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propose to you some further amendments, to
which I shall presently allude.

In noticing the state of business in the land
department, I have to express my regret that
the two main impediments to its satisfactory
progress (to which I have adverted on previous
occasions) still remain. I refer to the backward
state of the surveys, and the absence of a direct
official correspondence with the land purchase
department. The first impediment has existed
for many years, was inherited from former
Governments, and was brought under the
special notice of the first Provincial Council,
during one of its early sessions, by Commissioner
Bell; and I fear, in spite of the heavy expense
we have incurred in surveys during the last few
years, (amounting to between six and seven
thousand a year) that some time will yet elapse
before the arrears are brought up. I am glad,
however, to be informed that there is a prospect
that one great desideratum will shortly be supplied by the Survey Office to the Land Department,
by the completion of a connected map of
the important district of the Wairarapa.

With reference to the other impediment, it
can only be a matter of regret that the jealousy
of the General Government should have forbidden
that responsible relationship between the
Land Purchase and Land Sale Departments,
the want of which is felt by the latter department as a practical obstruction to its efficiency.
From a schedule I shall lay before you, you
will perceive that the only blocks of land within
the present limits of the Province handed over
since 1855 are, a block at the forty mile bush,
purchased I believe, in Sir G. Grey’s time, and
the Puketotara block of 15,000 or 16,000 acres,
of 34,000 acres in the Waikanae District—showing
a neglect to the interests of this Province as
unsatisfactory as it is unaccountable.

I am, at the same time, happy to inform you
that, through the recent exertions of Mr. Commissioner
Serancke, the following blocks have
been acquired,—the Manaia, containing about
5,500 acres, the Tauhangi (near the forty mile
bush), of 2,000; the Pupipuri, of 35,000; two
blocks at the Manawatu, of about 34,000 acres
each; the Popawai, of about 15,000; the Waihui,
of 30,000 acres; and that Mr. Commissioner
McLean has, I understand, paid an instalment
of the purchase of a block at the Waitotara,
estimated to contain about 50,000 acres.
There is no doubt that a considerable revenue
will be derived from the sale of these blocks, as
soon as they are placed at the disposal of the
Government; but still you must look for your
future land revenue mainly to the sale at 5s.
an acre, of the three or four million acres in
your Province, which never can be available
for agriculture.

After the reports which have been recently
circulated respecting hostile movements on the
part of the aboriginal natives—reports which
have created considerable alarm in the minds
of the settlers in outlying districts, I am glad
to avail myself of this opportunity to declare,
that after having caused enquiries to be made,
I see no ground for these apprehensions—no
reason for anticipating any disturbance of the
friendly relations which have hitherto subsisted
between the two races. At the same time,
there is no denying the fact—that for some
months past the natives have been busily em-
ployed in arming themselves, and that considerable
excitement and disaffection at present
exist among them.

Sir George Grey shortly after his arrival in
the Colony, caused ordinances to be passed
placing stringent restrictions on the importation
and sale of arms and ammunition, and by a
government proclamation (dated the 24th January,
1846), he absolutely prohibited their sale
to the natives. No difficulty was experienced
in enforcing these restrictive laws—they were
acquiesced in by the Europeans as wise and
salutary precautions—and submitted to by the
natives without the slightest reluctance or even
murmuring. It must be admitted by all, that
as far as this Province is concerned, Sir George
Grey’s scheme of disarming the natives, was
successful to a degree which he himself could
not reasonably have anticipated; for, three or
four years ago, the natives were to all intents
and purposes disarmed:—their muskets, from
the difficulty of getting them repaired, had
become unserviceable,—their stores of gunpowder
were either expended or spoilt, so that another
native war was rendered well nigh impossible.

Unfortunately, for reasons which it is difficult
to conceive, his Excellency the present Governor
by a proclamation dated the 25th June,
1857, superseded Sir George Grey’s regulations,
and substituted other provisions in their place.
Whatever may have been the intention of his
Excellency in issuing that proclamation, the
interpretation put upon it by all parties seems
to have been—that Sir George Grey’s restrictions,
if not repealed, were at any rate relaxed.
And that the proclamation on the face of it
fully justified this construction, is clear, from
the report of the Select Committee of the House
of Representatives appointed to inquire into
this matter in 1858, for their report simply was,
that while "it would be injudicious to make
any attempt to reimpose the former restrictions
in the sale of arms and ammunition it would not
be expedient further to relax existing regulations."

The result has been, that the fruits of Sir
George Grey’s wise and beneficent policy have
been entirely thrown away; for the natives at
this moment are better armed, and more amply
supplied with the munitions of war, than at any
previous period of the history of this Colony.
And while I repeat that the recent alarms are
groundless, still it is impossible not to perceive,
that with the natives thus armed and in a state
of uneasy agitation, the merest accident might
endanger the peace of the whole Colony; and
it is with the object of impressing upon my
fellow settlers the necessity not merely of avoiding
all cause of dispute—of cultivating the same
kindly relations they have hitherto maintained—
but of doing their utmost to dispel the suspicions
which I fear designing persons have recently
been endeavouring to instil into the minds of
the natives, that I have alluded to this topic.

Understanding that the question of Education
will again be brought before you, I have
called for and will shortly lay upon your table
returns of the several schools receiving Government
aid. From those returns you will learn
that at present there are 10 schools subsidized
by Government—that the number of children
on their rolls exceeds 300—that the school fee
varies from 3d. to 1s. a week, and that the whole
of the schools, with one exception, are established.