New Plymouth 21 June 1876. My dear Sir Donald, I write to congratulate you on the position that the Masonic body of the Colony is going to place you in. I am not a Mason (although I have done a little in the way of building, and sometimes in pulling down) but it seems to me to be the highest position that anyone can attain, as a mark of the highest esteem and respect, that can only be acquired by being the best deserving of it in the Colony. So far as I understand it, neither wealth or influence can attain to it, that is not accompanied by that worth that Burns I think speaks of, as stamped by Nature's mint. When I returned here, I found your note introducing Mr. W. Johnstone. I immediately started with a piece of pasteboard to find him, and as the song says, I soon saw that he was out of sight, having left I think by coach. On further acquanitance with Miss Ar. she told me that she ''hated Maories and everyone who liked them''. I think the remark was only a playful one, but she made other playful remarks that went against the grain. Instead therefore of proposing, I told Mr. A. that I had arrived at the conclusion that he did, that I was too old. My daughter Laura was recently in Wellington, and she has chosen a lady for me to propose to. I will try my fate there, whenever you may require my presence in Wellington, but it is too much in the ''Buzzum of fate'' for me to ask leave to especially run after a remote chance. Yours ever truly, Chas. Brown. P.S. Parris keeps chatting, and I make mistakes.