264 ADVENTURE IN NEW ZEALAND. Chap. X. 
territory and of the county of Eden had not yet been 
tested by the plough ; and the second year's wheat 
crop of the " mountains, marshes, and fens of Cook's 
" Strait," was beginning to look very promising for 
the harvest. 
A deputation had waited on the Governor with the 
memorial ; but his Excellency was too ill to see any 
one, and even unable to affix his signature to a written 
answer. 
This was indeed his death-illness ; for on the 28th 
of September, the Government brig, bringing the 
Chief Justice to hold a sitting of the Supreme Court 
at Wellington, bore the news of the Governor's death 
on the 10th of that month, at Auckland. 
Any recapitulation of the manner in which he had 
discharged his public duties would be here misplaced. 
Fulsome and unmerited praise is no graceful oflfering 
even to the memory of the dead ; and censure, how- 
ever just, must refrain from opening its stern lips 
when passing over the grave. 
In the virtues of private life, the first Governor of 
New Zealand was allowed by all to have been exem- 
plary. He was carried off by the same harassing and 
enfeebling disease, of which the first symptoms had 
appeared on his earliest arrival to assume his office. 
Let the blame of the evils which were gathered for 
the country during his reign fall on the worthless 
advisers who did not scruple to presume on the weak 
state of his bodily and mental faculties. 
No unseemly exultation was manifested at Wel- 
lington. This was prevented by the same self-respect 
which had induced the inhabitants to express, in so 
firm and yet decent a manner, their disapprobation 
of the Governor's acts when he was present among 
them. 
