THE ADDRESS TO SIR G. GREY.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume 12, Issue 902, 21 December 1867, Page 2

THE ADDRESS TO SIR G. GREY.

Last evening, a meeting was held in the j Council Chamber— His Honor the Superintendent in the chair — to receive the re- j port of the committee appointed on Wed- j nesday to. prepare a farewell address to! His Excellency. The draft address was | brought up and adopted, and we subjoin a copy of the same. To His Excellency Sir George Grey, X.C.8., Governor of Hew Zealand, &c, &c, &c. Youb Excellency,— We the undersigned inhabitants of the Province of Hawke's Bay, in the colony of New Zealand, cannot allow your Excellency to take your departure from this colony, where you have been so long a time our G-overnor, without presenting you with an expression of our sentiments. Called suddenly, as you were, from the Cape of G-ood Hope, (where you enjoyed the confidence of the inhabitants, and were daily witnessing the beneficial results of your rule) to undertake a second time the Government of New Zealand, in consequence of its then critical state ; Your Excellency without hesitation responded to the confidence shewn by Her Majesty's Government in your character and ability, and in your previous experience and success in New Zealand ; and, with a generous which will always, command our admiration, you promptly returned to our shores, nobly purposing to devote your energies to the arduous task of extricating the colony from its difficulties. After a protracted struggle of six years, under very trying circumstances, your Excellency now leaves New Zealand a second time ; with the satisfaction, however, of seeing the colony in a great measure relieved from many evils which threatened it, and which were among the chief impedimfents to the development of its great resources ; and also of knowing that it is now in a rapidly advancing condition ; that, though the difficulties with the natives are not yet entirely overcome, very great progress has been made in their abatement ; and that the great body of the natives are now living in quiet and in obedience to our rules and laws, and on friendly terms with the colonists, for whose manners and mode of living they are daily evincing a greater inclination and aptness. All this great good your Excellency has the satisfaction of knowing, and also of leaving behind with us, and at the ! same time of receiving from all parts of ( the colony repeated manifestations of the , high regard in which you are held by ; those for whom you have so long and so ] perseveringly laboured. This Province, which is answering more ' and more to your Excellency's early pre- j diction of the importance it would attain j to, is especially indebted to your Excel- 1 lency for the interest you have always j shown in its welfare — particularly for the military protection, which it eminently owed to your Excellency's ready perception of tho danger to which it was likely, to be exposed through, the -onemy the Waifcato being driven southward directly upon it. And so we, the inhabitants of Hawke's Bay, heartily wish your Excellency all | prosperity and happiness. |