CORRESPONDENCE.

Lyttelton Times, Volume II, Issue 88, 11 September 1852, Page 9

CORRESPONDENCE.

To the Editor of the Lyttelton Times. Sir, —I would beg to call the attention of the public, through your valuable Journal, to a subject of the greatest importance to those living on the plains, and indeed to the Avhole Settlement—the erection of a Flour-mill. I am aware that this subject has been already entertained by private parties, but it appears to me that the best site for a mill would be in the immediate vicinity of Christehurch, in the middle of the corn-growing district, and where also the larger portion of that corn would, for some time to come, be consumed. Riccarton and Fendall Town are both too distant for the town mill. I would suggest Avhether it may not be possible to erect a mill close to the town, bringing the water from the river near the north-east corner of the Government domain to some point above the Royal Hotel. The distance would not be more than ten or tAvelve chains, and the fall must be something considerable as the distance, following the river is more than a mile. This scheme may be impracticable, but there are no doubt other places on the Avon in Hagley Park which would not be found so. The expense, if too great for private enterprize, may be carried out by a Company. The wheat now growing here would go far to supply the wants of Christchnrch and of the plains generally, and there should be no delay in converting it" into flour, so soon after the harvest as possible. No one can at present forsee to Avhat prices we may not be subjected unless this be done. Trusting that some abler hand than mine may treat this subject as it deserves, I am, Sir, your obedient Servant, An Old Subscriber. Christchnrch, Sept. 6, 1852.

To the Editor of the Lyttelton Times, Sir, —Another Blue book has come out, or rather has been dragged out by the exertions of Mr. Fox. For the Downing Street clerk, avlio watches over the interests of Governor Grey, would fain have postponed the revelations contained in it until after the present Session of Parliament. As it is, much that would not bear the light is suppressed, but enough remains to supply a foul chapter in the history, past cure, past care: Governor Grey is waxing desperate, —so far committed to a great scheme of fiction, that he has no choice but to brave detection, to prop up the old tales Avith new ones, and to cast about aspersions with increasing boldness to the last. Out of the present series I select, as one of those Avhich must ultimately prove most fraught Avith dangerous consequences to himself, his despatch concerning the resignation of their seats in Council by five non-official members. Two of these, Messrs. Greenwood and Monro, took high ground, assigning as their reason for retirement, a gross breach of law by the Executive. • The other three, Messrs. Bauuatyue, Ludlam, and Bell, resigned their seats from a much less stringent motive, —an implied affront offered to themselves by Lord Grey. This leads to an easy division of the subject, Avithin the first part of which, for the present, I shall restrict myself. The facts are these : the New Minister Appropriation Ordinance for the year 1849-50, would expire June 30, ISSO. Governor Eyre, who had been absent in the Northern province, returning to Wellington in May, ISSO, took measures for the Appropriation of the ensuing year. The first step was to obtain the Gover-nor-in-Chief's sanction to the assembly of a Council. This he applied for, making express mention of the required Ordinance among others, in a despatch dated May 30.

