[From the Times, March 22.]

Nelson Examiner and New Zealand Chronicle, Volume IV, Issue 185, 20 September 1845, Page 113

[From the Times, March 22.]

The names appended to a petition to Parliament on the subject of New Zealand, which appeared in our columns yesterday, embracing a considerable portion of the leading mercantile and banking firms of London, are such as to entitle it to, and indeed to insure it, the attention of the House of Commons. We would fain hope that its earnestly but temperately urged prayer may be- granted ; and we see no reasons, apart from personal ones, why it should not.

The petition commences in logical order, by a recital of the beneficial effects of colonisation in general : it then states the hopes that had been entertained with regard to New Zealand in particular, adverting to the advantageous geographical position of the islands, their soil, their climate, and the character of their native population; it shows how the development of the resources of New Zealand were likely to have been brought about by the spirit, enterprise, and capital of the New Zealand Company ; it touches lightly on the earlier differences that

had arisen between her Majesty's Government and that Company.-aiid expresses the satisfaction that had been felt at their termination and apparent adjustment in 184 D and 1841 : it then adverts to the renewal of differences with die Colonial Department, and the simultaneous distraction and disputes in the colony, and the alienation between the European and native races thence arising, the subsequent appointment of a Committee of the House to examine the subject, and the interest taken in its proceedings j it then observes that the report and evidence have satisfied the petitioners that the New Zealand Company and its colonists have been exposed to hardships, the result of the policy of the Colonial Office and the local authorities, and that these call for prompt parliamentary interference and redress; it remarks that, but for the Company, New Zealand would now be a colony of France, and yet that the Company's claims to land shave been perseveringly opposed by the Colonial Office, although they have been pronounced by the Committee to have been founded in justice; it comments on the injury and injustice of the present state of things; and it then closes by putting forth a prayer for decisive measures to ensure good government for the future, and to confirm to the Company a clear title to the lands recommended by the Committee to be given to it, together with compensation for the losseß which it has been made to sustain.

When the opinion of its own Committee is backed by such a demonstration of the opinion entertained outside the house as this, we hope that Parliament will not allow the well-being of a new and important colony (now compelled to depend upon this country for its prosperity and peace) to be tampered or trifled with, in order to gratify feelings of false pride, which boasts that it may be led, but not driven. A victory over a troublesome body of merchants may be a tempting object to strive for, but though this is sport in Downing Street, it is death in New Zealand ; and we would most respectfully hint to the ennobled Secretary that he might follow a graceful precedent by forgetting the Commoner's quarrels, and at the same time achieve a more magnanimous triumph than the angry passions of others can afford him scope for. The moderated tone of the late debate on the personal part of the question may be allowed to be taken by him as a reason for an alteration of his councils, and of his conduct towards the Company, for his satisfying the Company by acting on the Report of the Committee!, for his suffering a distant but interesting dependant on bis department to be happy. But if this may not be, if the rapture of the strife cannot be fbregone without too great a sacrifice of feeling, we then trust that Lord John Russell's advice will be taken, and that the House will insist on doing justice to the Company and the islanders, and will not suffer this object to be interfered with by the pugnacity of contending parties. The House conceded ' some nights ago a fair and ample allowance of time and space for personalities ; if that was not made the most of, it is not bound to defer again the merits of the case to the demerits of the litigants.