SEEKING A WAY
The cry for better Government was thus becoming imperative, and the
demand was not a new one. Both the House of Lords and the House of
Commons had entered upon exhaustive enquiries into the subject. The
former had reported that the responsibility of extending the colonial
possessions of the Crown was one that rested solely with the
Government, while the latter had declared in spirited terms that
"however pressing the nation's need for a vigorous emigration policy,
and whatever action the Government might take to meet that need by
finding a soil to which its surplus population might retreat, the
House would tolerate no scheme which implied violence or fraud in
taking possession of such territory." The reference to "surplus
population" in the House of Commons' report introduces a new factor
into the problem. It indicates internal as well as external pressure;
it tells of clamour from the teeming cities, and a rural population
discontented with their lot. It suggests that the nation's mind had
moved faster than the politicians, and that already many of England's
artisans were seeking to escape to some new country where they might
live under freer conditions. The popular theory of the political
economists of those days was "over population," and the panacea for
the existing national poverty was emigration. In spite of the fact
that people are the most precious asset a country can ever have, both
doctrines found much favour with the different sections of the
community whose interest they seemed best to serve; the spirit of
colonisation had got into the air, and the question of finding new
fields for the energies of the "surplus" people became a practical
issue which no Government could afford to ignore. The necessity for
doing something appeared impossible of evasion. Poverty at home and
crime unchecked abroad clamoured for redress, but just what to do, or
how to do it, was not easy of decision.
Sir Richard Bourke had told the Government in plainest terms that
unless they were prepared to give the British Resident more power, and
permanently station a ship of war on the coast to support him, it
would be more in keeping with the dignity of the nation to withdraw
him altogether. To give him more power was an impossibility, unless
the Government was prepared to violate the express injunction of the
House of Commons and all the precedents by which they had acknowledged
the independence of the Maoris. It was therefore not practicable to
supply the existing deficiency by extending the jurisdiction of Mr.
Busby.
In their dilemma the Ministers turned for light and leading to the
comparatively few people then in England who had previous experience
of these far-away islands. Amongst these was Captain Hobson, who in
1837 had been sent over in H.M.S. _Rattlesnake_ pell-mell to
render what aid he could to British shipping and British interests
generally, on news reaching Sydney of serious hostilities between two
of the northern tribes.[28] Captain Hobson had on his return furnished
the Governor with a report upon the condition of affairs as he found
them at the settlements he had visited. He had also entered into the
discussion of a scheme for the future government of the country, in
which he favoured proceeding upon the plan of the Hudson Bay and East
India Companies by establishing trading factories in different parts
of the islands, and so fulfilling what he urged had become a solemn
duty to apply a remedy for a growing evil. "It has occurred to me," he
wrote, "that if factories were established at the Bay of Islands, at
Cloudy Bay, and Hokianga, and in other places as the occupation by
British subjects proceeds, a sufficient restraint could be
constitutionally imposed on the licentious whites, without exciting
the jealousy of the New Zealanders or of any other power. I will not
presume to enter too deeply into the details of such a measure, but
beg simply to suggest that sections of land be purchased, enclosed,
and placed within the influence of British jurisdiction as
dependencies of this (New South Wales) colony. The heads of factories
should be Magistrates, and the chief factor should, in addition, be
accredited to the united chiefs of New Zealand as a political agent
and consul. All communications with the British Government should take
place through the chief factor, with whom alone the local factors
should correspond. All British subjects should be required to register
themselves and their landed property at the factories. Two or more
respectable British residents nearest to each station should hold
Commissions of the Peace to assist the factors. Prisons should be
constructed within the factories and legally proclaimed in the colony.
A treaty should be concluded with the New Zealand chiefs for the
recognition of the factories and the protection of British subjects
and property. To meet the expenses which the establishment of a system
of factories upon the principle I have mentioned would necessarily
entail, funds might be obtained from a variety of sources, such as a
small fee on the registration of the purchase of land from the
natives, on the entry and clearance of British shipping, and a small
percentage on goods and produce imported and exported. The great
security which would result from this system would, it is conceived,
readily dispose the British subjects resident in New Zealand, to
conform to such an impost."
After acknowledging the primary need for Imperial legislation to give
effect to his suggested policy, he continues: "The benefit which may
be supposed to arise from the establishment of factories in New
Zealand is not confined to the mere legal protection they are supposed
to afford; but we may hope they will be the means of introducing
amongst the natives a system of civil Government which may hereafter
be adopted and enlarged upon. Nor is it to be overlooked that in times
of intestine war they will afford a safe retreat to our
fellow-countrymen, who will then become powerful by concentration."
In the estimation of Sir Richard Bourke, Captain Hobson's scheme
contained "suggestions of great value," and in transmitting it to the
Colonial Office he not only gave it his full endorsement, but
justified it because it was in his opinion "neither possible nor
desirable to put a stop to the growing intercourse between the English
colonies in these seas and New Zealand." He also raised his voice
against the neutral policy which was being pursued, for while
admitting the failure of the British Residency, he protested that "it
would be difficult for His Majesty's or this Government to act for any
length of time upon the stern principle of non-interference if the
lives and property of British subjects appeared to be in jeopardy. Any
plan, therefore, by which the intercourse may be sufficiently
regulated, and usurpation, real or apparent, avoided, is well worthy
of serious consideration."
