New Zealand Spectator AND COOK'S STRAITS GUARDIAN. Saturday, October 12, 1844.

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume I, Issue 1, 12 October 1844, Page 2

New Zealand Spectator AND COOK'S STRAITS GUARDIAN. Saturday, October 12, 1844.

The first number of a new paper generally puts forth a sort of programme of its intended performances in the shape of a statement of its political principles. On the present occasion, however, we have neither time nor space to follow such a practice. The Bella Marina is about to sail direct for England, and it is of paramount importance that she should convey authentic and public intelligence respecting the position and piospects of the colony. First then, regarding its position. After nearly nine months passed, for a few days, in hope and afterwards in doubt,- fear, and anxiety respecting the views and intentions of the Local Government, we are arrived at the conclusion that, as far as the interests of Cook's Straits are concerned, it is no Government at all. The settlement of the Land Question is the hinge on which every other question in New Zealand turns, because it involves the very existence of the colony. As was natural this first, last, great fundamental subject waspressed on the attention of Captain Fitzroy on, we believe, the very day he arrived here, nearly nine months ago. His reply to the Deputation, that waited upon him on the subject, was to the effect that he wondered what the former Government had been about, and that he would not leave Port Nicholson till the Land Question had been adjusted. How has this public, unqualified pledge on a point which is the basis of our colonial existence been redeemed ? Captain Fitzroy informed the New Zealand Company that they must make a second payment for that which they believed they had fully purchased before, and that when that had been done he would issue Crown grants for the land. The Company's Agent immediately deposited the money required, in the Bank, in the name of the Protector of Aborigines, where it now remains. Some of the natives received a second payment, and some declined it. No Crown grant for an inch of land was made, and Captain Fitzroy left Port Nicholson. The next public occasion on which Capt. Fitzroy dealt with the Land Question, w<ts at Taranaki. There, as our readers know, two parties had been paid for the land ; first, those resident upon or putting forward titles to the land, who- received payment from the Company ; and secondly, the Waikatos, who claimed by right of conquest, and received payment from the late Capt. Hobson. Further payment being asked by the natives now resident there, who according to the New Zetland constitution, lost all their rights on being made slaves by the Waikatos, the matter was referred to " the examination and determination" of Mr. Commissioner Spain, who decided that the Maori slaves were not entitled to any payment. The settlers, however, could not get possession of their laud without the assistance of the Government and they applied to Captain Fitzroy. He repaired to Taranaki, compared the Maori slaves to England landowners having been made prisoners of war by France, and who on , their .return to England, found themselves ousted of their land and were entitled to repossession, and declared the Maori slaves were entitled to payment. Thus, in half an hour, Captain Fitzroy, in full uniform, marched through Mr. .Commissioner Spain's award, abrogated as far as he could the proceedings of the late Governor, and trampled upon the laws and customs of the natives, aud also, we believe, upon many grants of land in other places founded on the recognition of these very laws and cus--toms. Concerning the Land Question then, we were going to say, that Captain Fitzroy had done nothing — but that would be incorrect, he has done infinite mischief. At Port Nicholson by sanctioning, if not compelling the payment and receipt of money on a condition 'which has not been complied with, he has added to the distrust previously existing between the settlers and the natives, and he has destroyed all confidence among the settlers in the Local Government. At Taranaki he has raised a question amongst the Maories which

will not be easily solved, by abrogating their common law regarding slavery ; he has shaken the validity of grants from the Crown to settlers in other places, based on this Maori law, andlfcn the whole he has added so much to the comJfcfttion of the Land Question, both at Port Nicholson and at Taranaki, that no rational person could venture to predict that it will ever be settled. There being then no hope from the land the settlers in Port Nicholson might, one would conceive, turn to the water and trust to commerce for a living. There, however, his Excellency the Governor will meet them. About two months ago the natives at the Bay of Islands attacked the settlers, broke open their stores, seized their cattle,tore down the flag staff & insulted the wifes & daughters of the settlers. Information of these proceeding having been received at Auckland, the Governor sent to Sydney for two hundred troops, and, on their arrival, announced his intention of proceeding to the Bay of Islands. Before he started, however, there was a flourish of trumpets in the Auckland press and by the Government officials, about the supremacy of the law, the outrage to the British flag,the absolute necessity of upholding the moral superiority of the whites over the Maories, the degradation and infamy of submitting to insult from savages, and many other phrases, none of which were ever heard respecting the Massacre at the Wairau, where men of ten thousand times greater worth, than all the writers in the Auckland press ard all the Government toadies in New Zealand, were cruelly butchered, and every body concluded that the Maories were about to be put down. On the Governor's arrival near the scene of outrage, he had several communications with the native chiefs, of which the result was, that the troops were sent away and a day fixed for a public conference. To this conference both the Governor and the chiefs seem to have gone with set speeches, and to have perfectly understood each other. We can only refer to the Governor's long address, in which was an elaborate enconium on the English flag, (and a not very complimentary mention of the French one,) by saying, that the highway robberies, the assaults on the women, and the tearing down the British flag staff were all bartered for ten muskets. We ought to add, that in order to shew the Maories that he was not of a grasping disposition, Captain Fitzroy returned them on the spot. Before this conference, however, the natives having complained that the payment of duties by the whalers was injurious to them, the Governor informed the chiefs that he had made the Bay of Islands a free port, in other words, he proclaimed impunity to smugglers throught the Islands. Where now is your commerce, we ask of the commercial settlers at Port Nicholson ? for you cannot compete with those who have no duty to pay by any recognized mode of trading, and yet you must trade or starve ! No : There is a middle course, — you can smuggle. We may safely say then, that the position of the affairs of this settlement is as bad as possible. The settlers are without land, and without any prospect of obtaining it; and the intimate connexion between land and commerce is such that the latter must languish if the former be withheld. How different might not the state of things have been had Governor Fitzroy taken the trouble to inform himself before he decided upon his actions. The means of information too were most abundant. On his arrival here, every man, woman, and child in this place were disposed to look upon him as a father come to save them for impending ruin. The insults, tyranny, and oppression of his predecessors, would have insured a welcome to the most obscure and incompetent new Governor that ever issued from Downing-street ; and therefore the hopes of good from a man of Capt. Fitzroy's rank and reputation were, although perhaps immoderate, most heartily sincere. He might have done what he liked with the whole population, and what did he do ? The very day he landed he displayed an imperious harshness almost amounting to personal enmity towards those who came in contact with him. He placed the bar of contemptuous indifference between him and the settlers, respecting matters which they deemed of vital importance, and of course he left the

place as ignorant on the various subjects which people here have studied for years, as he was of the valley of the Hutl, which he has not seen. Since that time, about eight months ago, he has been inside the harbour for a few hours, but would not set his foot amongst us, and this is all the settlers here have known about him. We began by saying, that as respects the interests of Cook's Straits, we have no Government at all, and we conclude as we began. We certainly have a gentleman of a noble family as a Governor, and perhaps, fifty officials, some of whom wear uniforms, and all of whom receive salaries. We have clergymen too in abundance, with a lord Bishop at their head, but we have no one who knows our wants or concerns himself for our welfare.