PROVINCIAL COUNCIL.

Colonist, Issue 25, 15 January 1858, Page 2

PROVINCIAL COUNCIL.

Tuesday, January 12. , , The Speaker took the chair precisely at 5 o'clock. All the members present excepting Mr. W. Robinson. As the minutes of the last meeting were being read, a message from his honor the Superintendent was announced, and read by the Speaker—viz: Message No. 1, containing despatch from his Excellency the Governor with reference to Debenture Bill and Education Loan Act. Message No; 2, enclosing correspondence md plan as to Waitohi road, -•.■:' Also announcing the' Standing Orders of ihe Council; wei'e approved by his Honor. ; Dr. Munko presented a petition from the" Dim Mountain Copper Mining Company " for pel-mission to construct a railway for the transport of the ores and produce arising from the mines and lands of the company, and for other purposes connected with the said company.' Petition ordered to lay upon the table. Dr. Munro also presented a petition from the inhabitants of Nelson respecting the Dog Nuisance. Petition received. ■ Mr. Ward presented a petition from the. inhabitants of Suburban South/relative ta a Dew Act.. >° Petition received. Dr. Munro gave riorice of motion1 to move ori Wednesday the molioa of the Dun Mountain Mining Company. " Mr._ Ecelling moved—" That his Honor the Superintendent be requested to have the Government Gazette printed, in the form that the late Council, in the last session, dgreed upon, in order to save the double^ririting of the various bills." Mr. Saunoers moved—" That stauding order. No. 37, be suspended, with reference to those bills, that have failed to become law, in consequence of not having timely received the Governor's assent." Mr. Ward moved—" That, iri the conduct of the business of this Council at this period, it is desirable to entertain no questions or measures not imperatively demanded by the exigencies of the public service, with a view to an early adjournment to, a season more suited to the general convenience of it-a members." > The Speaker called on Mr. Mackay to move the resolutions standing in his name. "■: Mr. Mackay moved—" That his Honor the Superintendent be requested to furnish the Council with a return, showing the date, situation, arid cost of erecting of the several pounds in the province, arid the" number of animals impounded in them, and also the amount of fees received by the Provincial Treasurer for each separately." The motion having been seconded, on being put to the House was lost by a considerable majority. Mr. Mackay, in accordance with previous notice^ asked the Provincial Solicitor, if it is the intention of the Government to introduce a bill this session to amend the Impounding Ordinance.' The Provincial Solicitor replied in the negative. Mr. Elliott lriove'd—" T? hat his Honor the Superintendent be requested to furnish the Council with a copy of any correspondence that has taken place between the Government of this Province and the Government of the Province of Wellington, relative to an arrangement for the tr'atism'issiori of the English mails {o Nelson on their arrival in Wellington^ and^ also the copy of any offer received by the Provincial Goverriment from any shipowner or shipmaster for the conveyance of such mails." Mr. Maqkay seconded the motion which was* carried, unanimously. Mr. Elliott moved that a copy be: forwarded to his Honor the Superintendent. Carried. The Provincial Secretary moved—"That the Council resolve into committee to take1 irito consideration the Address of his Honor the Superintendent." Carried. Mr. SAtN»ERs proposed, and Mr. Adams seconded, that Mi\ Wells do take the chair. : The Provincial Secretary moved the reading of his Honor's address, which was read accordingly by the Clerk of the Council Dr< Monro asked the Chairman of Committee, whether he was out of order in asking the Clerk to read the correspondence between the Superintendent and the Provincial Government.' The question being put to the Committee, and their assent obtained, the Clerk read the various correspondence between the late Superintendent and the Provincial Government, but too lengthy in detail for publication. Mr. Saunders moved—" That despatch 47—76 be read, as it touched very closely upon the interest of this province/ Read accordingly. Mr. Parker rose to reply ta his Horio/s speech. He thought that speech to be very satisfactory, and read the folio wing address iri reply :—- To his Honor John Perry Robinson, Esquire* Superintendent of the Province of Nelson/ 1. We the members of the Provincial Council of Nelson,-in,Comicil assembled, beg to offer our thanks for your. Honor's actress opening its present Session. 12. We are satisfied that the state of the Province fully justifies the gratification expressed by your Honor, ami that it is steadily advancing in all" the elements of prosperity. * 3. The discovery and development of the go^d fields affords a grbuiid for special congratulation. We shall b6 happy to aid in such Legislation on the subject as may secure the orderly and regular occupation of the gold districts, give ev6'ry one as fair a chance

