THE LYTTELTON TIMES.

Lyttelton Times, Volume V, Issue 234, 27 January 1855, Page 4

THE LYTTELTON TIMES.

Saturday, Jan. 27,"1855. The political atmosphere has of late been getting rather stagnant. The Council has ceased to furnish warm discussions and ministerial crises for the edification of the uninitiated. The Government wheel has been rolling smoothly along, and every fly on the tire has had his claim to importance peaceably conceded. Under these circumstances it is perhaps a matter for congratulation that our contemporary the Standard has discovered a mai-e's nest. It is found that His Honor the Superintendent has, ipso motu, impoverished this Province, in order to gratify a personal pique against Sir George Grey! Such a discovery is ushered in with all due solemnity. On the 11th instant, the crime was darkly foreshadowed — the public mind was prepai-ed for the revelations that were to follow. On the ! 18th, the exact spot was pointed out where the mare's nest was found, but not a hair or a straw was left to mark the place. On Thursday last the Standard turns to its readers, after the manner of a Greek chorus, and pausing in the story comments on the startling sins committed in secret, and mingles the more sober tones of judicial rebuke with the indignant declamations of offended virtue. Now what is the real state of the case > iln January, 1854, instructions were sent by Governor Sir George Grey to the Commissioner of Crown Lands directing hnn to pay over to His Honor the Superintendent or his order all monies* aecruin°from the sale of land within the Canterbury Block on the receipt of a guarantee from His Honor that they should be applied " to the purposes pointed out in the Act of Parliament relating to these subjects." The Superintendent declined to give the required guarantee, stating fully at the same time the reasons of his refusal. His Honor says, (We quote from his letter to the Colonial Secretary of the 27th of February 1804, as published in the Standard of the' loth inst.) "lam doubtful what Act of Parliament is referred to ; if-,t he the Canterbury Act, some of thepvov lsl ons of that act, especially ;in 'the matter in hand, are no longer in force. Under that divided into four parts; one-third to be devoted to immigration ; one-third was to the Church one-sixth to miscellaneous purposes; anTone' sixth to the Grown. The expences of collection j and costs of surveys were included in tetZ smh for miscellaneous puipnses. But the Can erbury block bavin, Evened to t c Crow ~ theone-smh of the land fund payable to X Land Office are put, not on the onetsixth for rjsulue whatever fur public \vn\t. BL IfuT tier submit to his Excellenov n llt i •eyas I cannot anticipate, the wishes of the

