EDUCATIONAL RESERVES.

A.—No. 3.

29

been so. As an individual, I am quite willing to bear a part towards the expense, if there is not enough coming in from the land. I think the feeling is general. We should wish for a school that should give a superior education. lam aware there is no fit building for tho purpose. I know there has been an ill-feeling amongst us ever since that building was put up, because of the expense, which I have heard was £700, and the bad way in which it was built. I told Mr. Tudor at the time that the two chimneys would all have to come down again. He said he hoped pot. The architect did not employ proper people. I think the Maoris are dissatisfied with the school owing to there not having been proper attention paid to them. Sometimes there has been somebody to look after the school and sometimes not. I know that there has been always a dissatisfaction among them as to the land the Bishop received. They say the land is theirs. It was taken from them without their consent, and they do not know what is done with the money. James Macdonald, being duly sworn, states : I have been lately a storekeeper. I have been in this district twenty years. I always understood that the College was to be open for the Europeans as well as for the Maoris. I know that there are several families about here who would be very glad to avail themselves of a good school, but never understood that they could do so. I think it possible that if a certain scale of payment had been adopted, European children might be educated at the school. Charles Alley recalled: The chimneys of the building were erected by private contract, so far as I know; I was in Nelson at the time. I was instructed to go to Dr. Greenwood to give in a tender for the chimneys of the school at Motueka. I went to Dr. Greenwood. He told me to go to Mr. Russell. Mr. Russell acted, I believe, in the capacity of a builder. I saw him at Richmond. I told him that I would build the chimneys for £12. He said he could not give it, as he had only £14 for it. He offered £10. I said I could not do it for that. I was oyer here two months after. Mr. Tudor applied to me to inspect those chimneys. I went and looked at them, and I told Mr. Tudor they would never act. I could see, and almost put my hand through one of them. He told me there was a Bishop coming out, and there was no money at hand. The flues were too small, and they were not pargetted. The actual contract accepted was for £14, which was sufficient to have made a good job of it. I would have done it for £12. The plaster was only two-coat work, instead of three. I consider it a very inferior job. I told Mr. Tudor so. The lathes are in several places perpendicular, which will never hold the mortar properly. The zinc at the angle at the junction of the dormer with the roof was put over the plaster instead of under, so that the water always soaked in behind it. Takerei Paerota declared he would not send his children. I took my son Herewinei from the school a long time ago, because they whipped him. Nopera said: Me speak English —me never go to school —here my master (touching his own head) —me put it in here all the same potatoes into the ground. My way speaking English —half English, half Maori—like a pot of "bingo" (half ale,half porter). The man at the school* —the master —he make a beat of Paerota's boy. That no good. That no the Maori way. That old fellow (Paerota), he take him away. That the way the Maori no go to the school. They make one hour read ; one hour school a week ; all the rest time grow potato, grow wheat, grow cabbage. What the good of that ? Maori no like that. Ramari Tekauri: My name is now Herewine (Selwyn). My land was called Matakino-kino, (now sections Ito 9, also 10 and 11 Bewaka, the side of Motueka). It was mine before I was ill. It was land of my forefathers. I lived there till I went to Nelson. I lived on the Motueka River,, sections 72, 73, 74. Riwaka was my father's land too. I was requested to give up my land for a school, and I also had land at the Wakarewa which I also gave up ; but I kept the Motueka River land. I stuck to that land. I did not stay there because I was ill. No one told me to go off it. I have no land now. The Government has taken that at Motueka. I gave up the rest. The only thing I received for that land was my maintenance during my illness. Nobody ever told me this was the payment for my land. I had £2 a month from Taylor, the policeman at Tekapa, by Mr. Brunner's authority. I don't know bow much I received. I don't know how to count. I received it for about ten weeks while I lived at Motupipi. This was paid up to the time of my marriage. My father, E. Kia, got ten blankets for his share of the land at Motueka. Captain Wakefield gave him them. My father died whilst I was at Nelson. Whilst I was at Nelson they let the cottage that my husband (Charley) had built, and the land to Mr. Jackson and others, who said they had taken it on a lease from Brunner. Edmund Parkinson: lam a carpenter. I have lived here fourteen or fifteen years. I and my partner, Edward Bibbey, put up the school buildings. It was soon after our arrival. We tendered for the carpenters' work, but not the timber. We made it according to Mr. Clarke's plan, who was architect. Dr. Greenwood and Mr. Tudor had to do with it. The timber was splendid, and there was plenty of it. At that time wages were tip-top, and timber was very dear. We had just left Melbourne and put up a barn for Dr. Greenwood, also a job for Mr. Allen, and satisfied them. We did a portion of the lathe work ; some of the outside with gutters, some inside, to the best of my recollection. Ido not recollect the amount of the contract. My mate has been gone away some time. I cannot recollect whether tenders were advertised for. We got paid about days' wages ; we worked from light to dark in summer time, and did not get anything out of the way by it. Ido not think you could put up a better building now for the same money, though you might put more work upon it. I and my mate, while waiting for the plasterers, re-sunk the well. This was extra work. It was a dangerous job in that gravelly soil taking bricks out from the well. Ido not know anything about the lead or zinc being put outside the plaster of the gutters. The weather-boarding at the end was only intended for temporary work, to be built on to again afterwards. Mr. F. D. Greenwood re-examined : The Bishop's object in offering the terms to Saxon was to get the property improved and made more productive. The Bishop had the lease prepared, which I now produce, but which was never signed, Saxon having been willing at first to agree to those terms ; but I

* Mr. Harris was alluded to.

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