as possible of obtaining a share of the advantages they offer, confer upon the miners the privilege of self controul in all '..matters relating to mining-to a,s ample an extent as U-. consistent with established institutions, and raise a revenue requisite to meet the..expenses entailed upon the public, by tlie existence o:f the gold fields, and to provide the iiieans for ttitjir further development. ; 4. The increase of our exports to an amount more than double,1 that of the last preceding years, is a solid proof of tha advance of the province within the last 12 months. . -■-'■' . 5.. We concur with your Honour iii the belief that f,he land revenue of the province may be made sufficient to liquidate tlie undue portion of the debt to the New Zealand Company, saddled upon this province by tlie financial .schema of. the general ■government, and to yield a valuable surplus for public works, but that it will be necessary to encourage the explorations of new districts; and render them accessible by the construction of roads, in Order to maintain the revenue lin .q.uestion in so satisfactory a condition.'* Mi1; BaWiicoat moved the* • following amendment :— "We beg to express a hope that the exigencies of the public service will not again render it necessary for your Honor to summon us at this psriod of the year—at a season, in which ife last council repeatedly protested against being in session., and which is equally inconvenient to this. We would most respectfully call your Honour's attention to the fact that the nienibers of the Provincial Council are of necessity chosen chiefly from amony: those actively engaged in, and dependent on some industrious vocation: and that, consisting as it does chiefly of members.chosen by and from the country districts, it will always be found to be formed in a great measure of those to whom a protracted absence from home, &t this seasonoorf r the year, can only be a source of intolerable loss aad.vexation." Dr. Kenvvick seconded the address. Dr. Monbo said he was sorry he could not vote for the reply which they had just; listened to. It was a most meagre document, only to be exceeded in meagreness by the sufceeh oflthe hon. gentleman who moved its adoptioiL;; He thought ifc would be a great mistake for thehvto ag^ree to such a document as that. The Superintendent was not a crowned head, nor were his lion, friends xof the Executive her Majesty's responsible Ministers, and he therefore thought it absurd in them to parody imperial forms and make their reply a mere cuckoo-like echo of the speech. Bui independently of this, there was one paragraph at all events in the reply which he thought few ntembers of the Council would like to. vote for; Dr. Monro then read the paragraph which was to the effect that the Province had sustained little or no inconvenience from'tlie lapse of the bills of last session; and that in one respect the delay was advantageous by affording an opportunity of re-considering the bills. Now, he thought that this was sheer nonsense or something worse, and he must express his surprise that the hon. member for MotUeka, whose judgment and shrewdness lie had often had occasion to admire, could stand godfather to such stuff. But tie supposed the fact was that the member for Mptuefet; had '^loir very little hand in concocting ir, arid that irifw^he had hardly had time to read it Over. If there' wiis a redeeming point about it at all, it .waVthatr. it exhibited its author as a man of a fine, benevo-i lent, and sanguine disposition, determined to extract good out of evil, and like Mark Tapley, to be jolly under the" most depressing .circumstances. (Laughter.) For notwithstanding the destruction of nearly all the legislation 6f last session, its author still found comfort in the idea that the lapsed bills would be re-considered and turned out in an amefided form. Now if one of the new members had said this, he (Dr. Monro) would not have been surprised. He would have been able to set this down to the score of inexperience and pre : sumption, and he would have said to himself, " wait a little my fine fellow, till voii have tried your hand at it:'" but he certainly Was surprised at an expression of this sort coining from one of the old Council; who after great care and consideration had