AUCKLAND.

Evening Post, Issue 91, 25 May 1865, Page 2

AUCKLAND.

During the sittings of the Compensation Conrt presided over by Mr. Beckham some strange claims have been preferred, but the native claimants certainly eclipse the Europeans in the nature and imperativeness of their demands. One of them (a minister) for instance, claimed compensation for loss of property which belonged to a rebel native who was killed during the war. A number of letters were received by the Government, requesting immediate payment of a portion of the amount claimed, the remainder to be adjudicated upon. We give one of these epistles from the Southern Cross of the 18th instant, which illustrates the cool assurance of the writers :-— Waipapa, April, 1865. Sir George Grey, Governor. Sir, —Salutations. Listen you. We wish the half of the value of our property paid to us now, on the receipt of this letter, because we have heard that we shall not be paid now when peace is made ; that is why we are uneasy about our property, because there will not be peace yet. Pay us now in the time that we and our children are in need, Let the half be paid now — 3 horses, 60 pigs, 3 patches potatoes, and 1 cow from Maramarua. From Hauraki there were 4 boxes of clothes, 1 box of books, and 4 pigs. The total value of property is £160. Let us have £30 now, and let the balance, £130, be adjudicated upon' Another grievance is the time we have re mained in Auckland. We have been here from the Bth March to the 27th April* These are the months we have waited in Auckland. Front Wiremd Kepa WIBEMU KoitONEHO Mkke^Awitu MAORA K.ANGITUMI TE PUHA BLOCK. We are glad that his Excellency has taken the same course of action with respect to the threat contained in the letter of William Thompson, addressed to Colonel Greer, as that whioh we recommended in our issue of Saturday last. We felt quite certain that there was but the one course to take — to settle the Ist Waikato Regiment on the Te Puna block, in defiance of Thompson's threat that such occupation would mean war. We are far from thinking that war will necessarily be the sequence of the act. We look on Thompson as an empty braggart, and believe that where indecision and weakness might have induced war and disturbance, firmness and decisive action will have the very opposite effect. .