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363. Do I understand that your editor would expect you to follow that course ? —No directions are given to us. We are told to get hold of a piece of information, and no instructions are given as to how we are to get it, except in very rare cases. 364. While you are expected to behave as a gentleman, and get it in an honourable and straightforward way ?—Yes. George Humphries sworn and examined. 365. The Commissioner.] What are you? — Assistant in the office of the United Press Association. 366. Would you be so good as to tell me briefly anything you know in connection with Colonel Fox's resignation, and the publication of this paragraph [produced] in the Post ? —The first I knew of Colonel Fox's resignation was the publication in the Post some time towards the end of March—a brief paragraph, and a cross-heading in the second edition. I think it was the 27th March. That stated that he had asked to be released from his engagement by letter to the Premier. That was the first I knew of it. So far as the letters are concerned, I knew nothing of them until I saw them in the first edition of the Post on April 4th. The purport of the letters as published in the Post appeared to bear the stamp of authority on them, and I made out a message to send to our papers throughout the colony. 367. What document did you make the message up from?—From the first edition of the Post. The source of the information was not acknowledged, as is the usual practice when such a message is published, and I did not notice the fact until my attention was drawn to it by the editor of the Post after some of the papers to which it had been sent arrived in Wellington. At the same time he told me he knew it must have been their paragraph, because there was a slight difference in one part in the second edition : in the earlier edition it mentioned—in one place it mentioned—that it was the Under-Secretary of the Defence Department who took extracts from Colonel Fox's letters. In the second edition the editor told me they had made an alteration of the words to "an officer of the department." That was the first I knew of that alteration. It was when I. was explaining that it was through my oversight the correspondence was not acknowledged as from the Post. 368. Does that account for the difference between the Press Association message and the extract from the Post which I have now before me? —Yes ; that is the reason of the difference. I took out the message from the first edition, and it was not until I saw Mr. Gillon, and he was complaining that I did not acknowledge that it came from the Post, that I noticed there was any change. Mr. Gillon thought it was information of a kind such as ought to be acknowledged as from the Post. The ordinary news about town, as a rule, is not so acknowledged. I quite agreed with him, and explained that it was through an oversight. Ido not know if there was any other difference, but that was the one point he mentioned, and which would go to show that it must have been from the first edition I took it. 369. Did he say which was the more correct ?—No. He just pointed out to me that I had not acknowledged it. 370. Did you get the information independent of him at all ?—No. It was taken from their first edition. 371. I understand you to say you copied it in globo ? —Yes. 372. Did you ever see a manuscript copy or shorthand copy of the paragraph?—No; nothing at all. I knew nothing about it until its publication in the Post. 373. Did Mr. Gillon tell you where or how they got the information, or anything about it ? — No. 374. Do you know Mr. Hoben ?—Yes. 375. Did you ever have any conversation with him about the paragraph?—Not before that. Of course we have spoken about the incident since. 376. Can you remember the conversation you had with Mr. Hoben subsequent to the publication ? —I have just chaffed him about having to go to gaol, and being excluded from the Buildings, and so on. I have not even asked Mr. Gillon or Mr. Hoben where they got the information, because I knew I should be refused. 377. Did either of them volunteer the information as to where they got it? —No. 378. Do you know anything of your own knowledge which would lead you to form an idea as to how they got it?—No; I have no idea at all. 379. Did you understand from Mr. Gillon or Mr. Hoben that they got hold of the information in an ordinary way ?—Yes; from Mr. Gillon. 380. What led you to think they got hold of the information in an ordinary way ? —We had several conversations at the Empire Hotel, where Mr. Gillon lodges and I have my meals, and we have chatted both before and after dinner about it, and I have always understood from his conversation that they got it in a legitimate manner. 381. You understood from his conversation that he got the information in a perfectly straightforward, legitimate, and honourable manner ? —Yes. 382. And that the person who gave it to him had no objection to the publication of it ?—I could not say anything about that. 383. What would you understand by the term " legitimate way " ? —Such a way as would justify a pressman in using it. 384. Do you understand that the person who gave the information was committing no breach of trust, and that he had authority to give it ?—Presumably the person who gave the information had power to do so, and was committing no breach of trust in doing so. 385. Had you any conversations with Mr. Hoben on these points ? —No; I seldom see Mr. Hoben.