passed the bills in question. He thought there was too much humility about this, and for his part as a member of the defunct Council could not admit its implied inferiority.. Tlie circumstance's tip'oti which the Couricil was required to gve its opinion were of no ordinary character. The Cpuiicil of last year after a protracted session which had cost the province a good deal of money, had passed a variety of measures, some of itheixt confessedly of much importance' and value. Four of theni had become law: but with regard to'tlie rest of theni there was a mistery : what had become of them nobody knew, further than this" that there was a common1 report that through the fault of somebody or other they,had perished for want of the last vitalising influences tq be given to them by the Governor's signature; Theri there were' tlie usual reports circulated by some; that this was owing to' a bungle on the part of our Executive calculated to occasion 1 rid Surprise: while others maintained that it was all owing to groundless difficulties raise.d by Jack-in-office in Auckland. But in the midst of all this talk there was the fact i hat the bills were not law, and that the people of the province who had expected some' solid benefits from the legislation were disappointed. But now the Executive,(for this milk-and-water reply must be considered as the production of the Executive; actually wish u"s to' say that the province has sustained ho injury and is in point of fact a gainer. He would take only; two examples of the lapsed bills, arid ask what tlxe effects had been. There was the Debentures Bill—by that bill authority was given to raise the sum of £39,000, which was to be applied to a variety of most useful public works. Had that bill become law, some of these works' might, now Have been iri process of construction. One of the objects which was to have been accomplished by the bill was the construction of a road to the gold-diggings. It was difficult to overrate the importance of such a work. His Honor congratulated the province upon the increase of its material p'ro'spte'rity, and justly ascribed ,it mainly to the gold-diggings. The^ increase of our, trade.,. the tfecessiori we had received to our population, the evidences of wealth which were springing up around us were due to our production or the precious metal. But the gold-diggings would have been in a very different position if the Government had been enabled to render soriie assistance towards opening the couni try up. If there were a road to" the gold fields the cost of production would be immensely reduced, and in fact it might make the whole difference between a productive or non-productive gold field. ;He had no doubt that many diggers had left dis- ! gusted, in consequence of the labour and expense of transporting provisions to the back country where they worked; and he felt certain that in any other provincehadsucUagold field been discovered as that which we possess, there would have been [by this time a road constructed to give access to it upon which, if not her Majesty's mails, at all events' a biilloc'k'-cart loaded with a ton of provisions would be able to, travel with facility: It was difficult, perhaps impossible, to estimate the' loss which the province might have sustained from this cause: Another measure to which he would advert was the Education Loan Act. The lapse of this had almost paralysed the Central Board, and the delay in the construction of school-houses so urgently required had caused the greatest dissatisfaction.- To this he ascribed the difficulty experienced at the present time in collecting the Education' rate, and he' held that in consequence of this the province had Sustained serious injury. He would not dwell at length upori : the' direct pecuniary loss to the province, but that should not be altogether passed over. The last session could not have cost less than £1300. Five-sixths of the session were occupied with the Waste Lands' Bill which had been disallowed, and with the other bills which had lapsed. At least JIOOO had thus been unprofitably spent.: and then there was the £3000 which the Board of Trustees had set aside for Educntion, which was lying idle in the bank for the last eight months', yielding ho" interest to anybody and applied to no purpose' Whatever. Now the cause of all this, namely, the lapse of the bills, had been distinctly brought under their notice in his Honor's speech. He thought that one of the principal of their duties was" to,reply to this part: and even if his Honor had been entirely silent on the subject, it would have been their duty as the representatives of the people of the province, and guardians of tlie public interests, to enquire who was chargeable with having brought the province into1 Such' a scrape. To this question he would beg to direct the attention of the Council, and as the first step' towards the' enquiry, he would read to them his Honor's statement of the cjrcijm-

