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New Zealand Spectator, AND COOK'S STRAIT GUARDIAN. Saturday, February 27, 1847.

Onb of the uses of a newspaper in a new colony i 3 to collect from various sources and a* to reproduce to its readers ■ the expression of opinion published in other colonies or in the mother country on any public movement made by the settlers, or on any question of public importance affecting their interests. The settlers are by this means enabled in some degree to judge of the effect produced by their efforts in agitating any public question, by the interest attached to it out of the colony ; it revives at convenient intervals the discussion of these questions and keeps them prominently >before4he public, encouraging the settlers to renewed exertion, until they finally succeed in the attainment of their objects. With this view we have extracted from the Sydney Morning Herald of 13th January, their review of the Letter of the Land Purchasers of this settlement to the Directors of the New Zealand Company. It is evident, from the clear and correct outline given of its statements and argumentsj that the writer of this article, which occupies two closely printed columns of the Herald, has carefully considered the Letter. The following are his introductory obsertions: — We have been favoured with the perusal of a pamphlet, printed at Wellington, Port Nicholson, and entitled " A Letter to the Directors of the New Zealand Company, from the Land Purchasers resident in the first and principal Settlement, claiming Compensation for the Company's breach of Contract, and calling upon the Directors to fulfil the terms of Purchase/ 1 The letter is founded on certain resolutions passed at a public meeting of the owners of land orders, held on the 29th July, 1846, and was drawn up by acommitee appointed by that meeting, and was approved -of and adopted in public meeting on a subsequent day. The letter is in every sense worthy of the attentive perusal of all interested iv New Zealand affairs. In the calm, unjmpassioned assertion of what they feel to be their just claims — in the quiet yet telling rebuke with which they vit.it the manifold failures of promise on the part of the Directors, and the injustice thereby done to them, as well as in the close reasoning, aud clear and impressive language in which these claims are made, and these censures conveyed, we believe that few documents have gone home from the Australasian colonies which deserve a more careful entertainment than the present. Neither can we, judging from all that we have been enabled to glean, from private information, from official documents, and from the; tone of the public press, believe that the land purchasers have indulged in any exaggerated statements. The hardships to which they have been subjected have long been matter "of general comment, although perhaps the mode in which that hardship had been inflicted was not so well understood. Neither has the attention of the colonists in this portion of Australasia been so urgently culled of late to the affairs of our sister province, without feeling that the evasion of its contracts by the New Zealand Company, its shuffling procrastination of the fulfilment of its promises, and the plausible inconsistencies which have characterised and stigmatised its management, hay« tended much to enhance, if not to produce, the confusion and disasters which have recently prevailed in that unhappy colony. From the first to the last, the New Zealand Company has been what joint, stock colonizing, companies ever will be, a stumbling block in the way of successful colonization. " Left to* to their unaided and unfettered efforts, the enterprising settlers in New Zealand who have been ruined by their dependence on this selfish combination of home capitalists, would have secured wealth to themselves and prosperity to the colony in which they had planted themselves. But from the time of their first bargain with the Company, they have been - treacherously dealt with. Under the most specious show of honourable intentions to ful- ' fil its engagements to the settlers, the Company has insidiously evaded, one by one, every term of its compact, and at last, after having - made the sufferings of the settlers, the necessity of its fulfilling its engagements with them,; the instruments whereby to extort from the ; Imperial Government the fulfilment of promises to itself, it throws the settlers over with the barefaced assertion that they have no claim on the Company for compensation. The writer then proceeds to give a careful analysis of the «tatements contained in

the Letter, and concludes his review with the following-remarks : — • In thus briefly recapitulating the leading topics argued in this very able and forcible document, we feel our inability to do it the justice it deserves, but we have confidence that the hitherto impenetrable selfishness of the New Zealand monopoly will be shaken by its unanswerable -appeal. If not, we have still greater confidence, that what its grasping injustice would deny to the fair claims of the appellants will be conceded to that firm and -resolute determination to obtain justice which breathes forth in every page of this admirable letter. - The above extracts serve to show the impression made in Sydney by the arguments advanced in the Letter of the Land Purchasers in support of their claims on the Company. The interval of a few months will enable us to judge of the effect produced by " the Letter, and the discussions to which it ' has given rise, on that part of the public in England interested in New Zealand affairs. The present is certainly the best, perhaps the only opportunity which will occur for the agitation of this subject with the hope "of obtaining any practical result. After the •land claims are settled and the different questions adjusted which still remain open between the Government and the Company the settlers will find to their cost that the time has past ; — they will te told they are too late.