Simultaneously with Captain Hobson's scheme, was sent a letter from
Mr. Busby, written while the _Rattlesnake_ was in New Zealand
waters. In this communication the Resident also endeavoured, for the
guidance of Ministers, to reduce to a system a scheme of government
based upon his several years' experience of the people and the
country. Governor Bourke evidently looked upon it with a less
favourable eye than he did upon the report of the naval officer, and
commended it merely as advancing "suggestions that were not without
value."
This letter must, however, be regarded by all historians as the more
valuable of the two, for in it will be found the germ of the treaty
which was afterwards adopted by both _Pakeha_ and Maori as the
basis upon which New Zealand was taken into the British Empire; upon
which her past progress has been built, and her future prosperity must
depend.
In the previous year (1836) Mr. Busby had made a somewhat similar
suggestion, founded upon the principle sanctioned by the Treaty of
Paris in the case of Great Britain and the Ionian Isles, and also
applied in various instances on Britain's Indian frontier. That
principle recognised "a protecting state administering in chief the
affairs of another State in trust for the inhabitants," and this
condition he claimed could be, with but slight modification, applied
to New Zealand both economically and efficiently. Mr. Busby was by no
means of the opinion, afterwards so contemptuously expressed by Sir
George Gipps, that the native Declaration of Independence was "a paper
pellet fired off at Baron de Thierry." On the contrary, he attached
considerable importance to it, proposing to make it the authority on
which the chiefs were entitled to enter into diplomatic relations with
Great Britain for the cession of their administrative rights.
"The chiefs who were parties to the articles of Confederation, and to
the Declaration of Independence," he wrote, "together with those who
subsequently adhered to it, include, with very few exceptions, the
whole of the chiefs of influence in the northern parts of the Islands,
and the adhesion of the remainder could at any time be procured.
Whatever acts approaching to acts of sovereignty or government have
been exercised in the country, have been exercised by these chiefs in
their individual capacity, as relates to their own people, and in
their collective capacity as relates to their negotiations with the
British Government, the only Government with which the chiefs or
people of New Zealand have had any relations of a diplomatic
character. The articles of Confederation having centralised the powers
of sovereignty both _de jure_ and _de facto_ by the several
chiefs, and having established and declared the basis of a
constitution of government founded upon the union of those powers, I
cannot, I think, greatly err in assuming that the congress of chiefs,
the depositing of the powers of the State, as declared by its
constitution, is competent to become a party to a treaty with a
foreign power, and to avail itself of foreign assistance in reducing
the country under its authority to order, and this principle being
once admitted all difficulty appears to me to vanish."
It did not, however, enter into the proposal of Mr. Busby that the
British Government should be both in theory and in fact the
administrative authority. He still contemplated the retention of the
federated chiefs as the nominal source of power, with himself as its
presiding genius. "In theory and ostensibly the government would be
that of the confederated chiefs, but in reality it must necessarily be
that of the protecting power. The chiefs would meet annually, or
oftener, and nominally enact the laws proposed to them, but in truth
the present race of chiefs could not be entrusted with any discretion
whatever in the adoption or rejection of any measure that might be
submitted to them."
He proposed to constitute the chiefs guardians of the peace and public
morals, and to pay them for their services. Schools were to be
established, and the Missionaries and catechists were, as far as their
duties would permit, to be appointed Justices of the Peace, whose
decisions were, if needs must, to be supported by a military force.
Even a periodical newspaper was provided for as a means of
"instructing the natives in those relative duties of the people and
their rulers, which are familiar to all ranks of the population under
established Government, but of which the New Zealanders have scarcely
yet formed an idea." Revenue was to be raised by an impost on shipping
and a duty upon spirits and tobacco. Indeed, so modest was his
contemplated civil establishment that he estimated an expenditure of
not more than £1000 per annum would be sufficient to maintain it in
adequate splendour. All existing land claims were to be settled by an
independent commission, and after that all titles were to be void
unless procured through the Government, whose special duty it would
be to see that ample reserves were retained for the natives.
Mr. Busby, in submitting these proposals, ventured to suggest that
they might be presumed to give an effective degree of protection to
the British subjects resident in New Zealand, without infringing on
the rights of the New Zealanders as an independent people and at the
same time "satisfy the reasonable scruples of a foreign Government."
This latter condition was one that in maturing their plans the British
Cabinet could not leave out of their consideration; for already both
France and America were factors to be counted upon in the South
Pacific, and might with almost equal justice claim a share in the
sovereignty of the country.
The Government were still wrestling with the perplexities of the
position when the New Zealand Association rose into being, and served
to still further complicate the issues. There was an opinion in
political circles, afterwards crystallised into a definite
recommendation by the House of Lords, that the colonisation of New
Zealand was the duty of the State, if it was Britain's duty at all,
but private enterprise had never been wholly disassociated from the
scheme.[29] As far back as 1825 a New Zealand Company, "acting with
the sanction and encouragement of the Government," had been formed
under Lord Durham, and had acquired an estate on the banks of the
Hokianga River. This settlement, under Captain Heard, had been of the
most fugitive character; but the land still remained more or less an
asset, and subsequently was acquired by the New Zealand Association,
founded in 1837 by the Hon. Francis Baring, M.P. for Sheffield, in
conjunction with other gentlemen prominent in English public life of
that day. This Association grew out of an enquiry made at the instance
of the House of Commons by a committee called the Committee on
Colonial Lands, but the real subject of the enquiry was colonisation.
One of the principal witnesses was Mr. Edward Gibbon Wakefield, who
gave some account of the then existing state of New Zealand, and spoke
of it as a country extremely eligible for the purpose of British
colonisation, provided some regular system should be adopted in place
of the lawless practices that were then rampant. In consequence of
that statement, a member of the committee spoke to him upon the
subject of colonising New Zealand. Subsequently other gentlemen were
admitted to their discussions, and as a result of their joint
deliberations they determined to form an Association for the purpose
of obtaining from Parliament (for Parliamentary aid was considered
essential) some regulation both for the colonisation and the
government of the Islands, to take the place of the irregular
practices that were then on foot.
There is little doubt that in its inception the Association had a
large measure of philanthropy underlying its principles, for it was
the outcome of the unsatisfactory social conditions existing in
England at that period. The scheme attracted to its aid men of wealth
and culture, and under the organising genius of Edward Gibbon
Wakefield it acquired an influence, both social and political, which
no government could safely regard with indifference.[30]
To secure New Zealand as a British possession; to find a profitable
investment for British capital; and to provide employment and
opportunity for England's idle labour were the nominal objects for
which the Association had been formed. To give these purposes
practical effect the Association had, under the guiding hand of
Wakefield, formulated definite theories upon the subject of
colonisation; and to the end that their ideals might be achieved they
sought the assistance of the Government and the sanction of
Parliament.
On a day in June 1837 they secured an interview with the Prime
Minister, Lord Melbourne, whom they found attended by Lord Howick, a
member of the Government, though not of the Colonial Office, and who
was present, so they were told, in the character of an adviser on the
subject, he having paid considerable attention to colonial problems.
The aims and purposes of the Association were laid before the
Ministers by Mr. Baring, chairman of the society, and the result of
the deputation was an assurance from the Premier that for himself he
saw no objection to the scheme of the Association, and that he
perceived in some of their purposes a laudable object, but that not
being familiarly conversant with such subjects he did not care to do
more than to express his general approbation, and to refer the
deputation for the discussion of all matters of detail to Lord Howick,
who was well informed on all such questions, and who possessed, in the
office which he held, as much leisure as would enable him to attend to
the subject. The committee was highly satisfied with their interview,
and communicated in various ways with Lord Howick upon the details of
their plan, amongst other things submitting to him a draft of the Bill
which they proposed to introduce into the House of Commons. Lord
Howick examined the Bill, and both in conversation and in writing
suggested various modifications, which though not universally approved
by the promoters, were adopted in their entirety rather than risk the
loss of that influence which they considered essential to the success
of their plan--the assistance of the Executive Government. The death
of the King, William IV., at this juncture, put a sudden termination
to their political proceedings; but the outlook for their negotiation
appeared so satisfactory that, pending the assembly of the new
Parliament, they published an invitation to all persons so disposed to
join the Association for the purpose of emigrating to New Zealand. The
publication of this resolution drew to their ranks a large body of
wealthy and influential people; and when Parliament met again in
December of the same year a very considerable number of persons had
expressed their intention of settling in the new colony. Accordingly
the committee, on December 13, again waited on Lord Melbourne with a
view to obtaining his final approval upon the measure which they
proposed to submit to the Commons. As at the previous interview, the
object of the Association in seeking this second conference was stated
by Mr. Baring, when Lord Melbourne, who appeared to have forgotten
what had passed on the former occasion, referred the deputation to
Lord Glenelg, who was present as Colonial Minister.