stances. His Honor says—1-" These bills were reserved by me for the signification of the Governor's pleasure thereon; and, in accordance with a course which' had been pursued by my jn-edecessdr, and acted upon, by thfe then existing General Government, and iri compliance with what I conceived tb be a literal construction of a letter, received by me on the, subject, were transmitted to Auckland far that purpose on the ist of July. Information, however reached me from the Colonial Secretary, on the ,15th of August, td the effect that his Excellency could not be advised to give his assent to what only purported to be copies of the bills, together with irisrUcions to forward not only the original bills, but also authenticated duplicates. The latter part of these instrucsions it was totally impossible for me to comply with, for reasons that will be fully explained in the correspondence on the subject, copies of which will belaid before you. With the.greatest possible despatch v however, that portion of the instructions relative to forwarding the original" bills Was acted on by me ; but notwithstanding every effort was made for their special conveyance to Auckland, I regret to say that, through stress of weather, the vessel engaged for the purpose did not reach its destination till after the period allowed by the Constitution Act for the Governor expressing his pleasure thereon had expired." This statement of his Honor's was not strictly correct:: the bills were not forwarded in accordance with a course pursued by his predecessor. The despatch moved for by him (Dr. Monro 1 j and then on the table" showed.that in the case of the bill for e'riiargirig tlie Council which .was reserved for'the Governors-assent, Mr. Stafford had forwarded the original bill as" required by the Constitution Act. It was true that upon a subsequent occasion Mr;. Stafford appears to have forwarded " a copy!' of a bill, reserved for the Governor's assent, namely, a bill passed by the Council to repeal the Fines arid Forfeitures' Ordinance. It would appear by his> despatch that in this instance he forwarded a copy, perhaps", not the original; and if sucli were the case, Mi;. Stafford appears, to have departed from the strict requirements of the Con- ■ stltu'tion Act. But then it is to be remarked with regard to the bill that Mr. Stafford accompanied it by a despatch giving the Governor.iriariy reasons why it should hot be assented to.. He might, in fact, almost be said to have reserved it fdr the Governor's dissent arid riot for the Governor's assent. Be that, however, as" it may, it appears that Mr. Stafford only reserved two bills for the Governor's assent; one of.these he transmitted in original as required by the Constitution; of the other; he says in his despatch, " I have transmitted a copy!" though whether that expression mean's" a transcript; or one original bill, it is not possible to Say. It is not, therefore, strictly correct tb say that the bills in question were sent to Auckland " in accordance with the course pursued by my predecessor." But lef;^ us jwiiat the Constitution Act says UjpMt^is subject. Rules are laid down for dealing with two separate classes of bills; first, bills assented to by the Superintendent ori behalf of the i.Croyfernor j secondly, bilk which the Superintendent reserves for the Governor's assent: The riioiie of"proceeding, with regard to them two classes of bills is different, and for very sufficient reason. Where the Superintendent has given his assent, the measure becomes law at once, and it is subsequently submitted to the Governor; who is but a party to it as it were iri the second degree, and who affixes his assent alnidst as a matter of course, provided there is nothing distinctly objectionable in the law, or which conies into conflict with other laws of higher authority. In this case an authentic copy of the Bill assented to.by the Superintendent is required to &c forwarded to the Governdr. But it is quite a different matter when a bill is reserved for1 the Governor's assent, iri that case the Governor is made a party to the law in the first degree. :The Superintendent devolves the responsibility of assenting to the law upon the Governor; and it is* therefore necessary that the Governor should have the* instrument .itself before hiniasit passed the ProvhiciaTCdiincil, just as in the case iri which the Superintendent assents at. once he requires to see to the