– 52 –

F.
To the Editor of the New Zealand Spectator.

I shall feel obliged by your insertion in your columns of a letter I addressed to the Governor nearly five years ago. My object for desiring its publication is to shew that the opinions I have recently advocated are not new ones. It will be observed, that I called attention to the suspicious combination among the chiefs that subsequently resulted in the King-party;—that I discouraged any attempts to raise or increase their influence, advising on the contrary the impartial enforcement of law;—and that I pointed out even then what would inevitably be the result of the reckless proceedings of the Land Purchase Department. It will be observed that the letter was written in reply to one received from the Governor asking for my “opinion of the present state of feeling among the natives towards the Europeans and the Queen's Government.”