B.—No. 5.

10

PAPERS RELATIVE TO CLAIMS AND COUNTER-CLAIMS

I do not doubt that, in reporting to our several Governments, we shall find no difficulty in affording to each other the opportunities necessary for enabling them to arrive at a clear understanding of the whole subject. I do not think that any other point in your memorandum under reply requires immediate notice. J. RICHARDSON.

Sub-Enclosure 6 to Enclosure in No. 4. (No. 21.) Memorandum by Commissary-General Jones, C.B. Wellington, 6th October, 1866. To the Hon. Major Richardson, M.E.C.— Your memorandum of this date (No. 3) has just been handed to me. I have endeavoured throughout our communication to be clear and explicit on all points, and I have confidently attributed similar desires on your part towards myself. But there is one point you have (perhaps unintentionally) left still doubtful, and that is whether or not you intend to let me know the opinions you form upon the several items of service in my accounts, and the reasons upon which you found those opinions. Your reply in the memorandum under consideration is so ambiguous that I trust you will pardon the extra trouble I am giving you in thus pressing for an explicit statement of your intentions. H. Stanley Jones, Commissary-General.

Sub-Enclosure 7 to Enclosure in No. 4. (No. 4.) Memorandum by Major Richardson. Wellington, 6th October, 1866. To Commissary-General Jones, C.B.— In reply to your Memorandum (No. 21) of this day's date, I have only to say that I will communicate to you the opinions I form upon the several items of service, and the reasons upon which I form these opinions. I differ from you in the opinion you have formed as to the ambiguity of my language in the former Memorandum to which you allude. It was intended to be explicit, and I see no reason to doubt that it might have been so regarded. J. Richardson.

Suh-Enclosure 8 to Enclosure in No. 4. Memorandum by Major Eichardson. Wellington, March 30th, 1367. To Commissary General Jones, C. B.— It appearing from certain documents which have been submitted to me that certificates in favour of contractors for drawback of duty on groceries supplied to the Imperial Troops have been issued by the Commissariat several times over on account of the same rations, and that the Customs have paid the drawback on each certificate; and it being probable that there may be other cases of a similar kind, I would feel obliged if you would favor me with a return of the actual number of rations issued by the various contractors in each month and at each station since the Ist January, 1864, in order that it may be ascertained what each contractor was entitled to for drawback for rations supplied at each of the stations, so as to enable me to ascertain the exact amount of overpayments which have been made. I may mention that the Collector of Customs at Auckland asked on the 19th of October last to be supplied with such a return, but, up thel2th instant, he had not been furnished with it, though a return was sent of the gross number of rations received from contractors in the Auckland Provinces in the year 1863, and on the 14th January, another was given of the total number of rations received in the Waikato District, from Ist January, 18(54, to 31st August, 1866. It is evident that such returns cannot be used for purposes of comparison. J. RICHARESON.

[A Memorandum by Commissary-General Jones, of the 30th March, was sent to England, and no copy has been kept.]

Bub-Enclosuro 9 to Enclosure in No. 4. Memorandum by Major Richardson. To Commissary-General Jones, C.B. I duly received your memorandum of Saturday, the 30th ultimo, on my return home in the afternoon of the same day, and I take the earliest opportunity of replying to it, as it appears to me that you misapprehend the circumstances under which we entered on the duty entrusted to us by our respective Governments. Had I thought that our unreserved conversation of that morning alluded to by you would have been so pointedly referred to in an official memorandum, I should either have entered more fully into