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I HEREBY certify that the foregoing is a correct statement of the Receipts and Expenditure of the Province of Hawke’s Bay for the period from the 1st April to 30th June 1863, and that the following are the amounts expended during that time without the authority of the Appropriation Act, viz.,—

Native Interpreter ... £ 14 3 6
Harbour Improvements ... 38 1 9
Addition to Gaol ... 166 11 8
Colonial Defence Force ... 50 0 0

Total ... 268 16 11

G. E. G. RICHARDSON,
Provincial Auditor.

Napier, January 14, 1864.

Superintendent’s Office,
Napier, January 28, 1864.

THE following Report from the Chief Provincial Surveyor is published for general information.

DONALD McLEAN,
Superintendent.

Napier, January 12, 1864.

Sir,—I have the honor to report now upon the surveys executed during the past half-year.

Mr. Locke, the only surveyor on the staff, has principally been employed in surveying native boundaries and in settling long pending disputes regarding them. At present he is engaged on a detail survey of the Tautane Block, in marking off into sections the lately proclaimed agricultural reserve, and in staking out all purchases and applications in that block. I beg to embrace this opportunity to subjoin for your Honor’s information a list of the surveys which should be executed during the next twelve months, showing likewise the time it will probably take to one surveyor and party to carry them out.

1. Survey of 120 different sections (purchased prior to this date) of 40 acres and upwards, distributed over the whole Province. The greater portion being detached selections of military settlers, including 30 bush sections, their survey cannot take less than 14 months, as a great deal of time must be lost by the frequent shifting of camp, &c. Although the issue of Crown Grants will not be required for 3 or 4 years for the military settlers’ selections, their survey should not be delayed, as the grantees make the non-survey the excuse for non-occupation.

2. The detail survey of the Ahuriri and the Mohaka Blocks will require 6 months.

3. The main roads of the Province, viz., the Te Aute, the Middle, the Porangahau, and the Taupo Road, about 170 miles, should be marked off and laid down in the maps. Survey, 5 months.

4. About 500 sections for settlers under the New Zealand Settlements Act will in all probability have to be surveyed during this year. The survey of the above will take at least 15 months, as the natural features of the country will have to be studied carefully, to be able to select the best lines of road for the internal connection of the settlements, to fix upon the best sites for reserves, &c.

5. Estimating the survey work to accrue from selections during the year at 8 months, we arrive at a total of 48 months of field-work for one survey party.

As at present only one surveyor is in the employ of the Provincial Government, I beg to recommend that the services of at least two more surveyors should be secured as early as possible; or that portions of the above surveys be executed by contract, for which way of proceeding a great portion of the work is well adapted.

The increase of field work will entail likewise a proportionate increase of office work, to meet which a second draftsman should be engaged, or at least one surveyor should be added to the staff, who may be employed at times in the office.

Additional assistance in the office is the more required as within the last few days instructions have been received from Auckland requiring the forwarding in future of all Crown Grants in duplicate, independent of a copy to be filed in the Crown Lands office here.

I have the honor to be,

Sir,
Your most obedient servant,
CHARLES WEBER,
Chief Provincial Surveyor.

His Honor the Superintendent, Napier.

PROCLAMATION.

By His Honor DONALD McLEAN, Esquire,
Superintendent of the Province of Hawke’s Bay, in the Colony of New Zealand.

WHEREAS by Section No. 9 of “The Diseased Cattle Act, 1861,” passed by the General Assembly of New Zealand in Parliament assembled, it is enacted that “If at any time it shall be made to appear to the Governor that any infectious or contagious disease has broken out in any