought in a bill for Newfoundland which abolishes the council and house of assembly, and substitutes a legislative council, to be composed of members three-fifths of whom are to be elected, and the remaining two-fifths government nominees. We have seen letters from England of the very latest date. Sir John Franklin is positively removed, but it is not publicly known who is his successor. We may, however, state, that as the Bolivar was on the point of sailing the captain was applied to, to know whether he could give accommodation for four horses for the new Governor of Van Diemen’s Land.— Australian Chronicle.