A.—No. 1.

DESPATCHES PROM THE GOVERNOR OF NEW ZEALAND TO THE SECRETARY OF STATE.

No. 1. Copy of a DESPATCH from Governor Sir G-. F. Bqwen, G.C.M.G., to the Right Hon. the Earl of Kimberley. (No. 72.) Government House, Wellington, My Lord, — New Zealand, 23rd August, 1871. It will be observed that, in the Speech with which I opened the present Session of the Colonial Parliament, there occurs the following paragraph:— " You will concur with me in regretting the death of the celebrated chief, Tamati " Waka Nene, alike distinguished for his loyalty to the Queen and for his " friendship with the English, and who, whether in peace or war, did more than " any other chief in New Zealand to establish the Queen's sovereignty and to " promote colonization." In their Addresses in Reply to my Speech, both Houses reciprocated the feeling thus expressed, and the same sentiment is universal throughout this Colony. The enclosed extract from one of the local journals shows the general tone of the comments in the Colonial Press. 2. Tamati Waka Nene, the principal chief and most famous warrior of the great clan of the Ngapuhis, the most powerful in New Zealand, died at the Bay of Islands on the 4th instant, lamented alike by the English and by the Maoris. His age must have been above eighty years, for he was an elderly man when he procured the cession of the sovereignty of these Islands to the British Crown, by the Treaty of Waitangi, in 1840, and when he fought so gallantly for the Queen in the Maori war of 1845-48. His last illness was short and not severe. A few weeks previously he had paid me a visit at Auckland, and he was then still erect in stature and unclouded in mind. His dying words were earnest exhortations to his countrymen to live in peace and union with the English; and his last wish was that he should be buried, not like the old heroes of his race in heathen times, in a remote cavern of the mountains, but in the English churchyard at the Town of Russell. This last wish was assented to by his family and his tribe, and the funeral took place on the 11th instant, according to the rites of the Church of England, to which Nene had been, for more than thirty years, a sincere and faithful convert. His coffin was borne to the grave by twelve of the leading colonists of the North, who have owed so much to his good offices, while his chief surviving clansmen and the Government officers of the district were pall-bearers. Had it been possible for me to leave Wellington during the Session of the Colonial Parliament, I should have gone myself to the Bay of Islands to pay the last mark of respect to him, " who, whether in peace or war, did more than any other chief in New " Zealand to establish the Queen's sovereignty and to promote colonization." 3. In my Despatch No. 51, of the 26th May, 1870, written after my second visit to the northern clans, I gave some description of the Ngapuhis and of their country, and mentioned that Tamati Waka Nene always spoke " with grateful " emotion of the silver goblet presented to him several years ago by the Queen, in " recognition of his services to the British Crown. As he has outlived his own " children, he has bequeathed it as an heirloom to the family of the late Mr. " Russell, a respectable settler at Hokianga, who married his niece, and there it " will be carefully preserved." I may now add that the Colonial Government will continue to the widow of Tamati Waka Nene the pension which was conferred many years since on her husband. 4. I described my first visit to the Bay of Islands in my Despatch No. 37, of the 4th May, 1868. On that occasion the chiefs and people of the North assembled

Wellington Independent, Aug. 10,1871