New Zealand Spectator, AND COOK'S STRAIT GUARDIAN. Saturday, July 13, 1850.

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume VI, Issue 516, 13 July 1850, Page 2

New Zealand Spectator, AND COOK'S STRAIT GUARDIAN. Saturday, July 13, 1850.

"Fluellin. Eat, 1 pray you: Will you haye some moresauceto your leek? fl there is not enough leek to jwrear by. Pistol. Quiet thy cudgel; thou dost see I eat."

After a good deal of goading Mr. Fox has at length broken his silence, and put forth in his organ the Independent a sort of explanation of the late bill transactions, and anything more miserably inconclusive* more weak or lame as a defence in answer to the charges brought against him, it is impossible to conceive, In spite of his blustering and swaggering, he virtually admits all that has been advanced ; like Pistol, he eats his leek, though it must be confessed, with a very bad grace. He acknowledges that the Company could not meet its engagements, that the Manager of the Bank exercised a sound discretion in refusing to discount their bills without the endorsement of the Provincial Treasurer, and that the money was ultimately paid by the Government. Mr. Fox's mode of reasoning is peculiar, and somewhat after this fashion. The Local Government not only meet their own engagements but provide for those of the Company, therefore they are bankrupt ; but "it is childish to attempt to fix a charge of bankruptcy on the Company," because they are unable to meet their engagements. But Mr. Fox entirely omits to notice the principal charges against him ; that while the Government, besides meeting their own obligations, were sustaining the credit of the Company, their Agent was accusing the former of bankruptcy and insolvency; and that at the very time he was asserting the Company were ready to pay for fresh districts, if the Government would purchase them, he knew his employers were unable to pay for those that had already been bought. But as the attempt to meet these charges with any degree of candour would only involve more awkward and humiliating admissions, he perhaps deems it more prudent to evade them, and, therefore, passes them over in silence. But he sees nothing in all this, that "the Company's Agent can be ashamed of !" Among other odd notions, we are informed that the Home Government are "virtual partners" with the Company, though the partnership arrangements appear to be somewhat unusual. As far as these can be understood from Mr. Fox's explanation the Government have to meet all the responsibilities of the business, while the profits, if any, are claimed by the Company, and he is perfectly astonished at " the prudery of the Local Government" in exhibiting so decided a disinclination to be admitted into so flourishing a concern on similar terms. But the settlers will be inclined to think the sooner so unequal a partnership is dissolved the better both for the Government and the Colony. But whatever becomes of the Company's other engagements, we are told their ordinary expenditure is duly provided for, in other words, that the Agent and their other officers, having nothing else to do but to receive their salaries, take very good care at all events to secure themselves. We are at a loss to know what Mr. Fox means about our insinuations as to the understanding between the Company's Agent and the Bank, a subject about which we have never troubled ourselves. Oar statement was to the effect (and it is no mean praise of its present Manager) that the Bank is now conducted on strictly commercial principles, irrespective of party feeling or political predilections, and we may add that we believe this to be the general opinion. Mr. Fox's statement that Lord Grey promised the Company that the Local Government ' f should find the purchase money for the waste lands of the Port Cooper district"

is certainly new and requires confirmation. If such a promise has ever been really made it is rather strange that neither the Company nor their Agent should have published the despatch containing this promise for general information. The last paragraph, of Mr. Fox's defence, in which he states that acting under his instructions from home, he might, if he thought proper, " throw up his colonial operations altogether" is an important admission, since in effect he acknowledges the dissolution or, as he expresses it, the retirement of the Company. This admission furnishes a strong additional reason to the land purchasers for resisting the Conveyancing Job, and for prudently waiting until the news of the Company's dissolution is officially proclaimed. They will then escape the iniquitous tax attempted to be levied upon them, and if the Company's liabilites are transferred to the Government there can be little doubt that they will receive the same consideration, by obtaining Crown Grants to their lands at a trifling cost, which has already been shewn them in completing the purchase of the Rangitikei district.

Hating in our previous article, noticed at some length Mr. Fox's pitiful defence of himself and his employers, we must bestow a few remarks, en passant, on the letter which follows, and which is as fitting an accompaniment to it, as the Merry Andrew to the charlatan at a village fair. We will preface our observations with the following story. A man playing at cards with a noted sharper whom he suspected was cheating him, suddenly seized a fork, and catch* ing the sharper in the act by pinning his hand to the table said, " if the ace of spades is not under your hand I beg your pardon." We owe a somewhat similar apology to the presumed author of the letter referred to, if in common with very many others we ascribe it to the wrong person, but we believe he might have indifferently signed himself " a Colonist," or "W. Fitzherbert." The internal evidence the letter affords of its author (in spite of the disguise of an anonymous signature — the crape over his face while making a personal attack) is so strong as hardly to admit of mistake, the likeness it bears to its putative parent is as plain as the nose on his face. Who but the Thersites of the settlement, " half bully, half buffoon," could have produced such a tissue of scurrility, calumny, and personal abuse ? The letter professes to be aimed at the editor of the Spectator and his contributors. The remarks against ourselves may be dismissed with merited contempt seeing they are threadbare calumnies of the writer and his party, which have too often been refuted and exposed to require further notice. But when this Bachelor of Cambridge, baculo magisquam lauro dignus, ventures to criticize the able letter of the " Member of the University of Oxford" which appeared in a recent number of the Spectator, when he presumes to lecture on style, education, and the attainments which do honour to our ancient seats of learning, he betrays such remarkable ignorance of bis mother tongue, he shows himself to be so entirely unacquainted with the commonest rules of grammar, that any one who reads his production must feel convinced that, in describing those who leave the universities neither scholars nor gentlemen, and who reflect but little credit on the place of their education, he ha 3 unconsciously supplied us with a portrait of himself, that he himself must be classed among those whom the University would be sorry to acknowledge. How little he knows either of the contributors to this Journal or of our sources of information is shewn in the ludicrous mistakes which immediately follow, and which are the clumsy inventions of his disordered brain. In attempting to palliate the conduct of the Company's Principal Agent with reference to the gross job meditated in the conveyances to their land purchasers, he damages his friend in the excuse he offers since, if Mr. Fox found no difficulty in accepting a legal appointment under the Government when he abandoned the Company, (which he subsequently threw up when he ratted again to the service of the latter with the prospect of securing a sinecure of £1000 a-year,) he would mid as little difficulty in preparing the conveyances from the Company to their land purchasers if he were really disposed to make himself useful, and do something for the money he receives which, it is to be feared, will ultimately come out of the pockets of the settlers. But we have exceeded the limits we proposed to ourselves in noticing this stupid and malignant tissue of personalities ; we will only in conclusion add, that we hope we may never be so unfortunate as to receive the commendation of Thersites or his party ; their abuse

is but the indirect homage which knavery and faction pay to integrity and consistency of purpose. Malts displicere laudari est.

On Thursday evening a lecture was delivered at the Athenaeum by the Rev. W. Kirton, on the Immortality of the Soul. The attendance, considering the unfavourable state of the weather, was very numerous, the Hall being nearly full. The lecture, which lasted an hour and a half, was extremely interesting; the lecturer, having by his manner of treating the subject, succeeded effectually in engaging the attention of his auditors.

By the Maria Josephine we have received Nelson Examiners to the 29th ult. The Examiner of the last mentioned date contains a letter from Mr. Impey, giving an account of his overland trip, which we intend inserting in our next number.