17

H.—2lb

variable. The attendance being optional, it is difficult to secure it. They varied from possibly two to possibly twenty. The Maori children are allowed their own way very much by their parents, and if there be any excitement elsewhere within reach will abstain from coming to the school to be present at it. (The Putike Natives have been great supporters of the Government during the war, and it ha s been mainly from them that the Native Contingent from the West Coast has been raised.)

[Evidence taken before Mr. Domett.] Wednesday, 3kd Novembeb, 1869. Otaki School. — Otaki School Reserve. The Venerable Archdeacon Hadfield, having been duly sworn, stated : My name is Octavius Hadfield. lam one of the trustees of the lands comprised in the grants for the school at Otaki. Grant, 500 acres, Porirua. No. I.—l know the land comprised in the grant (page 10, N.M., vol. 5, area 500 acres'). Attempts were made to raise funds to erect a building upon it for a school-house, which failed. It has been let to Mr. Richards for some years for a term, which has about a year to run. The rent, I believe, is about £100 a year, payable half-yearly. The Otaki school at present receives £75 a year (Miss Me William £50 for teaching the girls, and the Rev. James Me William £25 out of the above). The remaining balance is accumulating. The accounts can be had in about a fortnight. Ido not think the tenant has made any improvements on the property. Grass has spread upon it, and the brushwood has been broken down, but I do not think that the tenant is under any covenant to improve. Memorandum handed in by Archdeacon Hadfield. For several years the Porirua estate was let to Mr. Richards for £50 per annum. Prom October, 1865, the rent paid by him has been £75 per annum. Prom July 1, 1865, till the present time, £25 has been annually paid to the master of the Otaki Industrial School; that is to say, up to July 1, 1869, £100. From September, 1868, till September, 1869, has been paid (one year) to Miss Me William, £50. Grants to Otaki school (special), 1867 and 1868, £200. June 30, 1868, the sum of £800 was lent to the Rev. H. W. St. Hill, master of the Church of England Grammar School, on mortgage at 6 per cent. There is now a balance of £183 11s. 6d. to the credit of the estate at the Union Bank of Australia. To the best of my belief the above is a correct statement of the state of the accounts. Octavius Hadfield. Grant, 396 acres 2 roods 30 perches, Otaki. No. 2. —What I have to say respecting the grant (No. 32, N.M., vol. 5, Miscellaneous, area 396 acres 2 roods 30 perches) applies to several others in that locality. I know the land therein recorded. It has been all fenced in and improved to a yen' great extent, and it has been farmed, and the proceeds devoted to the support of a boarding-school, from about January, 1854, up to the end of July, 1868. Since then it has not been a boarding-school. The number of children varied ; from 1854 to July, 1868, the average number (boys and girls) I should say, roughly, was 40. There were two-thirds boys. The ages of the boys were from eight years to fifteen, after which they generally left us; the girls about the same ages. Some of the parents resided in the neighbourhood, but more than half came from a distance —Manawatu, &c. For many years it worked very satisfactorily indeed. They were taught English—which many of them knew very fairly; arithmetic—in which many made good progress. They wrote fairly. They were also taught singing. The industrial training of the boys was for agricultural pursuits. The boys were taught ploughing, and the management of cattle and sheep. There was always a good farming man, an Englishman, on the establishment. Many boys would not have come without this. The girls were taught sewing and household matters. Ido not think there was much difference in steadiness at work between pupils from the neighbourhood and those from a distance. I have never had any particular difficulty with the children of Natives in the neighbourhood. From the Ist January, 1858, to Ist July, 1868, I think there was no assistance from Government at all. It was certainly about ten years. For the four years previous to 1858 there was considerable Government assistance—without it I should not have been able to fence the land, or start the institution. The boys worked better at that time also. Returns were regularly furnished to the Government of the expenditure of the funds. For one year from same date in 1867 I received a capitation, fixed, of £5 per head for the boys and girls, and a bonus of £100. I found, with the greatest economy, that the expense of each pupil was £18 oi 1 £19 a year. This was exclusive of the master's salary. For ten years the institution supported itself, with extraneous aid from England and elsewhere. The schoolmaster was generally paid from these sources. The financial means of the institution were mainly due to an exceptional course of management of the farm—viz., by raising choice stock, which was sold at high prices up to a recent period. We are now and for the last year we have been carrying on a day-school only. The principal cause of the declension of the institution was the deficiency of funds. I consider as another cause the establishment of two public-houses adjoining the school land. Occasionally a pupil has been made to drink. As an instance, I heard from the Rev. Mr. Me William, only last week, that the pupils were singing in the church when , a party of drunken men entered, broke a brandy bottle in the church, and the singing of course had to cease. 2—H. 21b.