This gentleman at once adopted an attitude of hostility to the whole
proposal, his objections being primarily that the jealousy of foreign
powers might be excited by the extension of British colonies; that
England had colonies enough; that they were very expensive to govern
and to manage; and that they were not of sufficient value to make it
worth while to increase their number.[31] The rebuttal of these
unexpected objections involved a discussion of over an hour, during
which considerable feeling was displayed by some of the gentlemen
present, who saw in the attitude of the Minister a grim prospect of
their scheme being thwarted. Several of these had, during the interval
since the previous interview, disposed of their property and quitted
professions in which they were engaged, with a view to emigrating, and
they now felt very strongly the position in which they were placed by
the withdrawal of the Ministerial approval which they believed their
enterprise was to receive. One of these was described to Lord
Melbourne as having wound up his affairs with a view to emigrating,
and as being likely to suffer very seriously from now finding himself
unable to carry his plan into effect. Lord Melbourne, not knowing that
he was present, said that such an individual must be mad. The
gentleman immediately rose and, facing the Premier, said that he was
the madman. This created a distinctly dramatic situation, and the
conference was on the point of breaking up in excitement and disorder
when Lord Melbourne was reminded of his former sympathetic reception
of the Association's proposals, whereupon he held a further brief
consultation with the leaders of the deputation, and gave them to
understand that the matter would be again considered by the
Government, and that if they would wait upon Lord Glenelg in a week's
time they would get an answer more to their satisfaction. Pursuant to
that arrangement, the same body of persons waited on the Colonial
Secretary on that day week (Wednesday, December 20), when Lord Glenelg
informed them that the subject of the colonisation of New Zealand had
been reconsidered by the Cabinet, and that circumstances which had
occurred during the interval had induced Ministers to think that their
former view was not the correct one. What had happened to so influence
the Ministerial mind was the receipt of those important despatches
from Mr. Busby, the British Resident, and from Captain Hobson, in
which both these officers urged the need for a more vigorous policy on
the part of the Colonial Office in its relations with New Zealand. The
opinions of the Government, therefore, now approximated somewhat more
closely to those of the Association, but there was still some
hesitancy in proceeding by way of Act of Parliament. The Colonial
Department, Lord Glenelg said, had fully considered the matter, and
were satisfied that the measures desired might be carried into
complete effect without applying to Parliament at all; and that they
were consequently prepared, in the exercise of the power of the Crown
vested in the Secretary of State for the Colonial Department, to give
to the Association a Charter of Incorporation, being a Charter of
government similar to those which were granted in the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries to the companies which founded the thirteen
great colonies in America. Nine days after this interview the
Association received an official letter from Lord Glenelg, reiterating
his offer of a Charter, and calling upon the committee to form their
members into a Joint-Stock Company with a subscribed capital
sufficient to qualify them for the Charter he proposed to issue. This
proposition was wholly unacceptable to the Association for two vital
reasons. They had from the beginning declared that they intended to
take no private pecuniary interest in the undertaking, and yet in
spite of their care in this direction they had been very untruly
charged before the public with having no other object than that of
private pecuniary gain for themselves. Again some of their most
influential leaders were persons, such as distinguished clergymen of
the Established Church, holding preferment, who were almost
disqualified by that circumstance from becoming members of a
Joint-Stock Company, and, therefore, it was unanimously resolved that
the offer of the Colonial Secretary could not be accepted. But though
this avenue of procedure was closed there was still another open to
them, and it was determined to procure, if possible, the passage of a
Bill through Parliament, based upon the plan which they had originally
placed before the Government. Such a Bill was brought into the House
of Commons by Mr. Baring, but owing to the opposition of the
Ministers, including Lord Howick,[32] and the widespread impression
that the Association was nothing better than a land-sharking Company,
the measure was defeated by a large majority.
The discussion which was provoked by this Bill was responsible for
concentrating public attention upon two points, namely, the objects
which animated the Association, and, secondly, the diversity of
opinion which existed on the subject of British sovereignty in New
Zealand. One of the most ardent advocates of the Association was the
Rev. Dr. Hinds, a clergyman of the Established Church, who had been
greatly impressed by the social stagnation in England, and who had
joined the committee in the hope of providing some outlet for the
country's allegedly "surplus" population. Dr. Hinds told the Committee
of the House of Lords in 1838[33] that he considered the colonisation
of New Zealand expedient because of the number of persons of various
classes in Great Britain who were anxious to settle themselves in a
colony in New Zealand; persons who from their character, station, and
other considerations, had a claim on the British Parliament to
facilitate that object. The feeling, he assured their Lordships, in
favour of such a colony was deep seated and sincere, supporting his
contention by quoting letters he had received from Scotland,[34]
where, he said, existing conditions were clamant for an immediate
remedy. That remedy, he contended, the colonisation of New Zealand
would supply. "There is," he said, "an abundance of capital and an
abundance of labour in Great Britain, and the abundance of capital the
capitalists can hardly employ so as to be sufficiently remunerative by
any investment in this country. At the same time there is a great mass
of the labouring population who can no longer obtain sufficient wages
to keep up what have become the necessaries of life to them. The
proposed colony would therefore be a measure of relief to both the
capitalists and labourers."
[Illustration: LORD NORMANBY.]
Dr. Hinds concluded his instructive picture of social England at that
date by urging the colonisation of New Zealand on the general ground
that settlement was already proceeding there along irregular lines,
and without any "combining principle." This fundamental requirement to
all well-ordered societies, he thought, was provided for in the plan
of the Association, and he proceeded to explain in very explicit terms
the two cardinal points of its constitution--its Government, and the
principles which would control its land transactions.
