CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN THE LAND HOLDERS AND RESIDENT AGENT.

Nelson Examiner and New Zealand Chronicle, Volume V, Issue 228, 18 July 1846, Page 78

CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN THE LAND HOLDERS AND RESIDENT AGENT.

[Concluded from page 60.J To William Fox, Esq., Resident Agent of the New Zealand Company. §i r — We regret we are unable to suffer the correspondence between us to terminate without offering a few observations on some portions of your last letter, which we conceive to be at variance with the general feeling of the colonists, and adverse to their interests. Before entering upon the question between us, we must express our concern to find that any of our remarks should have appeared unfair towards you, and beg to assure you that it was very far from our wish or intention to convey any expression in the slightest degree inconsistent with our personal sentiments of respect and goodwill : we addressed you solely as Agent to the New Zealand Company, and are sorry that in that character your advocacy of its cause should appear to us inconsistent with our interests or its own engagements. We may first remark that our opinion as to the amount of cultivable land available for this settlement was not formed without much careful inquiry. As a committee, we do not think our personal inspection of the districts in question essential to our expressing the general feeling of our fellow-colonists ; but we may observe, that our being unable to do so without a very considerable sacrifice of time and much expense, is an additional confirmation of our view, that wheresoever or whatsoever they may eventually prove to be, they will not have that natural connexion with or dependence upon the settlement of Nelson which alone could induce us to consider their delivery as a satisfactory completion of the Company's engagements under that head. We hold that the districts referred to as the probable localities of the rural sections are so physically and geographically independent of this settlement, as to make their delivery, without the purchasers' consent, no more a redemption of the Company's engagements than the distribution of an equivalent quantity at Hokianga or Otago. With respect to the different proposals and suggestions which have been lately published, and from which you consider it impracticable to extract our opinions as a body, we feel no such difficulty. We conceive that the very circumstance of their appearance and discussion furnishes a conclusive answer to the assumption on which you proceed throughout, viz,, that the cooperation and assistance of the Government will at once enable the Company to discharge its liabilities. All the different schemes you refer to assert, or take for granted, that the present system cannot be maintained, and that it is physically impossible for the New Zealand Company to redeem its pledges : they do not question the beauly or healthfulness of the climate, the fertility of the soil where cultivable, or the natural advantages of the portion of the country fit for occupation; but they say the locality is unfitted for the scheme; that the good land is intermixed with much of a very worthless character, which has been, but which ought not to have been, allotted to them ; and that the attempt to persevere in this system will entail further distress and misfortune on the settlement. We do not perceive that any difference of opinion exists on the abolition of the lottery in future sales, the size of the town, the expenditure on public works, or the disposal of the trust funds : on all these subjects the feeling is all but unanimous ; and whilst we allow that considerable diversity of opinion exists as to the proper remedies for existing evils, we believe that the bond jide attempt to meet our wishes and satisfy our just expectations would prove very far from a hopeless undertaking. If we have been for years silent upon the subject of our claims, it has been from motives of forbearance towards the Company, which then possessed our confidence. We were totally unprepared for such a complete ignorance of our situation and requirements as its late Regulations exhibit. We imagine it is now in as favourable a position for meeting its pecuniary obligations as it can expect to occupy for a considerable time to come ; and whilst we are prepared to receive (and, we believe, with few exceptions, to accept) any equitable proposition for the adjustment of our claims, we must respectfully, but firmly, insist upon our rights, and upon the redemption of the faith pledged to us. We would therefore request you to communicate to the Court of Directors these our sentiments, which the avowal of your views on these points, so different and opposed to our own, compel us distinctly to restate and put on record. We have the honour to remain, Sir, Your obedient servants, A. C, Dillon. - D. Monro. J. D. Greenwood. J. Greaves. H. Seymour. Nelson, June 27, 1846. To the Hon. C. A. Dillon, Messrs. Monro, Greenwood, Greaves, and Seymour. Gentlemen — I beg to acknowledge the receipt of your letter dated the 27th current. I think it necessary to inform you that mine to which it is a reply having been dated the 7th current, and delivered to one of your body on that or the following day, I had, in the absence of a reply, considered the present correspondence concluded, and on the day previous to the receipt of your last I forwarded the correspondence to that date to the Court of Directors, by the Ralph Bernal. If your present letter should not reach the Directors at the same time as the others, this will account to you for it. I shall forward it by the first opportunity. To prevent misunderstanding, I think it also necessary to allude to the reference you make

in your last letter to "the general feeling of the colonists, and their interests." I beg to observe , that in the present correspondence I have considered you to express the opinions, not of the generality of the colonists, but of that more limited section of the colonists, the resident landowners and agents, whom you informed me you had been deputed to represent ; and being aware that at a recent public meeting of the co- . lonists at large, they expressly dec&ned being parties to the discussion of any question between the landowners and the Company, I think it necessary to state that I can only receive any opinions expressed by you as being those entertained by the class which appointed you to act on their behalf. I have the honour to be, gentlemen, Your obedient servant, William Fox, Resident Agent of the N. Z. Co. |] Nelson, June 29, 1846. '