THE NELSON EXAMINER. Nelson, July 26, 1845.

Nelson Examiner and New Zealand Chronicle, Volume IV, Issue 177, 26 July 1845, Page 82

THE NELSON EXAMINER. Nelson, July 26, 1845.

Journal* become more necessary v men become more equal and individualism more to be feared. It would be to underrate their importance to suppose that they serve only to secure liberty : they maintain civilization. D« TocQurviLL*. Of Democracy in America, vol. iv., p. 203.

Lord Stanley, the House of Commons dfippiser, has issued another of those despatches which, when the absurd policy they defend has reached the consummation towards which it is fast tending, will furnish food for the ridicule of posterity.

The first thing that strikes the reader of this production is the apologetical and defensive tone that pervades it. His fiery, self-willed lordship appears regularly as Captain Fitzßoy's advocate. There wants nothing but horse-hair wig and gown to make the piece of elaborate special pleading complete. He appears for his client, the Governor, at the bar of public opinion, and eagerly, though very lamely, defends him. It is satisfactory, however, to see the arrogant destroyer of the happiness of thousands reduced even to this.

Some censure indeed escapes him ; but so unwillingly and grudgingly bestowed as to make it evident how Counsellor Stanley longs to defend the Governor out and out, through thick and thin, without regard to anything human or divine but carrying his point and winning his case. And it ia

equally clear that spite against his opponents' at home animates him quite as much as any love for his precious protege abroad. After expressing his rt general approbation " of Captain Fitzßoy's measures, the learned counsel remarks, " I do not refer to single expressions, here or there, in your intercourse with Europeans or natives, to which perhaps exception might be taken; but to the strong cause " (so printed perhaps for " sense") " of justice, and the earnest desire of reconciling differences by an effectual and authoritative mediation, which appear to have influenced your conduct ; to the boldness and promptitude with which you have enforced your views, and met, by decided measures, the emergencies of your embarrassing position."

Mark the magnanimous admission in the first clause ! Lord Stanley thinks that " perhaps exceptions may be taken " to calling gentlemen of character and education I at least equal to his own, " Devil's missionaries," " trespassers," &c. ; to telling them they are " actuated by a spirit of aggression and injustice," are notorious for " rudeness " and disrespect — officious fellows, " whose advice he neither sought nor needed, who had caught a Tartar " when they least expected it; to charging one (a member of his own Council) with talking " schoolboy ! trash," and virtually giving the lie to another gentleman in most things his superior, by obstinately persisting in and peremptorily reasserting a charge flatly denied and of the utter groundlessness of which the clearest evidence was offered him. Considerate and generous Lord Stanley ! How thankful we all ought to be !

But what else, on second thoughts, could we have expected from Lord Stanley in this respect? He no doubt was thinking of the admonition about "the mote and the beam." " A fellow-feeling makes us wondrous kind;" and Captain Fitzßoy was certain of a most tender and delicate castigation for only imitating what the Times (of London) somewhere designates as " the multitudinous offences of Lord Stanley's tongue."

The " strong sense of justice " has been shown by his acquitting the wholesale murderer of his countrymen without even the form of a trial, on his own inconsistent and clearly disproved story ; by forcing on creditors depreciated debentures at their full nominal value ; by securing nothing higher than a penny an acre on the sale of waste lands, when most others had paid a pound, or thirty shillings, or more for them; by acting the part of a decided partisan of the natives in every difference between them and the Europeans.

" Boldness and promptitude," better described as rashness and haste, he showed certainly in announcing his obnoxious opinions and judging at Waikanai. If applied to his measures for the maintenance of British authority, the " ten musket " business at the Bay of Islands is alone sufficient evidence of their utter inappropriateness.

The Counsel next excuses himself for the large discretion given Captain Fitzßoy. He does this by referring to Captain Fitz Roy's " high personal and public character," and his " peculiar fitness, at that time acknowledged by all parties most interested, for. the post " assigned him.

Of Captain Fitzßoy's " personal character " either little could have been known by those who pretended and pretend to the greatest knowledge of it, or else he has greatly belied it in all his dealings with the settlers. In his public character he was principally known as a " good surveyor," who had written a book. If " public " mean " parliamentary," the little it was our fortune in New Zealand to know of it was not particularly admirable. But for his " peculiar fitness for his post," acknowledged " by all parties interested," we must first ask whether the New Zealand settlers are among those " most interested " or not. We humbly opine that we are the very foremost of them ; and so far from acknow-

ledging it, the settlers we believe had the very greatest apprehension of all the evils he has since brought on them from his known narrow and sectarian prejudices and subjection to the visionaries of Exeter Hall. But as it is customary for Lord Stanley to overlook the settlers altogether, we must suppose he was only alluding in this passage to the New Zealand Company. It is true that, to make the best of a very questionable bargain, and not ruin at the outset every chance of a favourable result to an appointment out of their power to alter, by anticipating evils perhaps not absolutely certain* of occurring — in the faith moreover that he was going out to fulfil the agreement they had made with Lord Stanley according to its fair and indeed only rational construction — they did express a favourable opinions of Captain Fitzßoy. But all this is nothing to the purpose. It was the business of Government, and of Lord Stanley in particular, and of no one else, to find out anfl make sure of the fitness of their representa-^ tive ; and if they omitted this or could not effect it, from whatever cause, they are at least answerable for the results, and cannot shift their responsibility upon others.

