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deration a course which has been adopted in all the other Provinces, the constitution of an Executive Council; in explanation I will offer a few remarks on my views of the form of Government given to us by the Constitution Act. We have, suited to the limited means for forming a Government, a single elective Legislative Chamber—and an elective Executive centred in one individual, on whom rests the sole responsibility, as you have defined it, as his own conduct, and of those acting under him, the working of this system will be, that, as the Representative of the whole body of electors, the Superintendent will feel it his duty to act as a check on the majority in the Council, when he considers the views of the minority and his own, coincide best with the interests and permanent prosperity of the Province. When this takes place, the exercise of the valuable privilege you possess, and of which I hope you will never be deprived, that of obtaining the removal of the Superintendent by petition, will be at your disposal, and will enable you to place the Superintendent at the bar of public opinion, that the acts of his administration may be approved or condemned.

While I see no reason to anticipate those wide differences of opinion which I have in illustration entertained the possibility of, I should regret to see those differences of opinion which lead to a wholesome discussion, compromised by my appointment of an Executive Council, and any further appointment of Provincial Officers from among your number. You will, I hope, agree with me that by preserving the independence of the Council, even from what may be termed insensible influence, and maintaining the responsibility of the Superintendent inviolate, the best results will be obtained. We should steadily keep in view the principle laid down by an eminent writer—"that whatever a man is expected to do, or does, it be known and seen whether he does it, and how."

Had the Superintendent been appointed by the Crown, my position would probably have been in the Provincial Council, where I have had my efforts to those of my fellow settlers to obtain the responsibility by means of an Executive Council, which such an arrangement would have rendered necessary, and which at best would have been far less than the undivided responsibility now accountable to you.

The New Zealand Company's debt is a heavy drag on the prosperity of the Province, independently of the share of the debt that may be imposed on us by the power of the British Parliament, as a punishment for having maintained a struggling existence through ten years of the quarrels of Government and Company in which the money was lost. The assets of all kinds that the Company left in this Province were not equal to the value of the claims of settlers and absentees on the Company, which the Province has now to purchase land to satisfy, at four times the price it could have been obtained for some years ago. This powerful Company has been unfortunately supported by the Home Government in this legalized plunder of the colony; but let us hope that the representations of the General Assembly and other Counsels prevailing in the Home Government, will obtain an equitable adjustment of the so called New Zealand Company's debt, now practically, the New Zealand Settler's debt.

With reference to the control of the Waste lands, I hope the wishes of the Provincial Legislatures will have due weight with the General Assembly. The Land Regulations I consider as a great advance on the system which locked up the forest of this Province, the principle I should wish to see introduced would be that of sales by auction, at a low upset price of not a particular spot of land, but of the first choice of an amount of land definable by the purchaser within certain limits as to extent, which would not subject the experience of the bona fide settler to the competition of the speculator.

The good feeling subsisting between the two races, and which has never been seriously interrupted in New Plymouth, it will be my object to promote with every feeling of confidence in your support, and that of the Province generally. Whether viewed from motives of justice or policy, every one must be sensible that as a civilized race we owe a helping hand to the population which surrounds us and is fast emerging from its primitive state, and that any serious misunderstanding must materially retard the progress of both races. Those who with me have seen the early days of the