55

A.—3a

Regulations to be observed in keeping accounts between the Colonial Treasurer and the Registrar of the Supreme Court, or other official administrators of intestate estates. 1. Whenever any official administrator shall be directed by an order of a Judge of the Supreme Court to pay over the residue of any estate into the hands of the Colonial Treasurer, or any monthly balance in respect of any estate into the hands of the Colonial Treasurer or of any Sub-Treasurer, the Treasurer or Sub-Treasurer will receive the same accordingly, and give a receipt for the same, and will also enter every such balance to an account to be called " Official Administration Account —Estate of A. B." 2. When any money paid into Court to abide the event of any suit shall have been ordered by a Judge of the Supreme Court to be paid into the hands of the Colonial Treasurer or of any SubTreasurer, the Treasurer or Sub-Treasurer will receive and give a receipt for the same, and will also enter every sum so received to an account to be called " Supreme Court Account —Suit of A. 8., plaintiff, against C. D., defendant." 3. Moneys so received as aforesaid by the Colonial Treasurer or any Sub-Treasurer will be paid out upon production of an order for that purpose under the hand of a Judge of the Supreme Court to the person named in such order as authorised to receive the same. No such moneys, nor any part thereof, will be paid out except upon the production of such order as aforesaid. Approved by the Lieutenant-Governor in Council this 13th day of December, 1845. —J. Coates, Clerk of Councils.

No. 27. Copy of Despatch from Governor Grey to the Eight Hon. Earl Grey. (No. 134.) My LoUd, — Wellington, 24th December, 1850. 1. I have the honour to transmit a letter addressed to your Lordship, on behalf of a Constitutional Association at Wellington, by Mr. John Dorset. This letter, having passed me on my journey from Auckland to this place, only reached me yesterday. It consists chiefly of comments on a despatch (No. 27) which I addressed to your Lordship on the 22nd March, 1849. 2. I wrote that despatch under the feeling of responsibility which necessarily rested upon an officer of the empire who was charged with very important duties. The Queen had, a few years before, intrusted to me the administration of the affairs of a country which was inhabited by distinct races, one of which (the aboriginal one) was still in a state of comparative barbarism, was by far the most numerous of the two, and was then in a state of active, successful, and increasing rebellion against British authority. Upon me, therefore, rested the responsibility, when peace had been established, of advising Her Majesty's Government, to the best of my ability, not to permit anything to be done which might either bring about renewed disturbances or might entail upon Great Britain the odium of having only obtained possession of this country by the infliction of unnecessary wars upon its inhabitants. 3. I have before also pointed out to your Lordship that, in the event of Great Britain being involved in a war with foreign Powers, it would depend upon the state of our relations with the Natives whether or not New Zealand was one of the weakest or strongest points in the British Empire; and I felt, therefore, during the recently disturbed state of Europe, that I was responsible to" my Queen and country if possible to take care so to conduct affairs that, in the event of a war, the Government intrusted to me might not only maintain against an enemy its own territory, but might even afford the means of aiding other contiguous portions of the empire, or of assailing any enemy in this part of the world. Opinions formed by me under such weighty responsibilities must necessarily have been sometimes opposed to the opinions of those upon whom no such responsibilities rested, and who were very anxious to obtain a particular object which they much desired. Her Majesty's Government acted upon the opinions which I expressed ; and I have the satisfaction of knowing that I at least led them to take no imprudent step ; for, disastrous as was the state of these colonies a few years since, it ia certain that, at the present moment, there is no portion of the empire in which a greater degree of tranquillity and prosperity prevails than in New Zealand. 4. I have just reperused the despatch upon which the enclosed letter comments, and I can see nothing in it that I am not glad I wrote, that I do not think it was my duty to have written. 5. The writers of the enclosed letter state that I have had recourse to what they term an ingenuity, and ask, Can the cause be an honest one which has recourse to a proceeding of this sort ? This assertion of theirs rests wholly on a misunderstanding; they overlook the fact that, in the second paragraph of my despatch, I distinctly begin my argument by stating, " In the Province of New Ulster, as your Lordship has proposed to fix the boundaries of that province;" and I then throughout the despatch speak of the provinces with the divisions your Lordship had proposed, calling the provinces as proposed to be defined when representative institutions were introduced, by the names of the provinces now existing with their present boundaries. I was writing to the person who had proposed certain boundaries, and who was anxious to see them established; I think, therefore, there can be no doubt I could not in this respect have deceived your Lordship. 6. I beg further to state on this subject that I did not, although they contend the contrary, omit in my statistics any settlement from the province to which it properly could belong under the proposed division of New Zealand ; and the statistics themselves were carefully taken from the latest documents then in my possession. 7. From the misunderstanding before alluded to, the return of Native and European populations in the enclosed letter from Dr. Dorset must, apart from their other causes of error, be wholly incorrect for the provinces with the boundaries it is proposed to fix. For instance, in regard to the Native population, the whole of the population of Taranaki, of the country to the north of Taranaki, betw reen Wanganui and Taranaki, as well as the population of Wanganui, of Eotoaire, &c, 'are all omitted from the Province of New Munster by the writers of the enclosed letter.