[From the Morning Chronicle, March 13.]

Nelson Examiner and New Zealand Chronicle, Volume IV, Issue 176, 19 July 1845, Page 77

[From the Morning Chronicle, March 13.]

Wrong, blunder, and abuse have been so copiously and repeatedly lavished, so crowded one over the other upon hapless New Zealand, or rather upon its hapless colonists, that even the gravity of former wrongs is lost sight of in the extravagance and prominence of the new. Each arrival from those regions brings a fresh cargo of strange doings, incredible acts, each of which would take a debate to itself, absorb all an orator's indignation, and monopolise the wonder of the house. One is not surprised, then, to find Mr. Somes or Mr. Aglionby make long speeches, followed by a debate, turning merely upon recent acts, and passing by or adjourning the great question, which it was thought a Committee of the House of Commons might have advanced towards settlement, viz., whether the Colonial Office will suffer the existence of the New Zealand Company at all ? The Committee of the House of Commons decide that justice and expediency both required the settlement of the claims of the Company, or a resuscitation to life. But the Colonial Secretary snaps his fingers at the House of Commons, and has determined that the Company shall remain in that state of suspended anima-

tion to which it has pleased him and his misrule to reduce it. Sir Robert Inglis, too, steps in to uphold Lord Stanley's right to nullify the report of a committe. "What is a committee V* exclaimed the honourable baronet : ''It is merely the opinion of seven members of the house, of which had one been withdrawn or changed, the report would have gone altogether, the , other way, and have been a sanction, not a condemnation of the Colonial Office." But let this doctrine of Sir Robert Inglis, upon parliamentary committees, be applied to Parliament itself; let it be asked what is the value of a vote carried by a small, majority, and, perhaps, in no full house. Is ii to be stigmatized as worthless ana null, and as merely expressing the opinion of the number of ayes which passed it ? If such a doctrine as that of Sir Robert Inglis was to prevail, there would be an end to the very principle of parliamentary authority, whilst committees would prove a useless waste of time and trouble,, their labours or conclusions to be weighed and judged, not by the house, but by the Minister, and adopted or set aside as suited official caprice. &;The question on Tuesday night, however, was not Lord Stanley's obstinacy, but the policy of his Governor, Captain Fitzßoy, who not only acts fully up to the aim of the Colonial Office to extinguish the Company, but who seems determined to extinguish also the innocent settlers, who engaged with the Company on the faith of Government declaration. Mr. Aglionby and Mr. C. Buller enumerated Captain Fitz Roy's 'doings — his ultra-tenderness for the natives, his determination to forbid the settlers the least act of self-defence or self-provision, his sluggishness in moving a step towards the settlement of their titles, and his simultaneous activity in taxing them, as well as the materials of their industry and improvement. But Captain Fitzßoy's taxation, and his arbitrary exemptions from taxation— his coquetry with the natives, and compliance with the demands of the most audacious and rebellious of them, contrasted with the gross incivility to the most eminent of the settlers — all these, as well as his issue of two shilling assignats, are before the public; and general opinion cannot but be made up on the subject, amounting to no less than Mr. Buller' s humorous proposal, of sending out a keeper for the Governor.

Captain Fitzßoy, however, is not in want of friends and relatives, chivalrous in his exculpation, starting up, like Rob Roy's band, each with a claymore, to defend him. But defence they offer none ; their only plea is, they know nothing of Captain Fitzßoy's conduct or administration. They enjoy his friendship, but not his confidence : that the gallant Governor has refused to bestow even upon Lord Stanley or the Colonial Office. And this dogged reserve, this premeditated silence, Sir Robert Peel himself puts forward as an excuse for Captain Fitz Roy, or, at least, as cause sufficient to tie his (the Premier's) hands, and preclude arry 1 order of animadversion or recall to be issued by the Colonial Office. Why, according to this doctrine, any of our governors at the other side of the globe may play what pranks he will before high heaven, and be certain of eighteen months' uncontrolled and absolute use or abuse of power. He has but to plunder and decimate those committed to his charge, take care not to say or write a word about it for six months, and his silence ties the hands of the Home Government. They must not condemn him unheard, and unheard he will remain, for he will not speak. The cries and complaints of the colonists must in the meantime be stifled. The Governor must be considered right till he declares himself wrong. He may commit the most insane acts, and Government durst not interfere. If such are the principles that guide Sir Robert Peel and his Cabinet in the management of remote empire, we can only say that the more that management is shared by others than the Cabinet the better. According to this rule, Lord Ellenborough might have set fire to the East ere the Government would have recalled him. Had not the Court of Directors had the courage to take the step, there is no knowing in what situation India might have been at present. If there be any who have been often puzzled to account for that step of the East India Directors, they may now seee the cause of it' m the fact that the present Ministers are unfit, from principle as well as character, to be entrusted with colonial administration.

Captain Fitzßoy's friends, although they could not prove him to be a wise, or a prudent, or a just man, still spoke of him with an unanimity and a degree of warmth to which one cannot be insensible. He must certainly be possessed of high and generous qualities. We should even fear that he was a bit of a Quixote, and that he went out more as a Las Casas, to. display sympathy and protection for the aborigines of the country, than as an enlightened governor, to consult for the united welfare of savage and of settler. It is evident that he would very well fill Mr. . Clarke's place of protector of the aborigines, or

perhaps that of chief missionary would suit him.., His dealings Th^th the chiefs are manifestly those of a itinionary, not a governor. He seems to think retribution a thing not to be dealt by earthly hands, and vengeance an exclusive attribute of Providence, forbidden to a governor; whilst patience and humility are Christian virtues, which are to be rigidly imposed upon the suffering settlers. There are many more symptoms, indeed, of Captain Fizßoy being a simple-minded man, more used to nautical surveying and the management of a small crew, than to large dealings with men of mixed interests and classes. He evidently was new to the task that he undertook; and his mind was a ready recipient of any spirit that the Colonial Secretary might pour into it. Unfortunately, Lord Stanley has no spirit save that of perverseness — a desire to cross and to snub, to disappoint and to mortify, to set grievance at nought, and to rough ride the sensitive feelings of sufferers or petitioners. One would think that Lord Stanley was bred in the administration or state councils of an absolute power. He has their hereditary contempt for every thing and person not emanating from Government itself. Wherever men get together and complain, there Lord Stanley sees a mob. He would put down the New Zealand English, as he would the Catholic Irish, by the strong hand and the strained law. Never was a Minister better formed for alienating colonies and discontenting masses of men. It is to be regretted that he had the opportunity of instilling his malignant spirit into a mind which his friends unanimously declare to be so amiable and disinterested as Captain Fitzßoy's.