H.—23.

26

APPENDIX C.

REPORTS OF THE SPECIAL COMMISSIONER. To the Chaieman of the Philadelphia Exhibition Commission. Sib,— Wellington, New Zealand, sth October, 1876. I have the honor to submit the following report of my proceedings as Special Commissioner to Philadelphia, in which I have repeated the substance of my despatches to you of various dates. 1. On the 6th of March last, when in London, I received the commission of His Excellency the Governor, together with your letter of instructions, dated 13th December, 1875. [Enclosure I.] On the following day 1 obtained from the Secretary of State for the Colonies an official introduction to the President of the Imperial British Commission, and was placed in communication with the officers of the Executive Commissioners with the view of making the necessary arrangements for the display of the New Zealand exhibits. 2. My first duty in carrying out the instructions I had received was to inspect the articles returned from the Vienna Exhibition, and which were stored in the custody of the Agent-General for the Colony. Having made from them a large selection of exhibits which I thought would be suitable for the American Exhibition, I prepared the general Catalogue, embodying in it the provisional list of the exhibits which were to be sent from the colony. This Catalogue was incorporated with the official Catalogue of the British section, printed at the expense of the British Commissioners, and a proof transmitted to you on the 25th of March. On April 7th the consignment of exhibits and show cases obtained in London were forwarded to America, and on the 12th I sailed from Liverpool, and reached Philadelphia on the 24th. Mr. A. T. Bothamley, agent in charge of the exhibits sent from New Zealand, had arrived by way of San Francisco about a month previously, and had forwarded the arrangements for the Exhibition as far as was possible. He reported that great delay had been experienced in getting the goods delivered in the Exhibition building owing to the bad state of the approaches, and likewise to the obstructive nature of the regulations relative to terminal charges, concerning which he has received no notice before leaving the colony ; and that although the first of the cases in his charge were placed on the space allotted on the 23rd March, the last of the London consignment was not received until the 18th April. In conjunction with the representatives of the colonies of New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, Jamaica, and Bermuda, an uniform system of construction and ornamentation of the Australian Courts had been agreed upon, so that they might form a conspicuous feature in the Exhibition. The contracts for these constructions, and for the erection of most of the show cases, were arranged by Mr. Bothamley before my arrival, although the work had not been commenced at that time. Ho had also visited Washington and New York, and obtained promises of assistance from the Smithsonian Institute and other quarters towards rendering the New Zealand exhibits more complete. In the course of a few days after my arrival I was able to comply with the Custom-house formalities, and to commence the work of unpacking; but as the show cases were not delivered by the date specified, notwithstanding the most strenuous efforts, the exhibits had to be arranged in a temporary manner for the ceremonial opening on the 10th May, and it was not until the end of the month that the final arrangement of the Court was completed. In reporting the above delay, I should state that New Zealand was not singular in this respect, as every other department was in the same predicament, excepting in the case of Queensland, and a few other sections which were represented by collections that had been thoroughly -organized and arranged previous to their being sent to Philadelphia, —and I would strongly advise that in the case of any future Exhibition, a similar course should be adopted with regard to New Zealand exhibits. On the 14th May, I visited Washington for the purpose of selecting a series of ethnological and other collections pertaining to New Zealand, contained in the National Museum, and which were most generously lent by the Trustees. During my visit, I received the greatest courtesy and assistance from Professors Henry, and Spencer Baird, of the Smithsonian Institute, and through them obtained introductions which enabled me to secure for the colony valuable and extensive gifts of books for the General Assembly Library, and to make permanent arrangements for obtaining the future publications of the United States Government by way of exchange. It is unnecessary that I should report the various difficulties which attended the arrangement of the Court, and the amount of trouble that was caused by the defective manner in which the exhibits were labelled, and the almost total absence of the statistical information required by the United States Commissioners for the guidance of the Judges. This naturally resulted from the hasty and irregular manner in which the greater part of the exhibits had been procured at the last moment. The mere fitting up of the Court was also accomplished only by extraordinary exertions owing to the impossibilty of obtaining labourers under proper control. On the 25th of May, I ceased to have the valuable assistance of Mr. Bothamley, who proceeded to England in accordance with the terms of his engagement. It was not until the 16th of June, that the New Zealand Court was in complete order ; and until the 20th, I was closely engaged in attendance on the Judges, preparing statistical and other information, and in replying to the numerous enquiries which were addressed to me relative to the colony. In furnishing information of this nature to the Press correspondents, and other persons, I was greatly assisted by having a large supply of the second edition of the Official Hand Book of the colony, 1000 copies of which had been sent me by the Agent-General for distribution. Those was freely given to