ZEALAND TO THE SECRETARY OF STATE.

65

A.—No. U

authority of the Governor has been superseded. They contend that it is beyond the power of a Secretary of State to issue instructions to a subordinate officer wliich virtually cancel the commission held by Her Majesty's representative in this Colony. If the Imperial Government did not consider that their instructions were carried out by the Governor, the obvious course was open to relieve him from his duties, and not to resort to the unconstitutional course of delegating his powers to a subordinate officer from a desire to avoid such an alternative. The Governor of the Colony, as the Bepresentative of the Queen, is an integral part of the Constitution of the Country, which Ministers are bound, as far as possible, to maintain inviolate; and they are alarmed when a Secretary of State seeks to set aside the Constitution by a formal Despatch. Nor is their objection on this point merely theoretical. It has been ascertained from reliable sources that the rebel Natives on the West Coast were on the eve of tendering their allegiance at the very time selected by a subordinate officer to give orders for the withdrawal of Imperial Troops occupying certain posts on that coast. It cannot be doubted by those who know the rapidity with which news is circulated amongst the Natives, that they are already acquainted with the reason of these orders, and understand that these detachments are removed in contempt of the authority of Her Majesty's representative. Neither can it be a matter of doubt that no more effectual mode could have been adopted to encourage those in rebellion. Had the Governor been enabled to inform these Natives who were lately on the eve of making their submission that he would take upon himself the responsibility of removing the soldiers so soon as he was satisfied of their return to loyalty, —it is not improbable that the outstanding rebels would quickly have submitted. The same objections are applicable to tho mode in which detachments have been withdrawn from outposts in other parts of the Colony. While thus objecting to the agency by which, and the manner in wliich the withdrawal of the Troops has been effected, Ministers deem it wholly unnecessary to rebut any opinion which might be entertained that they or the Colony objected to their being withdrawn, and they take this opportunity of reiterating the statement made in their Memorandum of the 15th ultimo, in reference to Lord Carnarvon's Despatch No. 49, of the Ist December last, to the effect that they absolutely decline toaccede to the terms sought to be imposed on the Colony for the retention of one Begiment. They accept the removal of the Troops and the consequences, but this being effected, they would observe that the Colony has claims which entitle it to, at least, the courteous consideration of the Imperial Government. It is animated by the warmest sentiments of loyalty to the Queen, and feels lively gratitude to the British nation for the aid so generously extended to it in a time of great emergency. It has organized and maintained during the most critical period a force of ten thousand men ; it has expended millions in the active suppression of insurrection ; it has sacrificed valuable lives and undergone all the miseries of civil war; it has imposed on itself a large increase of taxation ; but above all, it has undertaken, in the midst of actual hostilities, to dispense with Imperial assistance, aud to fulfil, from its own unaided resources, a task unparalleled in the history of colonization. Self-protection in the history of other Colonies has but too frequently resulted in tho maltreatment and ultimate annihilation of the Natives, but New Zealand has made and is making every effort for the preservation and civilization of the Aboriginal race. The Crown of Great Britain has contracted sacred obligations in respect of that race, on the faith of which it assumed the possession of the country —obligations which no sophistry can annul, and which cannot, according to any standard of morality, be transferred to other persons. The Imperial Government has now altogether relinquished to the Colonial Government the fulfilment of these obligations. It is strange therefore that while by its action the Imperial Government has reposed such implicit confidence in the Colonial authorities, it should in words be so ready to carp at their acts, and to mistrust their conduct. Nowhere docs this strange inconsistency appear in greater contrast than in the Despatch now in question, in the commencement of which Lord Carnarvon reiterates, with apparent satisfaction, the abandonment by the Imperial Government of both races to each other, while at the end he so lowly estimates the Colonial authorities as to believe them capable of an " unwarranted and merciless attack on unoffending persons" of the Native race. If that estimate be correct, what satisfaction can His Lordship derive from the contemplation of an arrangement which entirely vests in the Colonists the maintenance of the faith of the Crown, and even the existence of the Aborigines ? Ministers believe that the Colony will honorably fulfil the momentous trust imposed on it. But at tho outset of its career, when it is struggling under unexampled difficulties to do its duty, and when Great Britain withdraws all her material aid, it is not too much for the Colony to expect from British statesmen some modicum of moral aid even though it consist only in words of encouragement. At such a time and under such circumstances it is not too much to expect that every constitutional privilege of the Colony should be faithfully respected —that the conduct of the Colonial Government should be regarded with every desire to place on it the most favourable construction —and that every word which tends to estrangement from the mother country, and to bitterness of feeling between the Colonists and the Natives should be scrupulously avoided by the Imperial Government. Hnhappily this has not been the case. The Imperial Government has ignored the constitutional position of the Governor ; and has in successive Despatches displayed a sense of irritation and a proneness to take and give offence, which are much to be deplored. Ministers are unable to perceive either equity or good policy in such a course of action. It is unworthy of the great Empire to which New Zealand colonists are proud to belong; it is unjust to the Colony ; and it is dangerous to the welfare of tho Aboriginal race, to wliich the faith of the Crown has been solemnly pledged. Ministers have noticed at length the subjects brought more prominently under review in Lord Carnarvon's Despatch, not because they are entitled to any pre-eminence among the calumnies which originate with or obtain currency through the instrumentality of officers in the Imperial Service residing in New Zealand, but simply because they are the most recent of a series which from time to time have obtained an injurious circulation in the mother country before an opportunity has been 17