08 ADVENTURE IN NEW ZEALAND. Chap. HI. 
bearing Mr. Tuckett as Chief Surveyor, and a whole 
staff of assistants and labouring men for the new 
settlement. 
Colonel Wakefield immediately applied to the Go- 
vernor, requesting him to point out a site fit for the 
purpose, according to the conditions agreed upon between 
liord John Russell and the Company. His Excellency 
suggested a place called Mahurangi, situated about 
fifty miles from the capital at Auckland ; offering a 
site for a town, and 50,000 acres of land immediately 
adjoining it, there ; and stating his confidence of ob- 
taining from the natives the remaining 150,000 acres 
requisite for the new colony in the valley of the 
Thames or the plains of the Pf^aipa. This arrange- 
ment would have been in direct contravention to the 
distinct provisions of the agreement, that the site 
should not be in the vicinity of the capital, lest the 
labourers of the new settlement should be induced to 
desert it, and lest it should interfere with the lands to 
be laid out in the neighbourhood of the capital itself. 
Mahurangi, moreover, was avowedly a very inferior 
harbour and district; and the Governor proposed to 
separate the suburban district of "Nelson" from its 
rural lands by a distance of 100 miles, with Auck- 
land in the centre of the only road Ijetween them. So 
transparent a device for peopling his own pet metro{)olis 
was easily seen through by Colonel Wakefield. But 
the negotiations on the subject were interrupted by the 
departure of the Governor on a trip to Akaroa, on 
the 11th of September. 
On the 18th, the Whitby arrived, bearing my lamented 
uncle Captain Arthur Wakefield of the Royal Navy, 
as Agent for Nelson, and the rest of his staff; and also 
Capfciin Liardet of the Royal Navy, as Agent for New 
Plymouth. 