Lord Stanley then goes into a history of some of Captain Fitzßoy's doings ; telling him circumstantially what he has been doing and what were his motives for his doings, as if all this were positive news to him, the doer. As commentators used to " find in Homer more than Homer knew," so we suspect Lord Stanley finds in Captain Fitzßoy more reasons for his conduct than even Captain Fitzßoy was conscious of. But they are poor enough at best.

" I am happy," says Lord Stanley — (it is astonishing how " happy " these penmen of the Colonial Office are constantly finding themselves, how easily they are satisfied on all occasions; they surely must come under the category of those included in the " beatitude "—"" — " Blessed are they that expect nothing, for they shall not be disappointed.") — " lam happy to learn from you that the temporary irritation not unnaturally caused by the first announcement of your sentiments had shortly subsided." This supernaturally inspired writer must know more not only of Captain Fitzßoy's motives than he himself, but of the feelings of all us settlers too than we can pretend to; for we certainly did think — nay, do think now, and are perfectly sure of it — that the irritation caused by Captain Fitz Roy's sentiments, and still more by his disastrous mode of reducing them to practice, has gone on increasing from the first, and can hardly be at a greater height than at this very moment of our writing.

His lordship then, in the exercise of another attribute of the Colonial Office, " trusts " that nothing has occurred "to interrupt the amicable and equitable arrangement " entered into with Colonel "Wakefield " entirely in accordance with the understanding come to with myself and with the New Zealand Company " previous to Captain Fitzßoy's departure.

This is a monstrous piece of Downing Street brass. Is it necessary to remind our readers that the agreement was to give the Company primd facie grants to their land ; that this agreement must have meant grants previous to investigation by Mr. Spain, for if it did not, in what single respect or tittle were the proceedings under this agreement to differ from those actually going on before it was made ? Before it was made, grants were to be given after investigation. If it was only made to secure this point, which was already secure, why was it made at all ? What a farce to take so much trouble, literally for no purpose whatever. But Captain Fitzßoy has persisted in the old mode, and neither made primd facie grants nor any grants at all ; and yet Lord Stanley is barefaced enough to call this conduct " entirely in accordance " with the agreement.

He praises the Governor too for " having made such a firm stand against the unreasonable demands of the natives," in the question that is of the compensation for

some waste lands belonging to the natives of the Wellington pas. That is. to say, he would not give more than the award of Mr. Spain, amounting to about seven shillings an acre as far as we can learn, for land which had already been sold by and paid for to other natives to whom it was said it did not belong. Certainly a vast deal of praise is Captain Fitzßoy's due for this. : But he " trusts " again. Oh the faith and hope of the Colonial Office ! had it but a little charity (towards the settlers) what an amiable office it would be. He trusts that this "firm stand" of Captain Fitz Roy's " has led to a settlement satisfactory to all parties." Probably to the Maories, who have got the land and the money too, and are keeping forcible possession of it; but satisfaction to the Europeans from such can exist only in the inordinate faith of Downing Street, all the "substance" it has being that of " a thing hoped for," the evidence of it, that of " a thing not seen." fi > Then comes the Waikanai business. His tone is a little altered since his first despatch. Some facts are half sneakingly admitted, which before his fine-spun, rounded periods whisked out of sight altogether. Some of those killed at Wairau, says the despatch, " I am afraid, it is too clear, were killed after the conflict had cease 3." "Afraid! it is too clear:" mark the reluctance to admit anything against the i latives! What, in the name of all sense or fairness, is Lord Stanley afraid of? Does he feel any ideal twitches — premonitory in the parts most appropriate — of the brandished birch rods of the old ladies of Exeter Hall, of the scourges of the saints, the flagellations of the Pharisees? He, the contemner of committees, the spurn er of the House of Commons ! Then he allows I hat " to overlook such an affair" must tend " to shake British authority and to encourage further aggression and outrage." 'But he thinks this consideration outweighed by others. Will he think so when he hears what and how great the aggressions and outrages have since been ? He recounts some of the facts of the affray once more, of course taking as proved all those which best help to make out his own case, and rejecting all others, though supported by ten times the weight of uvidence. And this is just one of the evil consequences of Captain Fitzßoy's having taken upon himself the whole duty of all constituted legal authorities and tribur als, and then done their work so slovenly and one-sidedly. Had that evidence been ] >roperly sifted and pronounced upon, we should be saved at least this constant repetition of disproved circumstances; there would Lave been then some possible termination of the case conceivable ; but, as it is, both pai ties may go on repeating their version till doomsday, neither will ever be satisfied. But here we leave the despatch for the present. _______

We hear that a new company has been formed in London for the preparation of New Zealand flax. The capital is said to be very large ; but we are not in possession of any further particulars. There is also much talk of a company for running steamers to the Australian colonies. A letter, written in London on the 17th of March, received the other day by a gentleman in Nelson, says, " In my next I will send you a prospectus of an East Indian and Colonial Screw-propeller Navigation Company. They intend to have branch steamers from the Cape to Australia and New Zealand."