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I may add that, while I did my best to prevent the passing of the present Land Act, it is my duty now to deal with the law as it stands, fairly and impartially.

With regard to a resolution asking me to recommend His Excellency the Governor to dissolve this Council in December next, I have reserved coming to any decision as to the recommendation I shall give until the result of your subsequent resolutions upon the same subject is known.

Gentlemen, as an earnest upholder of the right of the people to local self-government, and cherishing a well-founded conviction that the progress, both of the Provinces and of the Colony, will be best promoted by Provincial independence, as provided by the Constitution Act, I may be pardoned if I express my sincere sorrow that, at a time when above all others it is essential that Provincial institutions should possess a warm place in the affections of the people, the tendency of the proceedings of the Session now ended has been to alienate those affections. Gentlemen, there can be no question but “an enemy hath done this.” I earnestly hope and trust, however, that when the excitement of the Session is over, it will give place to calm reflection, and that the people of the Province will be found uniting as one man in working out the destiny which, I believe, has been assigned to them, that, namely of colonising this portion of New Zealand in their own way, without let or hindrance.

I now declare this Council prorogued, and it stands prorogued accordingly.

APPOINTMENT

Of Mr. Henry Person Morse, Officer under the “Destitute Persons Relief Ordinance, 1862.”

WHEREAS by an Ordinance passed by the Lieutenant Governor and Legislative Council of New Zealand, Session VII, No. IX, intituled “An Ordinance for the Support of Destitute Families and Illegitimate Children,” it is amongst other things enacted that in the event of any person leaving his wife or children without means of support, it shall be lawful for any two Justices of the Peace to issue an order for the payment by any such person or the recovery out of the means and estate of any such person of money towards the support of the wife or children of such person as the case may be; And that in case the person who may be bound by any such order as aforesaid shall attempt to remove from the Colony, it shall be lawful for any two Justices of the Peace, on the application of any officer appointed by the Governor to act in that behalf, to cause such person to be arrested and to be detained in safe custody until he shall give security to the satisfaction of such Justices for the due performance of such order, or shall make a composition for the same as therein provided. And whereas by the Ordinance of the Superintendent and Provincial Council of the Province of Otago, intituled “The Destitute Persons Relief Ordinance, 1862,” it is enacted that the power vested in the Governor in this and other respects by the above-recited Ordinance should be vested in and exercised by the Superintendent of the Province of Otago within the said Province, and that the provisions of the said recited Ordinance applicable to any person quitting the colony should equally apply to any person quitting the said Province leaving his wife or children without means of support.

Now therefore I, James Macandrew, Superintendent of the Province of Otago, in pursuance of the powers so vested in me, do hereby appoint:

Henry Person Morse,
Clerk to the Resident Magistrate’s Court at Dunedin,
to be Officer under the said Ordinance, passed by the Lieutenant Governor and Legislative Council of New Zealand, Session VII, No. IX, and to perform the duties required by the aforesaid Ordinance within the Province of Otago.

Given under my hand, and issued under the Public Seal of the Province of Otago, at Dunedin, in the said Province, this thirteenth day of June, one thousand eight hundred and sixty-eight.

(L.S.) JAMES MACANDREW,
Superintendent.

It is hereby notified that a Writ issued for the election of a person to serve as a Member of the Provincial Council for the Town of Oamaru, in place of Herbert Amelius Julius, Esquire, deceased, has been returned with a certificate to the effect that Samuel Gibbs, Esquire, has been duly elected.

Julius Vogel,
Provincial Secretary.

11th June, 1868.

Land and Works Office,
Dunedin, 9th June, 1868.

NOTICE is hereby given that the Application made by Peter Sorenson, British Quartz Mining Company, for a portion of land on the northern boundary, adjoining the Scandinavian and Skipper’s Claims, Skipper’s Creek, has been withdrawn, and the said land is open for occupation by holders of Miner’s Rights.

GEO. DUNCAN,
Secretary for Land and Works.

SALE OF CROWN LANDS of Special Value,

under the 64th clause of “The Otago Waste Land Act, 1866.”—Notice is hereby given that the following allotments of land in the undermentioned Districts (formerly set aside as Educational Reserves), will be offered for Sale by public auction, as of special value, at upset prices as under, in the Auction Rooms of Messrs. Wright, Robertson and Co., Dunedin, on Tuesday, the 4th day of August next, at 12 o’clock, noon: