NEW ZEALAND SPECTATOR AND Cook's Strait Guardian. Saturday, October 7, 1854.

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume IX, Issue 958, 7 October 1854, Page 3

NEW ZEALAND SPECTATOR AND Cook's Strait Guardian. Saturday, October 7, 1854.

We have reprinted fiom the New Zealander the closing scene of the first session of the House of Representatives at Auckland. From some cause or other we were unable, until the return of the steamer, to procure a copy of the New Zealander containing a report of the proceedings on that memorable occasion — a copy was, we believe, in possession of the Independent } but of course the Provincial Executive took very good care not"to publish in their paper what could not but prove very damaging to their friends. Hitherto, from the Sydney papers or from other sources f we have obtained a general idea, — a rough outline of what took place ; here we have a complete and accurate account, with all the details carefully filled in, an account admitted by eye witnesses to be faithfully correct. Of course such a melancholy exhibition is 1 very painful to con template — but it is fitting the truth should be told ; it is right the electors should know how their representatives have conducted themselves j as,if thepresentmem-

bers again solicit the suffrages of the electors, they will appeal to their past conduct as a claim to their confidence ; — and those who admit the claim will become the aiders and abettors of these men of violence. It is scarcely possible to imagine a more factious or disgraceful scene, whether regard be had to Mr. Sewell's assault of Mr. Mackay, to Mr. Revans' characteristic outrageous conduct, the locking of the doors, or the Speaker's gross partiality, all is in keeping, all is equally bad, and wherever the story travels, among impartial persons there will be but one opinion — that such men were very unfit to be legislators, and that if Representative Institutions are to be carried out in New Zealand by such men, they have been granted too soon. Nothing can be more striking than the contrast afforded by the proceedings of the two houses. " The conduct of the Legislative Council has throughout been decorous, temperate, .and business like, that of the House of Assembly quite the reverse. And the " Commons," as Mr. Fitzgerald's party delight to call the House of Assembly, seem to invite a comparison between the two, to call the special attention of the electors to the difference between them in the resolutions adopted by them with reference to the payment of the members, which — unintentionally on their part — are the most severe satire on themselves. They vote no salary to the Speaker, no money in payment of the expenses of the members of the Upper House, because, they say, they should be thoroughly independent, "especially of Executive influence ;" and vote a liberal allowance to the Speaker and to themselves, or as the resolutions phrase it, provide for themselves "on a liberal rather than on a parsimonious scale," because, it is naturally to be inferred they can lay no claim to this distinction, and having the care of the money bag, they have an especial eye to its contents with reference to themselves. This explains sufficiently their desperate and unscrupulous attempt to clutch all the offices and power which " Executive influence" could confer, especially their anxious desire to get the waste lands of fthe colony under their .control — this sufficiently accounts for their extreme rage and mortification on finding they have so signally failed in obtaining what they so greedily coveted, that when they put forth their hands to seize it, like the wealth of Tantalus,' it has eluded their grasp.

On Thursday evening a lecture was delivered at the Wellington Athenseum by the Rev. J. Moir on Education. The subject had been previously treated of by previous lecturers during the season, but by his ingenious arguments and happy illustrations he shewed that those who had preceded him had by no means exhausted the subject. Mr. Moir advocated the necessity of Education by the State ; as the Government had the power to punish men for breaking the law he considered it was their duty to instruct the people to read and to put them in a position to understand the laws they were bound to obey, and rightly to discharge their duties as citizens. He condemned the voluntary system because there was a vast number of persons whom it was impossible to reach by that system, and after dwelling at some length on the denominational system which he considered ill adapted to the colony, expressed a decided preference in favour of schools conducted on the principle either of the British and Foreign, or Irish plan. The lecture, which was nearly two hours long, was listened to with great attention by ft numerous audience, and was considered to be one of the best that has been delivered during the season.