ioi8 AUSTRALASIA ILLUSTRATED. 



led by William King, with some six hundred followers, migrated from Waikanae, Cook 

 Strait, to Taranaki, locating themselves on the south bank of the Waitara River, which 

 had been from time immemorial their ancestral home. They had gone southwards earlier 

 in the century by pressure from the Waikato tribes, and the desire to obtain land in the 

 vicinity of Cook Strait, where the whale-ships brought guns and ammunition for barter. 



After the Governor had arrived in New Zealand he received official advice that a 

 sum of ten thousand pounds had been placed to his credit, to be applied to the 

 purchase of native lands for the purposes of colonization. He was thus enabled to 

 secure sites for the settlements of Otago and Canterbury, that were founded in the 

 years 1848 and 1850 respectively. Otago was settled by the members of the Free 

 Church of Scotland, and on the 22nd of March and the i5th of April, 1848, the first 

 emigrant vessels, the JoJin Wicklijfc and the Philip Lang, arrived at Port Chalmers. 

 Three vessels, with the first body of settlers, under the auspices of the Canterbury 

 Association, the Charlotte Jane, the Randolph and the Sir George Seymour, arrived in 

 Lyttleton Harbour on the i6th and i /th of December, 1850, and were received by the 

 Governor, who was awaiting their arrival. 



In July, 1850, the New Zealand Company gave their Charter of Incorporation back 

 to the Crown. No clear statement of its financial affairs has ever been published, but 

 the Company appears to have received nearly a million of money, all of which was 

 spent save some thirty thousand pounds, and to have been indebted to the share-holders 

 and the Government at the time of relinquishing their Charter, to the extent of some 

 five hundred thousand pounds. The sum of two hundred and thirty-six thousand pounds 

 owing to the Government by the Company was cancelled, and two hundred and sixty-eight 

 thousand three hundred and seventy pounds was made a charge on the lands of the colony. 



POLITICAL PROGRESS. 



In 1852, a representative Constitution was granted to New Zealand under the 

 Imperial Act, 15 and 16 Viet. c. 72. It was just about this time that the agitation in 

 the same direction on the part of the mother-colony showed signs of being crowned 

 with success. The long-continued and reiterated representations of the colonists on the 

 subject had at length begun to produce some effect on the Colonial Office, and public 

 opinion in England was being rapidly educated up to recognizing the right of people at 

 the antipodes to govern themselves and make laws to suit their own local circumstances. 

 Sir John Packington, the Colonial Secretary, was mainly guided by Sir George Grey's 

 recommendations in framing the New Zealand Constitution. Six provinces were created 

 Auckland, Wellington, Nelson, Canterbury, Otago and Taranaki the Governor defining 

 their boundaries. Superintendents were to be elective, but the Governor had the power 

 to veto the Bills passed in the Provincial Assemblies. The first election took place in 

 1853. The General Assembly was to consist of the Governor, a House of Representa- 

 tives, composed of thirty-seven Members, and a Legislative Council, to consist of fourteen 

 persons, the right to nominate all of whom was vested in the Crown. 



Sir George Grey distinguished his term of rule by remarkable zeal in the public 

 service. He arrived in the colony at thirty-three years of age, full of activity, and fresh 

 from his experience as Governor of South Australia. He had already earned a name 