The executive authority of the Association was, he said, to be placed
in the hands of a Commission resident in England, which Commission was
to be merely a provisional body to last so long as might be thought
necessary to set the scheme on foot. It was proposed to delegate to
these Commissioners the power to make laws, the Crown to determine the
extent of the delegation, and many other important matters. A further
power of delegation was to be given to a Council in New Zealand, but
the responsibility for all that was done was to rest with the
Commission at home. "Whatever the powers are, it is only required that
they should be exercised for a period of twenty-one years, and the
Association would not at all object if it should seem desirable to
have the time shortened. At the end of that term the whole Government
of the colony would revert to the Crown."
In its land dealings, the element of profit was to be eliminated by
the fact that the whole of the money derived from the sale of land or
other sources must be spent in the interests of the colony, and no
member was to derive any advantage therefrom: "The money for which the
land will be sold by the Commissioners will be a price made up of
several sums. It will in the first place contain the sum paid for the
land itself, which I conceive will be a very small proportion. It will
contain then a sum which will be calculated as sufficient for bringing
out labourers to cultivate the land purchased; that will be the
largest amount. It is also proposed that there should be a further sum
added for the purpose of making roads, bridges, and public works, and
it is also proposed that one of the items should be a sum to be
expended in making provision for the natives, such as procuring them
medical assistance and some instruction in the arts. The price the
settlers will pay for the land will be only the price paid for it to
the natives, and the additions to that sum will be in fact the
purchase money paid for certain benefits which are considered
essential to the prosperity of the colony, more especially for a due
supply of labour."
The House of Lords' Committee reported against this scheme on the
broadly Imperial grounds that the extension of the colonial
possessions of the Crown was a question of public policy with which
the Government only should deal. The element of private enterprise
was, in their Lordships' opinion, eminently undesirable, holding with
Captain Fitzroy, whose personal experience they valued, that
"colonisation to be useful must be entirely under the control of the
Executive Government of the Mother Country."
At this point a new and vigorous opponent directed its energies
against the plans of the Association. The Church Missionary Society
had been watching its proceedings with a jealous eye, and from the
moment of the Association's inception had adopted an attitude of
hostility towards it. Rightly or wrongly the Society had conceived the
notion that the colonisation of the country must have a detrimental
effect upon its Missions, and that therefore a sacred duty devolved
upon the Committee to frustrate its consummation if it were at all
possible so to do.
Immediately following the publication of the Association's prospectus
the Society had communicated with its Missionaries in New Zealand,
calling their attention to the scheme, and urging them to furnish the
Committee with their views upon it, and so assist the parent body in
reaching a conclusion as to its merits. Without waiting for these
replies the Committee proceeded to deliberate upon the evidence then
available, and on June 6, 1837, formulated the following resolutions,
which they ever afterwards consistently made the basis of their
attitude towards the Association.
That the New Zealand Association appears to the Committee highly
objectionable on the principle that it proposes to engage the British
Legislature to sanction the disposal of portion of a foreign country
over which it has no claim to sovereignty or jurisdiction whatever.
That the Association is further objectionable from its involving the
colonisation of New Zealand by Europeans, such colonisation of
countries inhabited by uncivilised tribes having been found by
universal experience to lead to the infliction upon the aborigines of
great wrongs and most severe injuries.
That the Committee consider the execution of such a scheme as that
contemplated by the Association especially to be deprecated in the
present case, from its unavoidable tendency, in their judgment, to
interrupt if not to defeat, those measures for the religious
improvement and civilisation of the natives of New Zealand, which are
now in favourable progress through the labours of the Missionaries.
That for the reasons assigned in the preceding resolutions the
Committee are of opinion that all suitable means should be employed
to prevent the plan of the New Zealand Association from being carried
into execution.
The Society again made declaration of its views in the following year,
embodying in its annual report (May 1, 1838) a plea for the humane
consideration of New Zealand's claims, and for their own disinterested
services to the country:
Your Committee cannot close this report on the New Zealand Mission
without adverting to the peculiar situation of that country as it is
regarded by the public at large. What events may await this fair
portion of the globe, whether England will regard with a sisterly eye
so beautiful an Island, placed like herself in a commanding position,
well harboured, well wooded, and fertile in resources; whether this
country will stretch forth a friendly and vigorous arm, so that New
Zealand may with her native population adorn the page of future
history as an industrious, well-ordered, and Christian nation, it is
not for the committee of the Church Missionary Society to
anticipate--but this consolation they do possess. They know that the
Society has for the past twenty years done good to the natives,
hoping for nothing again, nothing save the delight of promoting the
Glory of God and good-will among men. The Society has sent forth its
heralds of peace and messengers of salvation, and has thus contracted
such an obligation towards those whom it has sought to benefit that
your Committee are constrained to lift up their voice on behalf of
that Island, and to claim that no measures shall be adopted towards
that interesting country which would involve any violation of the
principles of justice on our part, or the rights and liberties of the
natives of New Zealand.
