70 ADVENTURE IN NEW ZEALAND. Cbaf. HI. 
were intending to proceed in the Gem, we made appli- 
cation to Colonel Wakefield to allow a messenger to 
be sent after the Surveyor, with a request to delay the 
selection, if possible, until we should arrive, in case 
we should be detained beyond the time fixed by bad 
weather or any unforeseen accident. On the 22nd 
we left Port Nicholson, with a crowded cabin full of 
passengers. 
As Captain Hobson returned from Akaroa on the 
24th, and finally left Port Nicholson on the 29th, I 
shall here complete the narrative of what he did during 
his stay at Wellington. 
On his return, the negotiation as to the site of the 
" Nelson" settlement was renewed, and finally em- 
bodied in the shape of a correspondence between the 
Governor and the two Agents of the Company. It 
would be tedious to follow out the arguments adduced 
by both parties in support of their respective views. 
The Governor obstinately named Mahurangi as the 
fittest site ; the Agents of the Company suggested Port 
Cooper, of which Messrs. Daniell and Duppa had 
brought back so promising an account. But his 
Excellency declared with some warmth that he would 
" not colonize New Munster." He disapproved of Port 
Cooper in a conclusive but somewhat intem})erate de- 
spatch, in which he imputed motives of gambling and 
speculation to the Company's operations, in such lan- 
guage as to draw forth a pointed rebuke from Lord 
Stanley, who had become Colonial Minister by the 
time the correspondence reached England. Colonel 
Wakefield closed the negotiation by a despatch ex- 
plaining the motives which induced him to fall back 
upon the original permission to select any site within 
the territory claimed by the Company, and named 
Blind Bay as a spot likely to be approved of by 
Captain Wakefield on due examination. And he ended 