The Governor-in-Chief made answer, that the enactments to Avhich Governor Eyre alluded, appeared to be " of no very pressing importance,"' and directed that the assembly of the Council should be delayed until October in that year. Governor Eyre had Avritten by the Government Brig, stating his intention to send for the Nelson members by that vessel, so soon as it should return from Auckland. But Governor Grey detained her at the North, and his ansvrer therefore tarried long upon the road. Governor Eyre aAvaited it, anxious as Sister Anne upon the battlements. He delayed the summons from day to day, even until the Ordinance had actually expired, but at last took upon himself to call a Council without the sanction of the Governor-in-Chief, that this illegal state of things might cease with the least possible delay. The meeting Avas fixed for August 1, the earliest period at which the attendance of the Nelson members would be considered secure. After the issue of the summons, Governor Grey's counterorders came to hand; Governor Eyre notified the postponement of the Session in the Government Gazette ; and Messrs. Greenwood and Monro, differing in opinion from Sir George, inasmuch as that they considered the maintenance of the law to be highly of "pressing importance," resigned their seats. How to exculpate himself, in notifying the event to the Setretary of State, Avas a matter of no small difficulty to Governor Grey. But even here, his unparalelled ingenuity was not at fault. He did succeed in beguiling the Home authorities for a Avhile. He begins by stating that the Nelson members resigned their seats on the grounds, — Ist. Of. an interval of time passing, during which, the revenue of New Munster was appropriated to the public service without being appropriated under the authority of any law ; and 2nd. Of the Provincial Council having been summoned at too short a notice, and without due warning having been given of the measures intended to be brought before them. The first ground of resignation, which it Avas impossible to suppress, is the true one. The second, introduced by Governor Grey himself, ,is fictitious. Dr. Greenwood's letter makes no I mention at all, either of the " short notice," or of the " Avant of due \A-arning." He confines himself to a protest against the illegality of the [ proceeding. Dr. Monro alludes, in his letter, to what is named as the second ground, but carefully disconnects from it his resignation. What therefore was the object of introducing the second objection ? It was symply to create a diversion —to distract attention from his own counterorders, the issue of which it avus not possible to deny. In pursuance of his usual tactics, he proceeded to accuse somebody of something -, and took occasion, nothing loth, to injure Governor Eyre, Avhom he has pursued from first to last, publicly and even privately, with unaccountable rancour. With consummate nicety of calculation, and management of impressions, he enters first upon the second objection. Blame having once been fixed upon Governor Eyre, Governor Grey's own defence would of course be read to more advantage. In plain terms, he charges the Lieutenant-Governor Avith blundering. On these subjects it will be seen from the first two enclosures to this despatch, that when the Lieutenant-Governor addressed me on the 30th of May last, he informed me that lie only intended to call the Provincial Council together, so soon as the return of the Government Brig to the South would admit of the members from Nelson being sent for by her. As I expected daily to receive your Lordship's reply to my despatch No. 16, of the 30th November, 1549, recommending a change in the existing form of constitution, I thought it useless to call the Provincial Council together until that reply was received, as they would then have to meet in the form of a General Council; and from the terms of the Lieutenant-Governor's despatch, I supposed that my reply, recommending the postponement of the meeting of the Provincial Council, would reach him before he had issued any summons for their assembling. In this, from his precipitation, I was, however, it appears, unfortunately mistaken. " I thought it useless to call the Provincial Council together till that despatch was received :"—the meaning of which appears to be, that it was useless to assemble the Council for one object, namely, the appropriation bill, became they could "not have legislated immediately concerning a totally different object! I believe the true "cause of" the postponement to have been, that the question of the Lieutenant