The Society having once determined upon its attitude towards the
Association never turned back. Their Secretary, Mr. Dandeson Coates,
became a militant force whom they found it difficult to shake off, and
together with the enormous influence he was able to wield in religious
circles, constituted a power that might have made the Government pause
had they been predisposed to afford the Association the shelter of
their wing.
Harassed by the Church Missionary Society and repulsed by Parliament
the Association turned to the hope of resuming the negotiations with
the Government at the point at which they had broken with Lord
Glenelg. In the previous year the Colonial Secretary had, it will be
remembered, reluctantly professed sympathy with the objects of the
organisation up to the point that it fell short of being a Joint-Stock
Company. He had then informed Lord Durham[35] that colonisation having
gone on in New Zealand to some extent, the only question was between
allowing it to proceed along desultory lines, without law, and fatal
to the natives, or a colonisation organised and salutory. "Her
Majesty's Government are therefore," he said, "disposed to entertain
the proposal of establishing such a colony. They are willing to
consent to a Corporation by a Royal Charter, of various persons to
whom the settlement and government of the projected colony for some
short term of years would be confided. The Charter would be framed
with reference to the precedents of the colonies established in North
America by Great Britain in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries."
The basis on which these Atlantic colonies had been established was
that of business concerns; for it was officially stated that the
Association's scheme was objected to because of the absence of an
actual subscribed capital, and the consequent want of protection to
those proceeding to the colony as emigrants. For the reasons already
given, the stipulation that the Association should convert itself into
a Joint-Stock Company was so contrary to the motives which had
inspired it that it was at first, and still was, hotly resented and
resisted by its principal and truly philanthropic promoters. Many of
these now withdrew from the ranks of the Association; but others,
rather than give up the hope of colonising the Islands, consented to
comply with the demand of the Minister, after Parliament had rejected
their Bill, as they wrongly assumed, for the insufficient reason of a
non-existent capital. The Association then, in 1838, became a Company,
shares were issued, capital subscribed, the reorganisation changing
its whole character from a quasi-benevolent to a strictly commercial
concern, whose business it was to buy land at a low price in New
Zealand, and sell it at a high price in England.[36]
In the meantime a change had taken place at the Colonial Office. Lord
Glenelg had fallen over his Canadian policy, and in the year following
its reconstruction, the Company, on the ground that they had now
complied with all that had been stipulated for, approached his
successor, Lord Normanby, "with a view of obtaining, through his
Lordship's intervention, a Royal Charter of Incorporation." Upon what
took place at this interview the widest divergence of opinion appears
to exist. The Company claimed that the Minister received them with the
greatest affability and encouragement, and that in consequence they
left the Colonial Office in high spirits at the very favourable
reception they had met with, and were perfectly satisfied in their own
minds that all opposition to their scheme had not only ceased, but
that they could proceed with the full concurrence of the Government.
Their feelings may, therefore, be easily imagined when, within
forty-eight hours of their meeting with the Minister, they received an
official letter from Lord Normanby, dated March 11, 1839, in which his
Lordship warmly repudiated the suggestion that the Government was in
any way bound to give effect to his predecessor's promise. He pointed
out that Lord Glenelg's offer had been distinctly rejected by those to
whom it was made; that they had since applied to Parliament for powers
which they had failed to procure from the Crown; and that the
personnel of the Company had so completely changed that by no process
of reasoning could it be argued that the promise of Ministerial
approval had been given to the same people as were now making the
application. He therefore claimed that he stood unfettered by any
pledge, and was free to discuss the question in the public interests,
and for the public as though the rejected offer of 1837 had not been
made.
In thus sternly refusing to countenance the proceedings of the
Company, the Minister may have been induced to adopt the course he
took by a reason altogether different from that which he gave, but one
which he found more difficult to diplomatically express. For directing
his attention to the change in the personnel of the promoters he was
indebted to his Departmental Secretary, Mr. Stephen, who had kept the
strictest watch upon the correspondence of the Company, and when the
request, now under review, was preferred, he wrote a Memorandum to his
Minister which may have profoundly influenced the mind of Lord
Normanby.
"You can see," he said, "from looking over the list of the proposed
Directors, that the leading members are now Roman Catholics. If this
business is committed to them, New Zealand will infallibly become a
Roman Catholic country. I am convinced that this would give the most
severe offence to all the religious bodies which have established
Missions there. I cannot withhold expressing my own opinion that the
objection would be perfectly just and well founded. As long as we
have the choice of establishing Popery or Protestantism in any part
of the world I cannot understand how any one, not a Roman Catholic,
would hesitate what that choice should be."[37]
How far the suggestion of Mr. Stephen weighed, or did not weigh, with
his chief can now only be a matter of merest speculation, for
unfortunately little in the way of record has been left to guide us.
