D.—No. 3

PAPERS RELATING TO IMMIGRATION.

48

their arrival as soon as possible, and ready to receive and provide for them at all seasons. The Government are desirous to avoid fettering you with detailed instructions in reference to the appointment of sub-agents for the selection of immigrants ; the charter and fitting up of ships ; the dietary scales; tho approval or appointment of and instructions to captains, surgeons, schoolmasters, and matrons ; the regulations to be observed on shipboard ; the gratuities (if any) to be given as an encouragement to an efficient performance of duties during the voyage, and other similar minutia?. The results of the long experience of the Imperial Immigration Commissioners, and of those of the Australian Colonies, will be at hand for your guidance ; but when you have settled all these details and printed them, tho Government will be glad to be furnished with copies, both for their own information and approval and that of the General Assembly. The only details to which the Government think it necessary at present to call your attention are —1. That to each ship a schoolmaster should be appointed, and that a supply of elementary schoolbooks, writing materials, and slates should be provided for the use of the children placed under his charge. 2. That encouragement should be given to tradesmen, single women, and others to provide materials for usefully filling up their time on shipboard, and for accumulating a stock of articles the sale of which, on arrival in the Colony, would be most advantageous to themselves. Youths of both sexes might also be taught on board useful trades. The best method of effecting these objects has no doubt been the subject of experiment, and the Government therefore do not indicate any particular mode of carrying their views in these respects into effect. 3. AVith a view to prevent waste and encourage frugality among the single as well as the married immigrants, the Government think it desirable that the immigrants shall have power to short-draw any of their rations, and that when oft' the coast of New Zealand the quantity so short-drawn should be served out to them for their use on shore, or, if they desire to receive the money value thereof instead, that they should be paid by an order on the ship's agents at the port of arrival at a scale of prices previously fixed in the charter-party. You will be good enough to furnish by each mail an abstract of the replies received from the nominated immigrants, showing the date when they will be ready to sail, or whether they decline to emigrate. When once any person has declined to emigrate, and you have informed the Government that his or her name has been struck out of your books, it is not to be replaced without a fresh application being made in the Colony in the usual course, because the money which has been paid in New Zealand on account of such passage will become returnable to the applicant so soon as the lists received from you show that the name has been erased in tho London Begister. An extract from the general list which you furnish to the Government should at the same time be addressed direct to each of the Superintendents of the Provinces from which the immigrants were nominated. Immediately on the sailing of every party of immigrants, copies of the charter-party, list of names, instructions, and all other explanatory documents should be sent to the Government by first following mail (by San Francisco or Suez), and a copy sent direct to the Superintendent of the. Province to which the immigrants are bound—duplicates in all cases to be forwarded by a second opportunity. The Government will be glad from time to time to receive from you full information on the subject of European emigration to New Zealand, and any suggestions relative thereto which you may think it advisable to make. In sending instructions for special emigration, I shall fully inform you of the object of such emigration and of the regulations for its settlement here. Statistical accounts of the prices of labour, of the necessaries of life, and of other important matters in each Province, will he prepared here from time to time as accurately as practicable, and transmitted to you for public information throughout the United Kingdom and other European countries. I have, Ac, The Agent-General of New Zealand, care of J. Alorrison, Esq, W. Gisborne. 3, Adelaide Place, King AVilliam Street, London.