220

3. To enable you rightly to appreciate the
   financial position of the Province I will proceed
   to lay before you a rough outline of our pro-
   bable resources during the current half-year,
   commencing from the 31st March last, and
   ending on the 30th of September. The
   Revenue actually received from the first-men-
   tioned date, to the 15th of a calculation,
   may be stated at £25,500, of which that de-
   rived from the sale of Land is about £19,000,
   and from the Customs about £3,700.
   Assuming this as the basis of a calculation,
   we shall not widely err if, for the remainder
   of the six months, we fix the Revenue at
   £25,000—viz., about £20,000 from the sale of
   Land, £3,500 from the Customs, and £2,000
   from other sources; making a total Revenue
   available for appropriation of about £51,000,
   of which about £19,000 will have been obtained
   from the sale of the Waste Lands, and £7,000
   from our proportion of the Customs

4. Of this sum of £51,000 there has already
   been expended, up to the 15th June, £24,000,
   of which about £10,000 have been disbursed
   on account of Public Works—such as Roads,
   Bridges, School-houses, &c.—leaving about
   £27,000 for the remaining portion of the half
   year; and of this sum about £11,000 is avail-
   able for Public Works. We thus arrive at the
   fact that after deducting the expense of De-
   partments—such as the Crown Land, Survey,
   and Provincial Engineer's, and also the pay-
   ment of interest on Debentures and those De-
   bentures which have fallen due, and the
   necessary provision for other charges—we
   have the sum of about £21,000 subject to be
   appropriated for Public Works during the
   current half year. It will be desirable, even
   admitting the expansive nature of our re-
   sources, and allowing the sum probably ob-
   tainable from Immigration account and the
   sale of Debentures to meet the demands for
   Immigration, that we should not, to any large
   extent, exceed the amount above stated; and
   it is on this principle that I have been
   guided in the preparation of the Estimates,
   which will shortly be laid before you. You
   will doubtless observe that the expense of
   some of the Departments is very heavy—for
   instance, that of the Survey Department,
   which may be roughly estimated at £10,000
   a year; but, when you review the amount of
   work done of a permanent character, the rate
   at which it is done, and the great advantages
   flowing from the Surveys, you will, I feel
   assured, coincide with me in regarding the
   operations of this Department as of a strictly
   reproductive nature. I have carefully scanned
   the Estimates to see where I could economise
   our funds, but I have experienced consider-
   able difficulty in retrenching without impair-
   ing efficiency—to abolish an appointment is
   a much harder task than to withstand its
   creation. I can only assure you that it will
   be my endeavour to obtain from all Depart-
   ments that faithful service which it is their
   duty, as I know it will be their pleasure, to
   give.

5. However willing I am to avoid any
   allusion to the conduct of my predecessor, I
   cannot omit to inform you that on two occa-
   sions since my election I have addressed him
   respecting the misappropriation of the Gula
   money, which Messrs. Gladstone & Co. have
   demanded by the last mail, upon the grounds
   that their instruction for its payment had not
   been acted up to. I also informed him that
   the Bill which he represented as having for-
   warded in July and November last had not
   reached the Home Agents in March last; and
   I further asked information as to the
   sum of £1012 of the public money which the
   Agents had expended, by his order, in pay-
   ment of a Bill of his favour of Messrs.
   Rayner, of Sunderland, and of which there is
   not the slightest Office record. I regret to
   say that my letters remained unanswered till
   yesterday afternoon. The correspondence will
   be submitted to you in due course.

6. I will now proceed to make a few re-
   marks on the several Bills which will be sub-
   mitted for your consideration, but before so
   doing I will first cursorily allude to two or
   three important points which have occurred
   since you last met in this hall.

7. The 1st of April last an event was con-
   summated which had long been foreseen. Our
   Province was deprived of one of its finest dis-
   tricts, to satisfy a bare majority of the electoral
   body, and in utter disregard of a numerous
   and influential minority resident therein; while
   the protest of nine-tenths of the undivided
   Province was treated with unbecoming con-
   tumely. So unjustifiable a spoliation has met
   with a swift retribution, for the Government
   which is the pride of power refused to listen
   to the demands of justice, is now placed, by a
   dissolution of the Assembly and the new elec-
   tions, in an insecure and undesirable position.
   If the interests of remote districts were ne-
   glected for those which were nearer the chief
   town of the Province, the remedy might have
   been applied without recourse to a measure
   which even its supporters fail in their endea-
   vours to justify; it had one merit in their eyes,
   in that it weakened their adversaries; but the
   policy, which, without a shadow of justice,
   multiplies its opponents and necessitates coali-
   tion, is short-sighted indeed. The blow has
   been struck, and we have now only to confine
   within as narrow limits as possible the proba-
   bly resulting injuries. It will be my pleasant
   duty to extend, in your name, the right hand
   of fellowship to our sister Province of South-
   land, and to endeavour so to arrange our in-
   tercourse, that instead of mutual embarrassment
   there may be mutual support and encourage-
   ment, in our common object of peopling these
   waste lands with a thriving and happy popu-
   lation.

8. Scarcely had the tidings of this dismem-
   berment reached us, than we learned that on
   the banks of the Lindis, a tributary of the
   Molyneux, there was discovered a Gold Field,
   bearing all the marks which characterize those
   which have been worked with profit and suc-
   cess; and subsequent information leads to the
   belief, that a very considerable portion of the
   Province, extending its whole length, will
   eventually be found equally remunerative;
   already the attractions have been so great, that
   several hundreds, despite the inconveniences
   and inclemency of a winter season, have con-
   gregated in the neighbourhood, and, conse-
   quently, in conjunction with the Executive, I
   lost no time in taking steps for the preservation
   of order, by the appointment of an officiating
   Resident Magistrate, and the organization of a
   small mounted Police Force; and I am happy
   to add, that the latest information received by
   me is extremely satisfactory as to the pros-
   pect of the Gold Field, both there and at
   Tokomairiro.

9. The most important Bill which will be
   submitted to you during the present session, is
   one for regulating the respective powers of the