Turanga Nui July 5th 1866 Dear Mr. McLean I was intending to write to you sometime since about the arrival in this Bay of two men - Priest and Rice - but Fitzgerald said he was intending to write to you so I left it to him to mention it - It appears Rice has been trying to get up a Counter Petition - I do not think he has succeeded very well - Priest has bought the Kerosine springs from the natives - has paid them a deposit of about £40 and is expected daily with a staff of surveyors engineers etc. to commence operations at once - I sent a report of Ross' illness I hope it was correct but I only had an hour or so to make it out in the steamer arrived here in the evening at six and left again the same evening at eleven - Everything in the Bay is going on quietly at present, the natives are getting more confident and a great deal more impudent - Westrup is in the "Tawera" at Tologa Bay coming here to settle - he has sold his land in the Waikato for £900 - he would have been here before but was laid up in Auckland in consequence of a kick from a horse - Fitzgerald is very busy laying out the land of the old settlers already I here there are likely to be several breaches of the peace in respect to fencing etc. Biggs I am glad to tell you is going on splendidly, he is picking up very fast and like most of us is getting anxious to have another brush with the Hau Hau's. Gold and Quicksilver have both been found at the Kawa Kawa - somewhere near Hunga Hunga ta roa - some of Morgans natives have come to day down the coast and brought us this news. Harris I have only seen once since you left the Bay, he was then very shaky and seedy - Tamihana has made his pah the strongest I have seen anywhere - I rode over the other day and examined it - Hoping that you may carry the annexation by a large majority. Believe me, Dear Mr. McLean Your most obedient servant Thos. F. Baker