original bill. The reason for this is, that the Gdverriqr in becoming a direct party to the law, an agent Yin provincial legislation requires that he should have"Jthe nio'st authentic document before Him, in drcler that there may be no mistake, that what he is putting hid signature to is the law as passed by the Legislature of the Province. This Jis what the Constitution Act requires, that when bills are reserved for the GoVemdr's assent, the' original bill should be transmitted to the Governor,,or rather He should say—duplicate o'i'igirials. The hon. member here read the 30t!i clause, and: sliowed that that was the meaning of it; arid that the original bill was to be retained by the Governor; while the duplicate with tlie Governor's asserit signified upon it was to be jretu'rned to the province arid preserved among- its' records. The Executive does riot appear to have been aware of this, or not to have paid attention to it; either from negligence" in studying the Constitution Act, or p'6rhaIp's..wheri they read it from not understanding it; For what they appear, to have done was this, iristead of sending original duplicates to the Governor they sient two copies', and then they justify themselves by saying that they did so because ordered to do so by the Colonial Secretary, But what does the Colonial Secretary say ? The hori.. riieinbe'r here read the despatch from the Colonial Secretary of the 31st March, the purport of which was that the Superintendent was requested in forwarding bills reserved fo*'the Governor's" a&erit to forward them iri duplicate, in order that the Governor's asserit might be affixed to" " the copy" to" be retained in Auckland,' and the other "copy" returned to the proy.irtee.1 The Executive, from apparently an imperfect knowledge .of ~the English language in , reading this despatch, fell into the ridiculous error of supposing that the" word "copy" here meant transcript; whereas the word copy just as frequently niearis original. (Hear, hear, and laughter from1 Mr. Sauriders.) Mr. Saunders might 1 sugh, but he adhered to what he said, and he would give hiitf afliilustrationi. If he went into the newspaper office arid bought two copies of the Examiner; did We thereby' mean two transcripts f certainly riot ' X it) wag two numbers pt the Exatiiimr that he warited,which* in ordinary language are'calied copies. He admitted that when placed in contrast with the word '''original," that copy meant a" transcript: for instance, if there' were but one copy of a pamphlet left, and he wanted two, arid to obtain tyro, it were necessary to transcribe the pamphlet, theri the written pamphlet would be a copy in the sense .of a transcript, bjit the printed " copy" would be art original; and (f the Supeirintendent and his advisers had only read tlie Constitution Act along with the letter of the .Colonial Secretary; aria had with such powers of comparison and gramiriatic ilknowledge as'theymay possess,looked for its meaning iri this way, the only way in fact that they ought.to have pursued, they could hardly have failed, (although that is perhaps' saying too' much) to have perceived that the two copies referred to in the letter of the Colonial Secretary meant two original documents. In fact he did not know what other word the Colonial Secretary could have used. When a person says two copies of the Times newspaper, meaning thereby two originals, he did not know what other word he could, substitute for copy—and even1 if it were cohteri'ded; that because the word had a'double meaning, therefore the Executive was justified in acting upon the wrong meaning, and that the Colonial Secretary ought by some process of circumlocution to have expressed what he meant in a mariner that admitted no doubt, the answer would be. a very obvious one, arid it was this. The Colonial Secretary was not to suppose, and could not in fact suppose, that the ignorance of the Superintendent and his advisers was so great vyifh regard to the Constitution Act asf it pvove3 to have been. The Colonial Secretary had no right to' infer1' that the" Executive of a province would fall irito so stupid and schoolboylike a blunder. He appeared to have used the language which any one' naturally would, in directing the Executive to" forward two'copies ofwhat they ought to have known were required to be duplicate originals. But the Executive did not stop even here in this mismanagement. They thought their duty was to send copies, that is' transcripts, but they appear to have been incapable of doing even that properly ; for they sent. up copies of which the Governor could take no\notice. Instead^ of forwarding copies properly signed by the I Speaker even itf'tne case or the bills to wUictt the

