TO THE GOVERNOR OF NEW ZEALAND.

29

A.—No. la.

principally at the expense of this country. And the result of the war is, that the leading tribe of the Maoris is scattered, that the power of the others is broken, and that large tracts of land to which the Government had no claim, and the settler no access except by friendly arrangement with the Natives, are confiscated, sold, and occupied by Europeans. It may be added, though not part of the argument, that meanwhile the number of the Colonists has risen from 49,800 in 1857, to 218,500 in 1867, and that of the Maoris is supposed, with more of conjecture, to have fallen from 56,000 to 38,500. If this statement is correct, it follows that the Imperial Government have not transferred to that of the Colony any obligation whatever, except that imposed on all of us by natural justice, not to appropriate the property of others; that all the Imperial expenditure on the Colony has been for the benefit of the Colonists, and a great part of it may be viewed as the price paid by this country for the territories wliich have been recently, and as I think unwisely, appropriated by them; and, lastly, that no part of the Colonial expenditure has been in any degree for the benefit of the Mother Country. So far, therefore, as there is any equitable claim remaining unsettled, it is not a claim on the part of New Zealand against Great Britain, but the reverse —a claim, and, if it were thought proper to urge it, a very heavy claim on the part of the Mother Country against the Colony. Lastly, Mr. Fitzherbert says that the Imperial Government "insisted" on transferring the burden of its obligations to the Native race from itself to the Colony. What the nature of these obligations are, in the opinion of the Home Government, I have already noticed. But I must add that Her Majesty's Government view this transfer, not as forced on the Colony, but, on the contrary, conceded to the Colony in compliance with the direct and indirect demands of the Colonists. The duty of protecting themselves against those whom they claimed the right to govern followed as a matter of course. I cannot help observing that if the opinions expressed at different times by my predecessors are correct, the present dangers of New Zealand are due, not to the punctual performance of their obligations to the Maori race, but rather to their adoption of a policy which, if not inconsistent with those obligations, was certain to appear so to the Natives affected by it. I have, &c, Governor Sir G. F. Bowen, G.C.M.G. GRANVILLE. Enclosure 1 in No. 38. Mr. Fitziieebeet to Earl Geaxville. Mt Loed— 21, Cockspur Street, S.W., sth February, 1869. In compliance with your Lordship's request, I now submit in writing the substance of the remarks which 1 offered for your consideration at the interview with which you favoured me relative to the present state of affairs in New Zealand. It was not requisite for me to enter into any particulars of the late disasters, for the state of the Colony was admitted to be sufficiently alarming to justify me in asking to be informed of the views of the Imperial Government thereon. If I did not seek to raise the question of who was to blame for the present state of things, the omission occurred from no desire to screen the Colony; and whilst I was prepared frankly to admit that errors have been committed by its successive Governments, yet I claimed for the Colony not only that its intentions had been good and its treatment of the Native race benevolent, but also that its sacrifices had been very great in submitting to a taxation much heavier than that imposed on the British taxpayers, ill order to enable it to meet tho special responsibilities which had been imposed on it. I considered, indeed, that affairs had travelled out of the region of complaint, and that the only wise course now left was to present a practical business statement for the consideration of the Secretary of State for the Colonies, of the grounds on which I claimed assistance for the Colony, and of the nature and extent of the relief which, in my opinion, the present emergency demanded. I was accordingly not misunderstood when I referred as a matter of fact to the difficulties which had been experienced by the Colony, more or less, ever since the Imperial Government had insisted on transferring the burden of its obligations to the Native race from itself to the Colony. It was unnecessary to point out the disadvantage to a transferee in all cases when a change of administration takes place, whilst the affairs to be administered are unsettled. This was especially the case with the transfer of Native administration in New Zealand, and I pointed out that the Colony had never yet been able to extricate itself from those embarrassments in which it became involved by the transfer, and was consequently never able to get a fair start. Neither was it necessary to dwell upon the nature of those obligations from which Great Britain sought to free herself. It is sufficient for mo to state that they were treaty obligations, which must remain as binding as ever on this country, and that if her Colony was unable adequately to perform the duty devolved upon her in regard to those obligations, that that inability could not discharge Great Britain from the engagements she originally contracted. 8