I.—4a

56

Telegram, Easton to Cook. Bth December, 1900. Must quit thousand group shares. Wire without fail your results. Telegram, Easton to Cook. 12th December, 1900. Cannot understand your silence. Please wire fully. Telegram, Cook to Easton. 12th December, 1900. Wrote Saturday. No buyer yet for shares. Telegram, Easton to Cook. 14th December, 1900. Letter received. Make offer thousand shares. Musi sell urgent. Telegram, Cook to EASTOif. 17th December, 1900. Hope to obtain definite offer Wednesday. Telegram, Easton to Cook. 24th December, 1900. Please remit moneys paid re Shellback, Ngahere, and options. Quote offer for thousand shares. Wire date money will arrive. Most urgent. Telegram, Haston to Cook. 28th December, 1900. Why no reply to prepaid wire of 24th ? Don't delay wiring me to-day. Telegram, Cook to Easton. 29th December, 1900. Wires just received. Living in bush till 7th. Will probably then make offer for your stooks, but do not understand tone of your telegram. Telegram, Cook to Easton. 7th January, 1901. Sending written offer for shares purchased from me. Letter, Cook to Easton. Auckland, 9th January, 1901. Enclosed I hand you cheque value £120, which with the £30 you received from Kee makes the amount in full that you paid me for the interest in the Upper Nelson Creek claims. On my return from the country I received your wire asking me to remit moneys paid re Shellback, Ngahere, and options. Why you should ask suoh a thing is to me incomprehensible, and savours of the boy who took the toy he had played with for months back to the shop and cried for his money ; but, as I should extremely regret that you should be inconvenienoed by anything you purchased from me, I will take back the whole of the shares you bought from me, at the price you paid for them. I must insist on having all, and also that you take the British Victory shares that you sold me. Our business transactions will then be as if they never existed, and you, I presume, be satisfied. Telegram, Easton to Cook. 10th January, 1901. No letter. Forward receipt for £150 paid you 17th September. Wire what offer for shares per Choyce. Will he repurchase ? Telegram, Easton to Cook. 15th January, 1901. Aocept offer per letter ninth, provided included thousand shares per Choyce. Reply. Telegram, Easton to Cook. 17th January, 1901. Please reply to my telegram of fifteenth. Telegram, Cook to Easton. 18th January, 1901. Not buying Choyca's shares. My offer of ninth firm till noon Saturday only. Telegram, Easton to Cook. 22nd January, 1901. Written. Can you find purchaser group shares? Pressed. Return Home. Telegram, Easton to Cook 31st January, 1901. Unless you refund one hundred pounds and relieve me of further liability in group within week from date, shall place position before Ward and Minister of Mines. Reply immediately. Letter, Cook to Easton. Wellington, 12th March, 1901. Replying to yours of the 26th ultimo and 7th instant re Ngahere shares that you purchased from me, I have no knowledge of "giving you a written undertaking io return money for share 3 on which coull not be delivered," and can find no copy in my book of any suoh uudartaking; bat, if I did so, an! you evnnot obtain the scrip for these shares, I will perform my promise. lam making application to the company for my sorip, and on receipt of their reply will communicate with you. Your ol sing remarks re our business transactions are uncalled-for. Of tthe five parcels of shares you bought from me, four are at a premium (two at a very handsome one). I offered to take the whole back at what you paid, but it appears you want to take the profits and saddle me with a prospective loss. The gross misstatements you have made, both verbally and in writing, I am sure you will regret ere long. In October you found out these alleged irregularities, and from October to the 31st January you tried to dispose of your shares, making use of subterfuges about going Home, and eventually finishing with threats that you would place the position of matters before Ward : who is that Ward you referred to ?—Sir Joseph Ward. 370. Why did you want to place the position before him ?—Because I understood at the time that he was connected with the Mines Department. 371. You did not make that threat because you knew that I had had, in my business, to report on the Ward Association? —No; I had no knowledge of that. 372. You are quite sure that you did not know that I was connected with that ?—Certainly. 373. You had not the slightest idea?—l never made it my business to investigate your business. 374. And yet you stated in your evidence-in-chief that your reason for relying on me was that you knew that I was employed as a liquidator by the Supreme Court ?—I did not know that you had any connection with Sir Joseph Ward ; I knew that you had acted as liquidator to large estates. 375. Mr. W. Fraser] With regard to the shares that you bought from Choyce, you alleged that they were transferred to you while there was a call unpaid by Choyce ?—Yes, on the shares in the Tucker Flat Company.