superintendent had assented, they forwarded bills >earing no authentic signature whatever; .signed, le believed By a clerk in the offi c; and yet riot withstanding this most important omission, so anxious 1 vas the General Government that the lawspassedby he Council should cdme into operation, that the jovernor practically assented to this set,- at thesame inle returning them to Nelson in order that they night receive the necessary authentication; But vith regard to the other set of laws, those reserved or the Governor's assent, the case was different: [t is necessary that they should be carefully, coniidered: The Superintendent had thrown, upon1 he Governor the responsibility of assenting td heni, and of considering whether they were mealures in themselves beneficial, and not coming in, sonflict with other laws, or violating any views of oilnd policy: The Governor was" tlius called upon o make himself a party to,tlieir passing in the irst degree, and it was therefore necsiary that he ihould have before him the original, 9111 itself; But what wiui it that tKe Executive had sent, up 0 him ? Rot the original bill's in duplicate, but :opies prepared By a clerk without authentic aiglature, ana as it appear in one instance without ;he Superintendent having written upon the bill, ;hat it had been presented to him for his assent ,vith the date. It was impossible for the Governor ;o consider such documents as authentic, and he would undertake to say that not only in carrying )ut tUe busiriess of Government, but in any business whatever, if flings were to be done in this ;arele3s arid slip-slop manner, everything would 50 to the dogs, As a further instance of the way in which the business of the office was conducted, ion. members would not have failed to perceive ihat the correspondence showed that one letter iud been received by the- Colonial Secretary which iv is imderstood to come from the Superintendent, but ivhicli hid no signature attached to" it. (Hear, hear, stndalaugh) The long and the short of the matter was thin: that the - SupsrintfeMent and his advisers had made a great blunder, and that the' consequences of this b under were uiost • disastrous to the province, and he thought it was the duty of the Provincial Council, more especially as the matter had been referred to them, tO'btate distinctly who was to blame. The Superintendent further states, that so soon as he became aware of what was really required, lie forwarded the bills in the propjr form with the . utmost possib c despatch. But the correspondence showed that on the 14th August the information referred to had been received, which left us for as he could make, out a period of iivd weeks to send the bills to Auckland in proper form. H«, couhl not vouch for it himself, but it was a matter of common report that the Executive for about a fortnight had been shilly-shallying with a person of tha natrie of Porter about taking these bisla up;: and afc last, at the eleventh hour; when there was only twelve days left, they sent.them in the " Palsarfc" The consequence was that they were too late ; aud the conso-* quence of that agam was their lapse, and tha injury which the province had sustained. With regard to' he other partY of his Ho'nor'n spaeuh, there was a good deal in it of which he .approved. . He was glad to see that in the new Waste LandsBid that atrocious .delusion?, sellinig Urid on' credit was abandoned. He felt.well satisfied that such' a system would give increased advantage to the capita ist and mere speculator, and would" be most injurious to tha very class whose welfare it ostensibly sought to promote. ' In" 'other- parts of the speech he recognised a. decided irriprovemeut over last year. His Honor was evidently both learning and unlearning: le vning new. truths .in the dischar.- c of the duties of hia office, unlearning many of the old fallacies which hupg about. : hi-<.l>ouii whyn ha originally entered upon h'ia* dlfica; The. present, speech exhibited a much'more enlarged arid, liberal tone than the last, and led one to recognise, in his Honor .some promise of bud,dmg statesmanship. In particular lie congratulated, his Honor upon the change his views had, undergone with reference to borrowing money. .Upon this subject he would be glad to assist in carrying'bu'thisHotior's views, beinu satisfied that borrowing money to develop the resources ofahiew country;'; is: justified'liotb:: by a sound political eaono'iny, by reason and by experi.enca The ■lion.- member then read the draftfof a reply which. we have not room to' insert. .-•-.■ '. '•■"■ -: .; /: Mr. Sanders said, although Dr. Monro had told .