236
THE NEW ZEALAND GAZETTE.

on all moneys which shall be received or collected
by them as Administrators under the provisions of
the said Act:
Now therefore, His Excellency the Governor, by
and with the advice and consent of the Executive
Council of the Colony, doth hereby, in pursuance
and exercise of the power and authority in him
vested for this purpose, fix the sum of Two pounds
and ten shillings per centum to be the amount of
commission to which such Curators shall be entitled
on all moneys which shall be received or collected by
them as such Administrators as aforesaid.

FORSTER GORING,
Clerk of the Executive Council.

Colonial Secretary's Office,
Wellington, 4th June, 1866.

THE following correspondence on the subject of
the publication of the Annual Statistics for the
year 1864, is published for general information.
E. W. STAFFORD.

Colonial Secretary's Office,
Wellington, 4th May, 1866.

SIR,—I have the honor, by the direction of Mr.
Stafford, to request you to be good enough to inform
him when it is probable that the Statistics for 1864
will be published.

As so much delay has occurred in their publi-
cation, it would be desirable that you should at the
same time place on record the causes, so far as you
are aware, of this delay.

W. GISBORNE,
Under Secretary.

The Registrar-General, Auckland.

Registrar-General's Office,
Auckland, 11th May, 1866.

SIR,—I have the honor to submit the following
statements in reply to a letter dated the 4th instant,
in which Mr. Gisborne, by your direction, requests
me to inform you when it is probable that the
Statistics for 1864 will be published; and, at the
same time, to place on record the causes, so far as I
am aware, of the delay in their publication.

With reference to the first inquiry, I have this
morning finally corrected the proofs of the last of
the Tables to be included in the volume. Only the
Introductory Report and the Contents remain to be
printed. The successive portions, as they were
worked off, were sent to the binder, in order to have
as much as possible in the way of preparation done
by him, and I think he is anxious to get his part
quickly out of hand. Under these circumstances, I
expect that (unless some hindrance, which I see no
reason to apprehend, should arise), the volume will
be ready to be put in circulation by the end of this
month.

The causes of the delay were various; and I trust
I may be permitted to say were, not only beyond my
control, but entailed upon me no small amount of
additional trouble and anxiety. Although I was able
to prepare certain principal results of the Census for
publication at an earlier date than on any former
occasion, yet the time and labour required in this
office for the revision of those results, and the com-
pilation of branches of information not included in
them, was greatly beyond what had been found
necessary for either 1858 or 1861. This arose, no
doubt, partly from the increase of population, but
was chiefly owing to the unsatisfactory state in
which the Returns from the Enumerators in some of
the Provinces were sent in to me, and which
required, not only correspondence, but in several

instances, recompilation in this office from the
original Household Schedules. Similar difficulties to
these (although then existing in only a smaller degree)
prevented the publication of the volume for 1861
until the close of 1862.

But the principal causes which have kept back the
publication of the volume up to the present, have
been the late period at which I received information
for the General Statistics, particularly with regard
to the Trade and Revenue Tables, and the time
which has been occupied in the printing. The
removal of the Seat of Government happened just at
the period of 1865 when the preparation of Returns
to be compiled from documents in the offices of the
Hon. the Colonial Treasurer and Commissioner of
Customs should have been commenced; and here
there was an inevitable occasion of delay, which
was prolonged by the necessity of giving
primary attention to Returns required for the
General Assembly during its session. But whatever
may have been the hindrances, the plain fact was
that, in the latter months of the year, while the
question was urgently asked "Why are not the
Statistics published?" a considerable portion of the
most important information to be embodied in them
had not come into my own hands. It was only in
the course of the month of January last that I
received some of the most indispensable of the
Financial Returns, there having been even at the
last, as I understood, delay and difficulty in obtaining
some of the information from the Provinces required
at Wellington for the completion of those Returns.

The time occupied by the printing of the volume
has far exceeded what I had calculated on after
making every allowance for the consideration that
the volume is larger than those of previous years.
The contractor has always expressed willingness and
even anxiety to get forward as rapidly as he could,
but still the average progress of the work has been
very slow. Although I do not know the fact to be
so, yet I have reason to believe that during, and
after, the session of the Provincial Council, the
printing for the Provincial Government (for which
he also holds the contract) sometimes proved a
hindrance. The cause of delay, whatever it was, was
not in this office. At the outset, I determined that
I would always have manuscript ready as required;
and this has been fully accomplished, although fre-
quently it involved embarrassing interruptions of
other official work. From the commencement of the
printing up to this day, the printer has not been
kept waiting for copy in even a single instance.

I have only to add the expression of my earnest
hope that the Statistics for 1865 (now in prepara-
tion) may not be kept back by similar, or any other
difficulties. No effort on my part shall be wanting
to ensure their publication at the earliest possible
date.

I have, &c.,
JOHN B. BENNETT,
Registrar-General.

The Hon. the Colonial Secretary,
Wellington.

Colonial Secretary's Office,
Wellington, 2nd June, 1866.

THE following Ordinance, passed by the Provincial
Council of the Province of Southland, intituled
"The Provincial Liabilities Confirmation
Ordinance, No. 2, 1866,"

which Ordinance was reserved for the signification
of the Governor's pleasure thereon, having been laid
before the Governor, His Excellency has been pleased
to assent to the same.

E. W. STAFFORD.