Provincial Council according to his Excellcn "" instructions conveyed in your letter of the of S Jumiary, No. 24. The laud funds for ilie " n sent are to be used for the repayment 0ff,,,., advances; before these repayments are nf made, I hope the whole question of the hll.l within the Province will be settled." ' In the face of this document publish,) in its own columns the Standard comply that no grounds for refusing the gumam,! are before the public. The pith of the ouf cry seems to be—His Honor has refusJ money which he might have accepted, ] c gaily or illegally it does not signify; and'h,," thus disappointed those whose motto i s .l " Get all you can by any means in you! power." It is unnecessary to coinin e n t upon the extremely loose and va^ue vS h.i of writing adopted by the Colonial Secre! tary on a subject of importance. It j s Ilot " likely that an officer that talks about "the Act of Parliament relating to these sub jects," went very deeply into the I c <r a j merits of the case. Indeed the General Government acknowledge as much in their letter of the 27th November, 1854, which states that " His Excellency the 'officer "administering the Government thinks the " view taken of this case by your Honor is " correct." When the General Government, so far from being indignant at His Honor's audacity, are glad to take a hint from him on a legal case which they have not enquired into, it is scarcely necessary for the : Standard to be indignant on their account. ! When we read therefore such a sentence as the following, " We will not stay on this occasion to notice what appears to us the indecorous act of questioning the legality of the Governor's (His Honor's superior) instructions, for such in fact it was." we are tempted to suspect that the. editor of the Standard has not read, or at any rate does not remember, the subject of the correspondence which he published himself in the number before last. If this be the case it "is strange— most strange; and not more strange than wrong." If all this outcry had been got. up for the sake of affording a little excitement and recreation to the. readers of the Standard, no harm would have-been.done; but when an unpardonable hoax is put upon them by trying to inveigle them into signing a petition which can only stultify themselves, there is a goodjground for complaint. Many people will sign; a petition on its being presented to them without any consideration whatever, especially when they see that its purport is to ask for money. We have no doubt that if those who have already signed it were asked on what grounds they expected it to be acceded to, they could not say. It is true that no harm is done when a little boy asks for the moon to play with— but then little boys are not sensitive about the misuse of their understandings. It is not at all probable that the majority of the public have looked into this question at all; and many will be very much annoyed at having been entrapped into signing what, on consideration, they will find to be simply a useless document. The framer of. the petition seems to have forgotten, in his array of authorises, to quote the 75th clause ol the " Constitution Act:" 75. It shall-not l, e ] awfu | for the said Gen(J . ral• -Assembly to repeal or interfere with all or | any ot the provisions of iU , act u j- {ue sess ; ua holder, in the thirteenth and fourteenth vcars of her Majesty, intituled "An act empowering the Caaterbnry Association to dispose of certain amis in ■ New Zealand," or of in act passed in fourTT then, next fr»°winp, clmplel eiffhtyfo«u, to alter and amend the said first-mentioned act- Pbovibbo alwah, That, on the cxpira«t.on, or sooner de.em.imuion, of the fiinclvf ;iF° Wei" S {-" d, ; lulh()l>Ui^ ««w vested in, or lawfully exercised by the said Association, the oviMons of the preset act shall come into a«srebtc S thC la"ds t0 which the said

~ And by the 74th clause ]of the same Act \vc find that one of their provisions is, that \ " In respect of all sales or other alienations ( ,f iiny waste -lands of the Crown in New Zealand'i» fee simple, or for any less estate or interest (except byway of license for occupation purposes for any term of years not exceeding seven, and not containing any contract for the renewal of the same, or for a further estate, interest, or license, or by way of reservation of such lands as may be required for public roads or other internal communications, whether by land or by water, or for the use and benefit of the aboriginal inhabitants of the country, or for purposes of military defence, or ;1S the sites of places of public worship, schools, or other public buildings, or as places for the interment of the dead, or places for the recreation and amusement of the inhabitants of the town or village, or as the sites of public quays or landing places on the sea coast, or shores of navigable streams, or for any other purpose of public safety, convenience, health, or enjoyment), there shall be paid to the said New Zealand Company, towards the discharge of the principal sum and interest charged as aforesaid, in lieu of all and every other claim of the said Company, in respect of the said sum, except where otherwise hereinafter provided, so long as the same, or any part thereof respectively, shall remain unpaid, one-fourth part of the sum paid by the purchaser in respect of every such sale and alienation." How are we to evade the payment of the New Zealand Company's Debt ? It is all very well to talk about what we should like to get; but we cannot get more than the f law allows us. Sir George G:ey excepted j the Canterbury Block from the lands \ affected by his Land Proclamation of March, 1853, and upon the cessation of the Canterbury Association's disposing powei's over the Waste Lands, he instructed the Commissioner of Crown Lands to continue the Canterbury Association's regulations with regard to the sale of the Waste Lands, and to fay the proceeds weekly inta the Colonial Treasury until further notice. The existing regulations for sale y letting, disposal, and occupation of the Waste Lands, are declared valid by Act of the General Assembly, until new regulations shall be framed under the provisions of that Act. The appropriation of the funds accruing therefrom i is settled by the Constitution Act. His Excellency has declared his conviction of the justness of His Honor's interpretation of the law as it stands. It is Inot likely therefore that he will now either become indignant at His Honor's questioning the legality of Sir George Grey's instructions, or be prepared so soon to stultify his own decision.