DESPATCHES FROM THE GOVERNOR OF NEW
A.—No. 1
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be advanced out of moneys arising from Native reserves in which any section of the Ngaitahu tribe is interested. And His Excellency the Governor further directs, with the advice and consent as aforesaid, that such funds as may be so advanced shall be repaid, with interest thereon, as shall be hereafter directed. Forster Goring, Clerk of the Executive Council.
No. 9. Copy of a DESPATCH from Governor Sir Geouge Ghey, X.C.8., to His Grace the Duke of Buckingham. (No. 118.) Government House, Wellington, My Lord Duke, — 4th November, 1867. Adverting to my Despatch No. 76, of the 6th of August last, transmitting a Petition to Her Majesty from certain members of the Ngatiraukawa tribe, complaining that an Act of the General Assembly of New Zealand, had excluded a block of land at llangitikei, which they claimed, from being subject to the operation of the Native Lands Court, so that their title to such land could not be judicially investigated: I have now the honor to transmit a copy of a Memorandum I have received from my Responsible Advisers, informing me that as by an Act passed by the General Assembly during its last Session, it is provided that the claims of these Natives who have withheld their assent to the sale of the block of land alluded to, can be referred by the Governor to the Native Lands Court, they propose at an early date to submit for my approval the necessary document for referring to the Native Lands Court, all claims of Natives who have not signed the deed of sale of the block of land in dispute. I have, &c, His Grace the Duke of Buckingham and Chandos. G. GREY.
Enclosure in No. 9. Memorandum: by Mr. Stafford. Ist reference to previous Memoranda on the subject of the Petition of Parakaia, Paranihi, and Rawiri Te Wanui, to the Queen, Ministers desire to call His Excellency's attention to two sections (copies of which are enclosed) of an Act intituled "The Native Lands Act, 1867," which was passed by the Legislature during its recent Session. The first of these sections provides that the claims of those Natives who have withheld their assent to the sale of the Hangitikei-Manawatu Block can be referred by the Governor to the Native Lands Court, and Ministers accordingly propose at an early date to submit for His Excellency's approval the necessary document referring to that Court all claims of Natives who have not signed the deed of sale. The Natives have been informed of the action taken by the General Assembly, in order to give them an opportunity of preferring claims. By the terms of the second section so much of the block originally excluded from the operation of the Native Lands Court as has not been under negotiation, is now brought within the operation of the Court, saving the rights of holders of land orders originally selected within the block at Manawatu. For His Excellency the Governor. E. W. Stafford.
Sub-Enclosure to Enclosure in No. 9. Sections of " Native Lands Act, 1867." Sec. 38. All Native land referred to in section eighty-three of " The Native Lands Act 1865" shall unless the Governor shall otherwise direct from time to time in respect of any such land be excluded from the operations of the said Act and of this Act until the thirty-first day of December one thousand eight hundred and sixty-eight Provided that every such agreement between the owners of any such land or other persons interested therein on the one part and officers duly authorized to enter into the same on behalf of Her Majesty on the other part may be referred by the Governor to the court and the court shall thereupon investigate the title to and the interests in such land in the manner prescribed in the said Act and this Act and shall make such orders as it is by the said eighty-third section of "The Native Lands Act" empowered to make. Sec. 39. In any case where lands have been granted under any Act or Ordinance for the settlement of claims arising out of dealings with the Aboriginal inhabitants of New Zealand or any other Act authorizing such grants which lands had been acquired either wholly or partly in consideration of the grantees having had issue by women of the Native race and where such grantees having subsequently thereto married and had issue by the same or other women have died without having made a valid disposal of such lands by will or settlement leaving the issue first above mentioned unprovided for it shall be lawful for the Native Lands Court upon the application of any person claiming to be interested in such lands to ascertain whether the issue first aforesaid should either by Native custom