■ the Council he * had no desire that his ideas' should follow the same channel as Mr. Saunders'/ they were upon thepresent occasion so hear doing so, that vi'ith one single exception he feltinucn more iriclined1 J.to: supp<}r&ith6 address moved by Dr. Monro, thari-th'e one moved by Mr. Parker;. He thought it most undesirable that the Council should attempt^ to underrate the real and un-; doubted injury which, this province had suffered biy the loss of tHese bills; They ought rather to set it forth in its, strongest light. It was also their duty to express their disapprobation of the conduct of those who. had been the cause of the loss, but it was absurd for a person", even with all Dr. MonroV ability, to attempt to! throw the whole or any portion of that blame Upon the Executive of this province. In the first place, the letter from the Colonial Secretaty to the Superintendent, dated March 31, ] 857, instructing him liow to send up' the bills, would fairly admit of no other construction than the one which the Executive had put upon it: The Superintendent was there told to' send up two copies, in order that the Governor's " assent may be recorded both On the copy^ of the' bill returned to you, and on the copy retained in the.office." But even if that letter had not been* perfectly unmistakable, the course which: the Colonial Secretary - himself had pursued when he" was Superintendent, put the question beyond all doubt, and the Council had just seen that when' he sent up the last bill that he ever reserved for the Governor's assent, he sent up a copy only.' Dr. Monro had stretched his ingenuity to the utmost to .convince this Council that a copy really nieant the original; but if Dr. Monro had proved that, he would tiav'e proved fur too much for his own case. If a copy meant an original, an original meant, a copy; a .copy and an original meant one" and the same, th'ihg, and the Colonial Secretary had no kind of excifce for recommending the Governor to w'itliold liis: assent from the copies (i.c; flip origirialii) tlfat w.ere sent up to him. Dr. Moriro". Had siatea .th*a£ tlie instructions contained in the Constitution1 Act were too clear-to admit of any mistake—life (Mr: Saunders) would admit that taking that act alone lie should have put the same construction .on it. that Dr. Monro' liad done; buthe was far from thinking that tlie Constitution1 ,iict would admit of ho o' her construction,-, and 6ertaihly was not so clear as to justify the Superintendent in acting contrary to the instruction's received from the Colonial Secretary, and contrary to the practice adopted by his predecessor in office, how become his superior, put even if Dr. Monro had succeeded in proving that the Superintendent h^d made any mistake in sending copies instead of rcnriginals, the blame of the bills being lost would still rest with the. Colonial .Secretary. The members would see that the bills were sent from here by the Wonga Wonga on the Ist July, so that they must have been in the hands of the Colonial Secretary se'-, veral days before he acknowledged the receipt of them in a letter written by him on the 14fh July. Why then' did he'not state in that letter that the" bills were not sent up in the manner he wished to have them ? Had hW done so there would have been abundance of time to. have sent other bills .in1 my shape that the ingenuity of the Colonial Secretary could possibly suggest, without any risk >f losing a single bill j, but instead of doing this he" merely exercises' his snubbing propensities,- by sending back four of the bills for more signatures, md leave the Executive of this province to believe ihat the rest of the bills are all right. But 31 lays after this letter had been received, another letter comes from Auckland to say that instead rf what they had so long received and held without my remark they wanted something else! It was' iheu of course too late to get anything else sent within the three months required by the Constitution Act. There is another circumstance, that Hipht $0 be mentioned in connection with these lost bills, as showing very clearly that no very jreat desire was mauifes ed by the General Goirernmeut, to facilitate the early transmission of these bills. The Wonga Wonga had positive nxlers not to wait for any mail, and although she ivas in the harbour at lca^f a great part of two' lays, no mail was made up by that steamer,-and :he bills were only got to Auckland in that vessel ty the Superintendent making up a private parcel md sending it per favor of Col. Mould. Dr;tfouro had certainly made out a very 6trong case igainst the Superintendent, because a clerk Lad none instance enclosed the unsigned.copy of a etter instvid of the letter which had received thuf