New Zealand Colonist. TUESDAY, MAY 23, 1843.

New Zealand Colonist and Port Nicholson Advertiser, Volume I, Issue 85, 23 May 1843, Page 2

New Zealand Colonist. TUESDAY, MAY 23, 1843.

On Saturday last a complaint was preferred before Mr. Macdonogh, the Police Magistrate, by W. Galpin, against a native for an assault, and for having pulled down a fence which he had erected. Mr. Macddnogh promptly issued a warrant for the apprehension of the native, who was taken into custody in the course of the afternoon. The case came on to be heard yesterday, when it appears the native was discharged on the ground, as we understand, that the land occupied by the complainant was an old-native clearing. As we have no report of the proceeding, we cannot, however, speak positively as to the ground upon which the case was dismissed.

This incident 'forms an apt illustration of ‘the condition in -which the settlers find themselves placed between the ‘Company and the Government. On the one hand, if we ask of the Company a fulfilment of their promises, we are told that the Government has interfered, and has taken the matter out of the hands of the Directors and their Agent. And on the other, when we appeal to the Government for that protection which is essential to the progress, almost to the existence, of the Settlement, we are told that the Company has no right to take or to deliver possession of land which the natives have not even nominally sold. And in the meantime cultivation is checked, the energies of the settlers-.are repressed, and a feeling of hostility, the more dangerous because it is mixed with a sense of positive injury, is excited towards the natives. Under -every aspect, the present state of affairs is calculated to excite at once doubt and indignation. In the mean time, we who suffer at the present moment, and the natives, for whose ultimate fate we are apprehensive, are equally devoid of blame. We have purchased and paid for land that we imagined the Company had a right to sell—and we desire only -to be put in possession of our purchase. On the other hand the natives, who deny the sale to the Company, and from what we can learn, with justice, at least as far as the natives of Te Aro are concerned, are disposed to resist the seizure of land which they claim. Nor can we in our conscience accuse them of wrong in so doing. We ask from the Company justice, and from the government protection ; and ‘the natives ask the same. We require possession of the land we have bought, and to be protected in its enjoyment. The natives ask to be protected in the enjoyment of lands which they have not sold. We do not now enquire who is to blame for the dilemma in which we are now placed. We care little about the past. We look to the present and the future. Forbidden to right ourselves, we claim from those who have received our money as the price of land, that they should give us the land for which we have paid; and from those who are daily taking our money as the price of protection, that they should protect us. And we must be allowed to tell each, that they are under the obligation of a pressing duty to comply with these our demands. We use no threats. We know too well our present impotence. But as the one regard their honor as men, and the other their character as statesmen, they must take measures for our relief. If not, the irresistible march of events will bring about results from which all would recoil

at the present moment; but which are nevertheless inevitable.

It is indeed a pitiable contemplation, to witness the progress of a community impeded—the fate of an interesting race put in hazard—a great national undertaking jeopardized by a spirit of parsimony or of pique on the one side, and by what we cannot but characterise as narrow and unstatesmanlike views on the other. Out of the 100,000 acres given out by the Company, the settlers are able to occupy no more than the district of Karori, a few hundred acres at the commencement of the Porirua river, and about an equal quantity in the valley of the Hutt! litis is a state of things which' ought not to, and \jßnnot last. The evils are daily augmenting, and so far as we are aware, nothing is done by either of the two parties to whom we must look, in order to devise or to apply a remedy. It is to, be feared that before they are awakened from

their torpor, the period for its application may have elapsed.

We have been informed that the Columbine in coming out of the Wanganui River got on to the bar in consequence of its falling calm. She will have go undergo some repairs before she can proceed. We have received from a correspondent at Wanganui the details of this disaster, which we shall publish in our next. A jolly boat has been drifted on shore at Rangatiki. N

One of the crew of the American whaler Sophia and Eliza , now in harbor, was fool-hardy enough last night to attempt to swim on board from the shore, when Mr. Brown of the Commercial Hotel, and several gentlemen from the shore, put off in a boat, and rescued him from a watery grave.