HISTORICAL REVIEW OF NEW ZEALAND. 



1005 



such land as the owners were willing to sell, but " the pre-emptive right of selection 

 over all lands;" and the practical interpretation put upon this by each of the Governors 

 except Fitzroy was that the Queen might have the refusal of all lands the natives were 

 willing to sell, and if that refusal were given no one else would be allowed to buy. 

 This was one of the chief grievances that underlay the Maori disaffection of the future. 



Soon after Captain Hobson arrived in Sydney, Bishop Broughton, the first Bishop 

 of Australia, wrote to the Rev. H. Williams, who held the greatest amount of influence 

 in the Church Mission, that upon the fullest consideration his judgment inclined him 

 very strongly to recommend Mr. Williams, and through him all other members of the 

 Mission, that 'their in- 

 fluence should be exer- 

 cised among the chiefs 

 to induce them to 

 make the desired sur- 

 render of sovereignty 

 to Her Majesty. Cap- 

 tain Hobson had, it 

 will be seen, the Mis- 

 sion influence on his 

 side, though the British 

 Resident, Mr. Busby, 

 held aloof from sign- 

 ing the address of con- 

 gratulation to his Ex- 

 cellency, and nearly all 

 the land-claimants resi- PLANTING THE BRITISH KLAC; AT AKAKOA. 



dent in Xew Zealand 



viewed the advent of the Governor with alarm. The Treaty was adopted in great part 

 all over the land by Mission influence, and the singular spectacle was manifested of 

 the Church and Wesleyan societies relinquishing the power it had cost them some 

 quarter of a million sterling to acquire. 



On the ist of March the Governor, while looking for a place to found a city to 

 be the seat of his future Government, became partially paralyzed in his right arm and 

 leg. The Rev. Henry Williams had, however, a clay or two before, shown him the 

 Tamaki District, and he tells us how " his Excellency was not long in pointing out the 

 spot, the present site of Auckland, seeing immediately its various advantages." On the 

 Governor becoming ill he was taken to the Bay of Islands, and in a Mission family 

 nursed back to health, while the missionaries took up the task of getting the Treaty 

 signed, which may be regarded as their handiwork ; for though the Governor's suite 

 were witnesses in many places to the signatures of the chiefs, it was the personal 

 influence of their teachers that made the natives rally round the officers sent them by 

 the Queen of England. On the: 2ist of May, 1840, the Governor proclaimed the 

 sovereignty of the Queen over the North Island of New Zealand by virtue of the Treaty 

 of Waitangi, and over the Middle and Stewart's Islands on the ground of discovery. 