H.M.S. Calliope will sail in the course of a few days for Porirua and Wanganui.

A proclamation, dated the 23rd February, has been issued by his Excellency the Governor, relieving from the jurisdiction of martial law that part of the Southern district of New Zealand, south of a line drawn from Wanganui on the south coast to Gastle Point on the east coast, as "the present circumstances of the colony render it unnecessary that martial law should be longer exercised within the said district." The proclamation is to take effect from and after the 15th of March next.

On Thursday the Lady Rvwena arrived from Twofold Bay, after a passage of fourteen days. The cattle were landed without any casualty, and in excellent condition; but owing to rough and rainy weather at starting a good number of sheep were lost on the passage. The Ltwestoft arrived yesterday from the same place, but was moie fortunate in her sheep, having only lost thirtyfour sheep out-of 150, and four out of fifty head of cattle. The Sir John Byng, which sailed from Twofold Bay with stock ten days before the Ladj Rowena, arrived here yesterday afternoon.

Twentt-five fat bullocks and two hundred fat wethers were sent from Wellington yesterday morning by Capt. Rhodes, whose contract for the supply of the troops stationed at Wanganui for the ensuing quarter has been accepted. They were very favourable specimens of the stock of this district.

We have received several complaints lately of a nuisance existing near Dixon Street, Te-Aro. We are informed that a person living in that neighbourhood is in the habit of soaking sheep-skins, (which, at this warm season of the year, must necessarily be very much fly-blown), to cleanse the wool, in the water of the Te-Aro stream. In passing near the spot, the smell of these skins during this warm weather is quite offensive, and must, we should think, affect the health of the inhabitants ; especially if they are invalids, as in the Military Hospital which is close to the spot. Nor is this, bad as it is, tfte* worst of the evil, the water is used for l drinking, and the water-casks of the different vessels frequenting the harbour are filled at this stream, which is thus rendered unfit for use. We are sure we have only to direct the attention of the local authorities to this matter to cause such steps to be taken as are necessary to remove this nuisance, and to secure the health and comfort of the inhabitants residing in the neighbour, hood.

W* are informed that the contract for supplying the troops stationed at Wanganui with fresh meat was taken at 6f d. per lb. As the stock required for the contract must for the most part be sent from Wairarapa, Bd. and 9d. per lb., the present price of beef and mutton in Wellington to the settlers, appear? to be unreasonably high ; after the late numerous importations of stock, we may hope that there will soon be a reduction in the price of butchers' meat.

"Wellington Savings Bank. — Dr. Fitzgerild, Mr. R. Hart, Mr. F. M. Hervey,

and Mr. J. Johnstone, the Managers in rotation, will attend to receive deposits at Messrs. Johnson & Moore's store, from seven to eight o'clock on Saturday evening, the 27thFebruary, 1847, and at the Union Bank of Australia, from twelve to one o'clock on Monday forenoon, the 29th February.

Permanent link to this item
Hononga pūmau ki tēnei tūemi

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/NZSCSG18470227.2.3

Bibliographic details
Ngā taipitopito pukapuka

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume III, Issue 165, 27 February 1847, Page 2

Word count
Tapeke kupu
1,559

New Zealand Spectator, AND COOK'S STRAIT GUARDIAN. Saturday, February 27, 1847. New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume III, Issue 165, 27 February 1847, Page 2

New Zealand Spectator, AND COOK'S STRAIT GUARDIAN. Saturday, February 27, 1847. New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume III, Issue 165, 27 February 1847, Page 2

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