8 The N.Z. Journal of Science and Technology. [Feb. 
So far as university education was concerned, there had been an attempt 
to utilize secondary schools as University colleges, but this scheme had not 
been successful, hence the appointment of the Commission. Nothing was 
done under the report of this Commission until 1882, when the Auckland 
University College Act was passed, and provision made for the endowment 
of a college situated in the City of Auckland. In 1887 I proposed to 
Parliament a Bill to found a University college in the City of Wellington. 
The main provision in that Bill which made it different from the statutes 
that had been passed to found the other University colleges was that it 
proposed that all the scientific work of the Government should be done by 
the Wellington University College, and that it should have the control of 
the Geological Survey and the Government Chemical Department, both in 
the Geological and Meteorological Departments ; that the Colonial Museum 
should be vested in the college and placed under its management; and 
that as the scientific wants of the country increased they were to be supplied 
by this Wellington University College. At that time the Government was 
paying a considerable amount of money for geological survey, for public 
analysis of soils, &c., and also providing for research. The whole of the 
scientific work of the Government was to be handed over to the Wellington 
University College. In order that the Government should have some 
control of this college the Minister of Education was to be ex officio a 
member of the Council. There was to be a Warden—in some universities 
he is termed the Principal, or Rector—and the Warden of the college was 
to be Sir James Hector, who was the Director of Geological Survey in New 
Zealand. He was to hold office as Warden during the time he held the 
office of Director of the Geological Survey, but afterwards the Warden 
was to be elected by the Professorial Board. The Museum and the land 
on which it was situated were to be handed over to the college. There was 
nearly an acre of land. The college was also to have the colonial University 
endowments that had been set aside in the Provincial Districts of Wellington 
and Taranaki, consisting in all of 14,000 acres of land, and any funds that 
had accrued from rents from those endowments were also to be paid to the 
college. The college was also to obtain £1,500 a year for seven years for 
the college maintenance, and the moneys usually voted for scientific pur¬ 
poses by the Government were to be handed over to the college for 
expenditure. 
The idea of this University college was that it was to be mainly a 
scientific institution, and to undertake all the scientific work that had 
been and was likely to be done by the Government. It was thought 
that this proposition would be economical—the colony requiring economy 
in its then state of finance—whilst at the same time it would give 
opportunities for youths in the Wellington Provincial District to obtain 
university education. 
The £1,500 allotted was to be spent mainly on the arts side, and it was 
expected that on the scientific side the votes given annually by the Govern¬ 
ment for the museums, geological staff, &c., and the rents from the endow¬ 
ments, would be sufficient to meet the expenses of a modern University 
college with science as its predominant feature. 
This Bill was passed by the House of Representatives by a considerable 
majority, but it was defeated in the Legislative Council. A strange fact is 
that of the members present in the Council at the vote which shelved the 
Bill there is only one member alive, and he was in favour of the Bill going 
on. All the rest have passed away. This being so, it is not seeming that 
