NEW ZEALAND COMPANY'S PRINCIPAL AGENT.

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume VI, Issue 527, 21 August 1850, Page 2

NEW ZEALAND COMPANY'S PRINCIPAL AGENT.

Letter from the Secretary to the Directors of the New Zealand Company to Earl Grey, reporting Mr. Fox's nomination as Principal

Agent in the room of the late Colonel Wakefield :— New Zealand House, February 2, 1849. My Lord, — On receipt of authentic intelligence of the decease of the late Principal Agent of the New Zealand Company in New Zealand, the Court of Directors_bave loit no time either in filling up the immediate vacancy has been thereby occasioned, or in proriding so far as is in their power against the possible consequences of a recurrence of an event similar to that which has deprived them so suddenly of the valued services of that lamented officer. For the former of these purposes they have appointed as the successor of Colonel Wakefield, Mr. William Fox, the gentleman who was provisionally selected for that office by Colonel Wakefield bhnself, so long ago as the year 1845 ; was employed as the Company's ' resident agent at the settlement of Nelson from that date, until recently nominated by Sir George Grey to be the Attorney General of the Southern Province ; having subsequently declined tbat appointment, was fortunately on the spot, and disengaged at the moment of Colonel Wakefield's death ; and, although not alluded to in the despatch of the Governor, is stated by the public newspapers to have assumed the duties of Principal Agent of the Company. In providing against the second of the contingencies above mentioned, the declining or ceasing of Mr. Fox to hold office, the best expedient that has suggested itself to the Directors and their solicitor, is to appoint prospectively and in succession, the local agents for the time being, of the several settlements of Nelson, New Plymouth, and Otago ; and failing the last of these, then such person as may be nominated by the Governor or Lieu tenantGovernor, or other officer for the time being, administering the government of that part of New Zealand where the settlement of Wellington is situated. The emergency of the occasion, and the shortness of the time, the ship Mariner being at this moment under immediate despatch for New Zealand, have prevented the Directors from previously asking the consent of your Lordship to the arrangement last mentioned. But while these circumstances will, they trust, be received as a sufficient excuse for the apparent omission, they hope also, that in the subsisting relations between the Company and Her Majesty's Government, and having regard to the manner in which the iuterests of the Crown must, 'under those relations be of necessity affected by the want of a due representative of the Company, your Lordship will consider the proposed arrangement as not only unobjectionable, but beneficial. I am therefore instructed to transmit the accompanying extract from the power of attorney, which has been this day sealed with the corporate seal of the Company, containing so much of the same as relates to the provisional appointments in question ; and to request that if it obtain your Lordship's approval, you will do the Directors the favour to give it efficacy by the transmission of coriesponding instructions to the Governor-in-Cbief and Lieute-nant-Governor of New Zealand. I am further instructed to apprise your Lordship that the Directors have not failed to impress upon Mr. Fox their desire, that his administration of the affairs of the Company shall be marked always by that ready co-ope-ration with the Government, aud those zealous < endeavours to promote the prosperity of the i colony, the well-being of individuals, and con- i tinual harmony between the Company and its 1 settlers, which characterized the official career I of his predecessor, and formed its appropriate i last crowning act ; and by which Mr. Fox's i performance of his own duties, while in charge of the settlement of Nelson, was in like man- i Her distinguished. j ' I have, &c, i c (Signed) T. C. Harington. , j The Right Hon. Earl Grey, 1 Secretary of State for the Colonies, '. &c, &c, &c. «