F—No. 3

Monday, sth August, 1861. The Committee met pursuant to adjournment. Present :— Mr. Chairman of Committees, The Hon. the Speaker, The Hon. Mr. Crosbie Ward, Mr. Cracroft Wilson, C.B. " Creyke, Mr. Weld in the Chair. Minutes of last Meeting read and confirmed. Mr. C. W. Richmond further examined. 72. Chairman.] At the last meeting of the Committee you stated that you were willing if such were the wish of the Committee, to waive your right of being presumed to be innocent until proved to be guilty, and that, if such were the wish of the Committee, you were prepared to make a statement in disproof of the allegations adduced against you. Having since had the opportunity of becoming acquainted with the previous proceedings of the Committee, are you still prepared to take that course ? —I am content to make my statement at once, if the Committee pleases. But as I now learn that Dr. Featherston has stated that he will produce documents and bring forward witnesses in support of what he has said, I submit that it will be preferable in the first place to call upon him to produce those documents and bring up the witnesses. Dr. Featherston ought, I submit, to be summoned to attend the Committee during my statement, and the examination of any witness I may call, and I ought to be allowed to be present whilst Dr. Featherston states his case, and examines his witnesses. Mr. C. W. Richmond having replied, it was resolved that no further questions be put, but that Dr. Featherston be called upon to be in attendance with the documents and witnesses he wishes to produce before the Committee, To-morrow, at 10 a.m., precisely ; and that Mr. C. W. Richmond be similarly warned. Upon Motion of the Hon. the Speaker, the Committee adjourned until To-morrow, at 10 a.m.

Mr. C. W. Richmond 5 Aug., 1861.

Tuesday, 6th August, 1861. The Committee met pursuant to adjournment. Present: — Mr. Cracroft Wilson, C.8., Mr. Creyke, The Hon. Mr. Crosbie Ward, " Fitzherbert, Mr. Chairman of Committees, The Hon. the Speaker. Mr. Weld in the Chair. Dr. Featherston examined:. 73. Chairm,an.] The Committee wish you to place before them the documents referred, to by you, and if you desire to call any witnesses they are prepared to hear them. Dr. Featherston. I wish to put in a selection from Major Nugent's letter, Ist September, 1855, [Par. pps, July 1860, Enclosure 3, No. 68.] " On our arrival the whole of the Tribe assembled, and after one of the Chiefs had briefly stated the reports that they had heard, Wm. King, the principal Chief of the Waitara, arose and spoke for some time. I enclose the substance of his speech which I consider to be couched in fair and manly terms. On the conclusion of his speech I assured him that nothing was further from my intentions than to seize him treacherously in the night, and that I was, \>j my instructions, sent for the preservation of peace between Europeans and Natives, and that I would not take active, steps against him or any other Natives, unless the Europeans were interferred with, and finally I recommended him to remain quietly at his Pah. He complained much of the false statements which had been made against him in the local papers, and in proof that he has some ground for his complaint, I enclose herewith copies of the last numbers of the Taranaki Herald, which do not disguise the wish of some of the writers in that paper to drive Wm. King and his party away from the Waitara. Now independently of the illegality of such a proceeding, the people of the Tribe have exported produce this year to the amount of between £8000 and £9000, the greater part of the proceeds of which is spent in British manufactured goods, and consoquently indirectly these Natives contribute a considerable sum to the revenue of the country. I have no hesitation in saying that these people who in their position are useful and beneficial occupiers of the soil, have been on the point of being driven to become our declared enemies, and compelled to 4ake a position in the forest where all the discontented and troublesome characters would have assembled, and from which it would have required considerable force, and a large expenditure of monies, to drive them. In the meantime the out-settlers would have been harrassed by constant alarms, and New Plymouth might have been thrown back a generation. I think that for the

Br. Featherston 6 Aug., 1861

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CHARGE PREFERRED BY BR. FEATHERSTON