...—No. 5

Queen's flag must be hoisted there, before I treated with the Natives. The General took possession of Ngaruawahia upon the Bth of December. Te Pukewhau did not receive my letter until the 9th of December. The Natives did not therefore reply to me that the General should go to Ngaruawahia, and did not immediately withdraw all their forces to the southward of that place in consequence of my letter, for they knew nothing of it until the General had taken Ngaruawahia, the fact is they were in full retreat before the General when I wrote it. 4. On the 16th December, I wrote again to the Natives, and Te Pukewhau having died before that date, the letter was delivered to his brother. In that letter I told the Natives, the General having reached Ngaruawahia, that I would receive a deputation from them, and treat with them. It is therefore not true that no communication of any kind whatever was made to the Natives, as Mr. FitzGerald asserts. The papers enclosed in my Despatch of the 30th of November last will prove what I have here alleged. 5. Again, Mr. FitzGerald states " Sir George Grey repeatedly promised that the affair of the Waitara purchase should be inquired into, and justice should be done, yet for eighteen long months he made no inquiry, and took no steps whatever in the matter." I can only say that this is quite untrue ; from the moment of my arrival in the Colony, I did my best in every way to get the Natives to agree to an inquiry into the justice of the Waitara ease, but no persuasion on my part or that of others could induce them to agree to such an inquiry. The writings of Mr. Gorst, and the Bishop of New Zealand, and of Mr. Fox, will be found to confirm what I say on this subject. 6. With regard to Mr. FitzGerald's statements as to my having taken possession of the Tataraimaka Block, I can only say it is true I did that, and that I should do the same thing again. The Tataraimaka Block had been by us fairly purchased from the Natives many years before. The validity of the purchase had never been called in question. It was only twelve miles distant from the town of New Plymouth, was only a few thousand acres in extent, had been nearly all in a high state of cultivation, had houses, a church, and places which had been the happy homes of families for years on it. Those people had all been driven away, their houses and crops absolutely destroyed, and their sheep and cattle all carried off by the Taranaki and Ngatiruanui tribes, to whom we had never done any wrong, who had murdered some of the settlers, and who, as Mr. FitzGerald says, claimed to have conquered it from the English. 7. To have let them retain possession of such a conquest so made, was I found to encourage our enemies, to depress and alarm our Native friends, and to set race against race. I therefore thought it my duty, as soon as I could, to go and again take possession of our own lawful property. And I feel quite certain my doing so had a most beneficial effect on both races throughout these Islands. Mr. FitzGerald.does not understand the English character, when he/thinks they will sit quietly down and see other people in possession of their homes and lands which these people to use Mr. FitzGerald's words, claimed because they had conquered them from the English. 8. Nor does Mr. FitzGerald understand barbarous men. To have admitted that a chosen spot, twelve miles from the town of New Plymouth, had been conquered from the English, would have terrified the wavering and prevented allies from risking their territories by helping a people that could not hoid their own ; and would have encouraged barbarians to attempt the conquest of new homesteads; the capture of more booty. I have, &c, The Eight Hon. Edward Cardwell, M.P. &c, &c. G. Ghet. Xo. 32. His Excellency the Goveenok to the Eight Hon. the Seceetaby of State for the Colonies. Sic, — Government House, Wellington, 7th April, 1865. Adverting to my Despatches Nos. 42 and 45, of the 6th instant, in which I alluded in part to information which had been given to me at Wanganui on the 14th of March, I beg to state that the intelligence imparted amounted to this : — 2. That on a previous occasion the head of a British Officer, Captain Lloyd, had been brought from Taranaki to Pipiriki; that it had been placed upon a pole ; that the population of the place had been induced to dance round it until roused to frenzy, when they rushed it, bit it, and treated it with every indignity. 3. The two principal chiefs at Pipiriki were absent when this took place, aiding the Waikato tribe against us. On their return, they expressed no disapproval of what had been done. On the contrary, Topia, one of these men who had lived from youth much with Europeans, placed himself at the hc^d of the fanatics, and became their priest. 4. Subsequently another baked head of an English soldier, who had been killed near New Plymouth, had been sent from Warea to Pipiriki, and thence, with the knowledge of the chief of that place, to Tauranga, for the purpose of rousing the East Coast tribes to deeds of violence. 5. The most material parts of this information were given to me by Pehi, on the afternoon of the 14th of March. On the night which followed came the news of the horrid murder of Mr. Yolkuer on the East Coast. Pehi, who was to have met me the next day, was so alarmed at this intelligence that he ran away at dawn the next morning, and got off to the Upper Wanganui. He did this with no intention of deserting us, but dreading some temporary outbreak of violence on the part of the European population when such shocking news was received. 6. Pipiriki is situated about eighty miles up the Wanganui Eiver ; from thence branch off the roads to the East Coast, to Taupo, to the Eangitikei, and to Taranaki and the Ngatiruanui country. It was the place through which the murderers must return to reach Warea, and it was the last spot from which they had proceeded in this part of the country to execute their purpose ; it was also the place at which the baked head of a British Officer had been exhibited in so revolting a manner by people who fully knew how great a crime they were committing. 7. All these circumstances made me conclude that Pipiriki ought to be forthwith taken possession of and occupied by us. ,

No. 47,

20

DESPATCHES FROM THE GOVERNOR OF NEW