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Enclosure 1 in No. 4. Copy of Besolution passed by the Taranaki Waste Lands Board, at its Meeting on Monday, sth November, 1877. The Board, having gone over the draft agreement between His Excellency the Governor and Mr. A. C. Fookes, forwarded by the Under Secretary for Crown Lands, approves of the same as amended, and recommends the same for the sanction of His Excellency ; and respectfully requests that he wall be pleased to have the conditions of this special settlement gazetted before the new Land Act is brought into operation. Waste Lands Board Office, C. D. Whitcombe, New Plymouth, 6th November, 1877. Chief Commissioner.

Enclosure 2 in No. 4. Mr. A. Ceaceoft Fookes to the Commissionee of Ceown Lands, Taranaki. Sic, — New Plymouth, sth November, 1877. After having attended already at meetings of the Waste Lands Board upon two separate occasions, each time for the purpose of passing with the Board, clause by clause, a draft agreement for carrying out my special-settlement scheme, in terms agreed upon with the Board, and which terms the Government appeared satisfied with, I must say I was much surprised to hear of the arrival of another entirely new draft of agreement. I have, however, gone carefully through the latter clause by clause, endeavouring as far as possible to accept the new conditions included therein, but I find some new clauses to which I cannot possibly agree, as they are completely at variance with my plans for settling the block, which are already partly carried out. For instance, — Clause 8 stipulates for compulsory residence of all settlers, and certain improvements, whereas the understanding between the Board and myself all through has been that I expend the sum of £2,000 in opening up roads through the block (which roads also open up a large tract of country still at the Board's disposal, but at present unsaleable for want of such roads), such expenditure to stand in the place of all other improvements; and the compulsory residence condition seems to have been specially instituted to hamper me, as there is no such condition imposed upon any purchaser in this provincial district, whether for cash or on deferred payments. The proposals made by me to the Board specially excluded such conditions as compulsory residence or compulsory improvements, excepting the road expenditure, and these proposals were accepted by the Board, subject to the approval of the Government; and in a letter from the Under Secretary for Crown Lands to the Commissioner of Crown Lands, New Plymouth, dated 3rd of September, of which I hold a copy, appears the following : — " With reference to your letter of the 26th July, forwarding a resolution of the Waste Lands Board recommending that a block of 5,000 acres be set apart as a special settlement, at the instance of Mr. A. C. Fookes, I am directed by the Hon. the Secretary for Crown Lands to inform you that no objection will be made to the formation of tho proposed settlement, provided that the conditions are made more explicit," &c. Had the Government required that new conditions, such as compulsory residence, &c, should be imposed, I respectfully contend that those conditions should have been mentioned in that letter, upon which I should have at once withdrawn from tho scheme; but to begin now, after I have entered into a contract for road-work on the block, and entered into an agreement with a large number of settlers for the sale to them of sections in the block upon terms which prevent my acceding to such terms, to impose such conditions upon mo simply means to cause a breakdown of the whole plan of settlement, which, through my having gone so far, would be calamitous to me, and I think the Board will say also of the progress of settlement in the Provincial District of Taranaki. The expenditure on roads agreed to is equivalent to Bs. per acre over the whole 5,000 acres, which I consider sufficient compulsory expenditure, And the compulsory residence I particularly wished to avoid, as in proposing this settlement I was acting for more than one party who could not take up his abode in the bush, and yet he is, I consider, one of a class who should be allowed to acquire land. I will give an instance of one of those who has paid me a deposit on 200 acres : He is a gentleman holding a respectable situation, and in receipt of a fair salary. He washes his sons (two lads now thirteen and fifteen) to become farmers as soon as they leave school—say, in two or three years. He therefore takes up 200 acres upon the block I am in treaty for, intending, he writes me, to himself keep up the payments until the lads are able to continue them, and to clear and grass (by means of paid labour) as much of the land as his means will permit year by year, so as to give his sons a good clearing to start upon. Other instances are very similar. In conclusion, it appears to me as though I were myself suspected of some underhand plan for acquiring the whole of the block for myself, or something of that kind ; but I need hardly say I have no such plan, and am quite willing to find security to any required amount that I acquire no more than the 400 acres already agreed upon. My whole object having been from the first to the last to form a prosperous and bond fide settlement of small farmers upon the block. I have written this in. the hope that the Board may forward it to Wellington, with any remarks of their own hereon. The Chief Commissioner, I have, &c, Waste Lands Board, New Plymouth. A. Ceaceoft Fookes.

No. 5. Ageeement between His Excellency the Goveenoe and Mr. Fookes. Ageeement made this eleventh day of February, 1878, between His Excellency George Augustus Constantino, Marquis of Normanby, the Governor of the Colony of New Zealand, herein termed "the