It is possible that under the sway of the religious feeling which
existed in England at that time he did not altogether disregard it,
but it is more probable that the circumstance which weighed with him
most was the fact that since Lord Glenelg's day the Government had
received more serviceable advice as to their powers under the Law of
Nations, and that finding it was not within their right to issue a
Charter affecting New Zealand, they were then considering the
suggestions made by Mr. Busby and Captain Hobson, and were even at
that moment contemplating the steps which they afterwards took. Lord
Normanby would, under these circumstances, find it difficult and
inexpedient to refer in definite language to these immature plans, and
consequently the general terms in which he was compelled to speak may
have misled the members of the Company who waited on him to sue for a
Charter. In considering a petition from the Merchants, Bankers, and
Shipowners of the City of London respecting the colonisation of New
Zealand, an effort was made by a Committee of the House of Commons, in
1840, to discover exactly what was the attitude of the Ministerial
mind at this juncture. Mr. Gibbon Wakefield complained that the
Company had been scurvily treated by Lord Normanby, who had led them
to suppose that they had his sympathy and approval, and had then,
within a comparatively few hours, despatched the letter in which he
refused to be bound by the promise of his predecessor to issue a
Charter. In reply to this accusation, Mr. Labouchere, who was then
Under-Secretary at the Colonial Office, and might, therefore, be
expected to have some inside knowledge, took the view that the
Minister had been misunderstood, and asked whether the position was
not this: That Lord Normanby had stated to the Company that he
considered their objects very useful and laudable, and that he should
have been disposed to give them his most favourable consideration,
provided New Zealand were a British colony; that he intended to take
steps that he believed would probably lead to the constitution of New
Zealand, either wholly or in part as a British colony; but that till
those steps had been taken it would be utterly inconsistent with his
official duty, not only to give encouragement, as a Minister, to the
proceedings of the Company, but even to recognise them in any way
whatever?
To this Mr. Wakefield's answer was: "My impression has always been
that when Lord Normanby received those gentlemen he sincerely felt
what he said; that he was glad to see persons of so much influence,
and of such station in society, engaged in such a work; but that after
the interview he came into communication with the officers of his
Department, and received information of what had passed before, for he
was quite new in the office,[38] and that the letter written after the
interview, which was so much at variance with it, was written rather
by the office, I should say, than by Lord Normanby himself, for the
purpose of maintaining the consistency of the course which the
Government had pursued."
It was therefore clearly the opinion of Mr. Wakefield that Mr. Stephen
was a force to be reckoned with, and that whether he influenced it
from the religious or the secular point of view, the Departmental head
of the office was a powerful factor in moulding the policy which the
Minister afterwards followed. But be that as it may, it still remains
that from this date the Company and its colonising scheme received no
quarter from the Colonial Secretary nor from the Department while he
was at its head. Nothing daunted by official discouragement, the
Company went steadily on with their arrangements; and within the year
they had so far completed their plans that their pilot ship was ready
to sail, all that was requisite being the extension of a helping hand
to Colonel Wakefield, their pioneer representative, by Her Majesty's
officers in Australia, in the event of things going badly with him. To
this end, on April 29, Mr. William Hutt, who had now become chairman
of the Company, Lord Petre and Mr. Somes waited upon Lord Normanby,
preferring a request that letters might be given to the leader of
their expedition, soliciting the good offices of the Governors of New
South Wales and Van Dieman's land, should Colonel Wakefield require
their aid. Their request was accompanied by a copy of the Company's
instructions to Wakefield, all of which came as a violent surprise to
the Colonial Secretary, who immediately pronounced with unmistakable
emphasis, the Government's hostility to these unauthorised
proceedings. He protested that this was the first he had heard of the
Company's matured plans to proceed to New Zealand and there set up a
system of Government independent of the authority of the British
Crown, therefore it was impossible that he could do any act which
might be construed into a direct, or even indirect, sanction of such a
proceeding. He further made it plain that the Government could not
recognise the authority of any agents whom the Company might send out
to New Zealand, nor would they give future recognition to any
proprietary titles to land within that country, which the Company
might obtain by grant or purchase from the natives. Indeed, so far had
matters, he said, now been pushed, that he had no option but to
indicate that the time had arrived when Her Majesty must be advised by
her Ministers to adopt one of the last of Lord Glenelg's
recommendations, before he left the Colonial Office,[39] and take
measures without delay to obtain cession in sovereignty to the British
Crown of such parts of New Zealand as are, or might be, occupied by
British subjects, and that officers selected by the Queen, and not by
the Company, would be appointed to administer the executive Government
within such territory. "Under these circumstances," the Colonial
Secretary concluded, "I must decline to furnish the Company with the
introductory letters for which they apply."
This intimation was given to the Company in the dying days of April
1839, and by the 13th of June Lords Normanby and Palmerston had, after
consultation with the Law Officers of the Crown, agreed not only that
the moment was ripe for official action, but that the proper course to
take was to send to New Zealand an officer with Consular powers, whose
first duty would be to secure the cession in sovereignty from the
chiefs. The territory so ceded was then to be annexed to New South
Wales, the Consul to be raised to the rank of Lieut.-Governor, acting
under the Governor of the Mother colony, but invested with sufficient
authority to preserve law and order in the country. His salary of £500
per annum was at first to be a charge upon the revenues of New South
Wales, to be refunded so soon as the necessary arrangements could be
made for the collection of taxation in New Zealand.
