laity, of an English alliance over the defence less tribes who claimed our friendship. His functions were conGned to the assurances of sympathy and the guarantee of protection. He was without any authority except such as the reflected greatness of his country lent him. He was without support except that which llie semi-savage notions of British power and the occasional presence of a British frigate af forded. He claimed from the country of his residence the usual rights and privileges of consular office. Two years had scarcely elapsed when in the name of his sovereign he presented the fragmentary powers which con stitute the body of New Zealand chiefs with a a national flag, and saluted it from the decks of her Majesty's ship Alligator. A few years elapse. We find a body of Englishmen oc cupying a portion of one of the islands ; this body grows greater and greater, bolder and 'bolder; designsof aggrandizement are avowed by the colonists, and repudiated by the Go vernment ; one Consul is superseded by ano ther, and fiually the Consul rises into a Go vernor. As if conscious of the difficulties which clouded the clearness of its title to pos session, the British Government instructs .the Viceroy of New Zealand to exercise the most scrupulous and hesitating caution in receiving any cession of lands from the natives. " They are not to be permitted" — thus wrote Lord Normanby — " to enter into any contracts in which they might be the ignorant and unin tentional authors of injuries to themselves. You will not, for example, purchase from them any territory, the retention of which Avould be essential or highly conducive to their own comfort, safety, or subsis tence." This was the gist of every despatch, the spirit of the whole policy adop ted towards the colony. It breathed at the same time the love of justice, the desire of •power, and the wish to reconcile the two. But when did a despatch from Downing-street control the acts of subjects of 19,000 miles off? or when did Parliamentary philanthropy check injustice at the antipodes ? Accident had begotten enterprise ; enterprise fostered speculation ; speculation degenerated intoland jobbing, and this jobbing was complicated with every sort of wrong that cunning could devise or violence inflict. It was necessary to unravel the twisted yarn of complex titles and antagonist claims. 