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No. 3. The Gore Electric Lighting Act authorises the Corporation of the Borough of Gore to contract with an electric-light company for the lighting of the streets and other places in the borough by electricity. No. 4. The Mangatu No. 1 Empowering Act incorporates the owners of a large tract of Native land in Poverty Bay, and authorises the election of a committee of seven of such owners to manage the said land on behalf of the corporate body. No. 5. The Niramona Pini Land Act authorises the antevesting date of a certain Land Transfer certificate of title in favour of a Native to relate back to the date when the Native Land Court first declared him to be the owner of the land.

No. 17. (No. 52.) My Lokd,- — Government House, Wellington, Bth December, 1893. In reply to your circular despatch of the 16th September, 1893, with reference to the marriage-laws prevailing in the colonies, I have the honour to forward the enclosed outline of marriage-laws at present in force in New Zealand, for your Lordship's information. I have, &c, GLASGOW. The Eight Hon. the Marquis of Eipon, G.C.M.G., &c.

A.-2, 1894, No. 24.

Enclosure. Outline op Makbiage-law of New Zealand. The marriage-law of the Colony of New Zealand is consolidated in the Act No. 21 of 1880. Subsequent to this, but in the same year, was passed the Deceased Wife's Sister Marriage Act. Also, in 1889, an Act providing that official records of marriages, when lost, destroyed, or defective, may be supplemented by evidence in possession of private parties; and an Act passed in 1891 regulating the marriage of Quakers, and enacting some new provisions as to officiating ministers. The Act of 1880 provides the following procedure :— The colony is divided into convenient districts, and a Eegistrar-General and District Registrars appointed. Officiating Ministers and Registrars authorised to solemnise Marriage. It is provided that a minister of religion, whose name shall have been sent into the EegistrarGeneral by the persons having ecclesiastical authority over certain specified religious bodies, shall be an officiating minister within the meaning of the Marriage Act, and, in case there be no ecclesiastical authority, the name of a minister may be certified by two duly-recognised office-bearers in his church. In regard to bodies not specified in the Act, the certificate must be signed by the recognised head in New Zealand, or two recognised ministers, or by ten adult members thereof whose signatures are to be verified. The names are sent in December in every year, and the EegistrarGeneral enters every year the names in a book called the list of officiating ministers, a copy of which is gazetted in January. Additional names may be placed on the list during the course of any year. The entry of a name of a minister on the list or Gazette is evidence of his right to solemnise marriage on a Eegistrar's certificate. District Eegistrars are all authorised to solemnise marriages for the convenience of parties who object to be married in the presence of an officiating minister. Notice of Marriage to be given. In every case of intending marriage one of the parties must give notice to the Registrar of the district in which one of the persons shall have dwelt for not less than three days. The notice states the age, name, surname, condition, and calling of each party intending marriage, their dwelling-place, the time that each has lived in the district, and the church or building in which the marriage is to be solemnised. And if the persons live in different districts, the same notice is given to the Eegistrar of each district. The notice is entered in the marriage notice-book and signed by the party giving it. The book is open to inspection. Declaration to be made. The person giving notice of marriage is called upon to make a solemn declaration to the truth of the particulars set forth in the notice, and also, in presence of Eegistrar, another solemn declaration that there is not any impediment of kindred, or alliance, or other lawful hindrance to the marriage, and that one of the persons has for the space of three days immediately before the day of making declaration had his or her place of abode within the district where the marriage is to be solemnised. When either of the persons, not being a widower or widow, is under the age of twenty-one years, the declaration must further state that the consent of the persons or person whose consent is required by law has been obtained, or that there is no person in the colony authorised to give consent.