VICE-REGAL COURTESY.

Auckland Star, Volume V, Issue 1489, 18 November 1874, Page 5 (Supplement)

VICE-REGAL COURTESY.

(To the Editor of the Evening Star.) Sir ( —l have noticed the flimsiness of the excuse made for the uncourteonstreatment of Sir George Grey, namelv,that the Governor's forwarding of the petition would have implied approbation of its contents. Another pretext which has been put forth by some of your contemporaries is to the effect that it is his Excellency's duty to act upon the eounael of his responsible advisers. Sir George Grey is taunted with having over-looked, and Sir James Fergusson i 3 complimented as having respected this great principle of constitutional government. And some other folk say : "It is not the Governor's fault; Dan Pollen is at the bottom of it." No Buch excuse will hold good. I entirely acquit that courtly and astute gentleman, Dr Pollen, of all responsibility for this unseemly affair. He may {more suo) have enjoyed tbe hit at his ancient chief and friend, the lord of the Kawau ; and he may be amused at the spectacle of the present supreme dignitary's performances ; but he cannot be held personally responsible Sir George Grey and Sir James Fergusaon are both of them well aware of the distinction—familiar to so many that even the writer in the Cross might have been expected not to ignore it—that whereas in the administration of the affairs of the colony his Excellency the Governor is expected to

he advised by responsible ministers, his •orrespondence with the Secretary of State. on the other hand, is a matter outside of heir jurisdiction. The erlory or the shame of "snubbing" and " chaffing" Sir George Grey, in a Vice-regal letter prematurely hurried into the newspapers, and of brusquely -efusin" to transmit to the Imperial Government a petition addressed by Sir George Grey to the Governor of New Z<^aInnd and comprising a prayer for its transmission, does not belong to Dr Pollen. —I am, &c, Spectator.