A.—3

38

High Commissioner's Court, was sure to excite on their part not unnatural irritation, and a sense of being treated with injustice, for it is hardly to be expected that men of the class to which most British subjects in the Pacific belong should understand that Great Britain has an interest, in their good conduct and the maintenance of legal restraint over their actions, quite apart from any sympathy with natives or care for their 'protection. The reply returned to such representations has invariably been that in the opinion of the Law Officers of the Crown insuperable obstacles exist to any assumption of jurisdiction by Her Majesty, over others than British subjects, beyond the limits of Her Majesty's dominions. Nevertheless, although Her Majesty's Government does not see its way to overcome the real as well as the formal and technical difficulties, with which any such exercise of authority is undoubtedly surrounded, the necessity for exceptional dealing with exceptional circumstances is not, I think, unrecognized. Meanwhile, however, the High Commissioner is absolutely powerless to take judicial cognizance of any offence committed by a Polynesian native not also a subject of Her Majesty. Should the proceedings of any native community be such as can be deemed acts of war, they can be dealt with as such by Her Majesty's naval force on the station. Until a few months since, the Commodore acted in such matters entirely independently of the High Commissioner, and on his own responsibility alone. Lately,-he has been instructed, wherever possible, to consult the High Commissioner before proceeding to active hostilities; but no proposal made by him has ever been objected to by the High Commissioner, between whom and the Commodore there exist the most entire confidence and agreement. Although, however, his concert is in certain cases required, the High Commissioner has no control whatever over the movements of the Australian Squadron, nor can he direct the course, or hasten or retard the sailing, of a single vessel. It is therefore manifest that the High Commissioner has had no opportunity of showing either leniency or severity towards natives, and that it has been made a matter of reproach to him that he has not exercised a jurisdiction which he has been strictly forbidden to assume, and that he has abstained from issuing orders which he has no right to give, and to which he could neither enforce nor claim obedience. The charge of undue hai'shness towards whites has next to be considered. The whole of the cases referred to at pp. 23, 24 were tried during my absence in England, and, even assuming them to be accurately described, (which it will presently be shown they are not), they would not in any way affect the High Commissioner. Since my return to [Fiji, in 1879, the cases brought to the cognizance of the Court* have been but four, in only one of which a white man was concerned. That white man was the Rev. George Brown, who has certainly no reason to complain of undue severity on the part of the High Commissioner's Court. Two of the other parties tried before the Chief Judicial Commissioner since September, 1879, were coloured subjects of Her Majesty: of these, one was convicted of murder, and sentenced to death; the other, charged with theft, was acquitted, the only evidence against him, (his own confession), being shown to have been extorted by threats and torture inflicted by Europeans. The fourth case was that of Aratuga, a Polynesian, concerned in the murder of the mate and labour-agent of the " Mystery," who was brought to Fiji as a prisoner by Her Majesty's ship "Conflict," and was put on his trial before the High Commissioner's Court, in the hope that some ground for claiming jurisdiction over him would be discovered. But no escape could be found from the conclusion that he was beyond the authority of the Court, a view the correctness of which has been emphatically confirmed by the highest legal authorities in England. Another case, that of a half-caste Tongan, charged with the murder of another half-caste, and of the captain of a German vessel, was never brought before the Court at all, it being clear that it was equally out of its jurisdiction, and the man was handed over to the Tongan authorities to be dealt with by them. It hence appears that, whilst a harsh exercise of the judicial powers he undoubtedly does possess over British subjects is imputed to the High Commis-

* I do not take into account petty cases between British subjects themselves, heard before the Deputy-Commissioner's Courts at Apia and Nukualofa.