Governor's salary, in which Governor Grey had been worsted, would have come before the Council. Is it not pitiful that Sir George, who contrived to obtain for himself so large a portion of the Parliamentary grant, in consideration of personal loss at the burning of Government House, should have grudged to Mr. Eyre those few hundreds which were not grudged by those on whom the payment falls. "By the precipitation of the Lieutenant Governor," —the said pvecipitation, in point of actual fact, amounting to this : that Governor Eyre summoned the Council for August 1 ; whereas he ought to have summoned them for before July. He had been driven, either to legislating .without the Nelson members, or to legislating behind the time. It Avas a choice of evils: perhaps be chose the greater; and if amenable to censure, it is not upon the ground of precipitation, but of delay. Governor Grey, having fixed a certain amount of blame elsewhere, ventures at last to touch upon his own subversal of the law. With regard to the second objection [i. c. the first], namely, an interval of time elapsing during which the revenue would be appropriated without any law being in existence authorising such appropriation, I have to state that the Provincial Council should, at its last meeting, have passed an Ordinance for the appropriation of the revenue i'or the year 1850, so that it might have received her Majesty's assent before it came into operation ; and, in my despatch, No. 39, of the 13 th of June, 1850, to the Lieutenant Governor of NeAV Munster, perhaps inadvertently concluded such a law had passed in New Munster, as a corresponding law had been passed in New Ulster. Sphinx nor CEdipus could have unriddled this paragraph, without commentatorial aid, in England. Here, indeed, we are sufficiently well acquainted with details to extract the nonsequitur contained in it. In the Northern Province the appropriation bill for the year 1849-50 was passed by Governor Grey, August 23, 1849, in the General Council. A clause Avas introduced, extending its operation to the year 1850-51, unless a Provincial Council should meantime be established, and otherwise provide for the appropriation of the second year. In the establishment of this Northern Provincial Council, Governor Grey had already been foiled, by the refusal of the more eligible settlers to accept seats in it. In the Southern province the appropriation bill for 1849-50, Avas passed by Governor Eyre, June 22, 1849, without the claim of extension. By the regulations of Her Majesty's colonial service, in colonies not possessing representative institutions, the Governor is bound to submit the estimates to Council before the last day of June in each year, and so far before, as to allow of the Ordinance receiving the Queen's assent before coming into operation. Governor Grey broke this rule by passing his own appropriation bill for two years instead of for one; and then accuses Governor Eyre of having -violated the rules of the service for not havinoacted in like manner! ° But the crowning point of Governor Grey's defence, is the pretence of being ignorant that an appropriation bill was needed. So shameless an assertion, out of New Zealand, Avould be almost beyond belief. For not only had he given his formal sanction to the Southern Ordinance (Government Gazette for NeAV Munster, October 15, 1849), passed for one year only; but Governor Eyre had likewise distinctly warned him that a new one Avas to be introduced. And while answering the very letter which contained this warning, Governor Grey '■concluded, perhaps inadvertently," that no such Ordinance was yet required. The boldness of the assertion is proof sufficient to what we are roundly assured of in letters from home, —that he had long since made all safe in the Colonial Office by means of back door influence. Fortune favours the brave. By a happy combination of courage and manaeuvre, dolo ac virtute, he succeeded in shifting the blame of the illegal act from his own shoulders on to those of his colleague. In the return despatch from the Secretary of StiUe, the following reprimand was conveyed, through Governor Grey, to Governor Eyre. With regard to the topics more immediately adverted to in your latest despatch now before me, I think that Dr. Greenwood and Dr. Monro had valid reasons for tendering their resignation, on the ground that the functions of the Legislature bad been superseded by the Lieutenant Governor taking upon himself to announce that the expenditure of the province wuuld continue beyond the

period for which it was sanctioned by the then existing Ordinance. This is a step which I have no doubt the Lieutenant Governor was induced to take under a mistaken impression of what Avas necessary for the public service, but of which I am bound to disapprove. If he had mentioned to you, among the subjects for which he proposed to call the Legislature together, that of passing a Supply Ordinance, shewing that this had become necessary, you would, no doubt, have sanctioned the assembling that body instead of recommending its postponement. It was a great inadvertence on his part not to have so mentioned it. But, having omitted to do this, be should either have taken upon himself the resprnsibility of calling the Legislature together for this necessary purpose without your sanction, or he should have postponed all payments not legally authorized until he could obtain authority from you for calling it together and passing the necessary Ordinance.

What is the meaning of this ? There is something here Avhich has yet to be accounted for. It Avill beat once perceived that Lord Grey's despatch is more than in answer to Governor Grey's. We are left to conclude, either that a .confidential despatch must have been superadded by Sir George,—that the reprimand was suggested by himself, in a private letter to some subordinate in the Colonial office, —or else, that his public despatch has been emasculated in the Blue Book by the State anatomist. Quousque tandem ! Yet have Ino fear for the result: "the lips of truth shall be established for ever, but a lying tongue is but for a moment." Metoikos.