On July 19 these proposals were confirmed by the Lords of the
Treasury, whereupon Lord Palmerston penned the letter to Captain
Hobson of which the opening paragraph of the previous chapter is a
brief extract.
In the meantime a clipper brig of 400 tons, named the _Tory_ had
been quietly fitted out by the Company for a dash to New Zealand. She
was armed with eight big guns, and as a precaution against a hostile
reception, small arms were provided for all the members of the crew, a
specially selected body of men. Under the command of Captain Chaffers,
who had been round the world with Fitzroy in the _Beagle_, she
left Plymouth Sound on May 12 (1839) and proving a smart sailer,
crossed the equator twenty-six days out, the high land of the South
Island being sighted in the vicinity of Cape Farewell on August 16.
This pioneer ship of the Company's fleet carried in her cabin their
official representative in the person of Colonel William Wakefield,
and in her hold a full complement of pots, pipes, and Jews' harps,
which that gentleman proposed to exchange as full value for the land
he hoped to acquire by barter from the natives.
The sailing of the _Tory_ was the New Zealand Company's challenge
to the Government, and in any estimate of its subsequent policy this
precipitate event must be accounted an important factor in endowing
the Colonial Office with a vital force which had hitherto been sadly
lacking.
[28] This war, it is said, arose through some one on board the
_Roslyn Castle_ carrying off a native woman of high rank to sea.
Her friends at Kawakawa accused the people of Kororareka of killing
and eating her in satisfaction of an old feud. This they denied, but a
war ensued, 1500 fighting men being engaged, the war continuing for
several months, eighty being killed.
[29] In 1821 Mr. Henry Goulburn, by direction of Earl Bathurst,
informed R. M. Sugden that his Lordship "did not feel he had any power
of approving any particular encouragement to the establishment of a
colony in New Zealand." In 1822 Earl Bathurst informed Thomas England
and Messrs. Taylor and Upton that no encouragement was given by the
Government to settlers to proceed to New Zealand. In the same year Mr.
John Thomson, A.M., Edinburgh, offered to found a colony of 50 sober
men, 100 Sepoys, and 100 convicts, as "the inhabitants of New Zealand
are just in that state of civilisation to be made useful." In November
1823 Lieutenant-Colonel Nicolls, an ex-Indian officer, made a proposal
to Earl Bathurst to establish a colony of military pensioners. In the
following month Baron de Thierry's scheme was brought under the notice
of the Government. The year 1825 saw the first New Zealand Company
established. Colonel R. Torrens, who afterwards did such good work in
South Australia, applied in 1826 for the command of a military force
in New Zealand, and so enable him to "make preliminary arrangements
which would facilitate the future colonisation of these islands upon
sound economical principles."
[30] It was said that at one period of its existence the New Zealand
Association could command 42 votes in the House of Commons.
[31] Lord Glenelg did not on this occasion urge as an objection that
New Zealand was not a part of the British Empire.
[32] After the Association was formed into a Company Lord Howick
became one of its most ardent supporters.
[33] A select Committee of the House of Lords was set up in 1838 "to
enquire into the present state of the Islands of New Zealand and of
the expediency of regulating the settlement of British subjects
therein."
[34] "It was only within the last three months that I received a
letter from Paisley, stating that if a colony were formed in New
Zealand on the principles laid down in our publication in that
neighbourhood alone there were a hundred respectable persons--indeed I
am not sure the expression was not 'respectable families,' but I have
not the letter with me--who would emigrate immediately" (Dr. Hinds
before the House of Lords Committee). Mr. G. S. Evans, LL.D., in his
evidence stated there was an Association in the West of Scotland
consisting of 200 members, and another in the Carse of Gowrie
consisting of at least 100 persons, all anxious to emigrate to New
Zealand.
[35] _Vide_ his letter to Lord Durham, December 29, 1837.
[36] "I was the principal founder of the Company and the principal
Managing Director from the time of its formation till the summer of
1846, allowing for intervals of absence occasioned by illness and
other occupation at a distance from England. My incapacity changed the
whole character of the direction of the New Zealand Company's affairs,
which then fell into the hands of a few persons in whose minds sound
principles of colonisation and colonial government were as nothing
compared with pounds, shillings, and pence."--Evidence of E. G.
Wakefield before a New Zealand Parliamentary Committee on New Zealand
Company's debt--Sessions 1 and 2.
[37] For the text of the above Memorandum I am indebted to Mr. R.
M'Nab, who copied it from the original in the Record Office, London.
Mr. Stephen, who wrote the Memorandum, was, at the time, an officer of
the Church Missionary Society.
[38] Lord Normanby became Colonial Secretary on February 8, 1839.
[39] _Vide_ his letter to Lord Palmerston, December 12, 1838.