H.—loa

26

613. If it had been known to them at the time Brewer's letter was received that it was proposed to reconvey the freehold of' a portion of the land to Kissling, would it have made any difference in the resolutions arrived at by the Board ?—I do not think the Trustees would have consented to such a thing under any circumstances whatever. Certainly, I would not. 614. Mr. Hesketh.] As to this letter of Waymouth's :do you think this document was before the Board?—l am inclined to think it was. 615. If the document was not before the Board, are you quite sure that the recommendation was made known to the Board ? —There are two recommendations in that: do you mean all of it ? 616. The two interests? —The values Waymouth assigns to the interest of the leaseholder and the interest of the Trustees was undoubtedly considered by the Board. 617. Did you approve of the amount of £632 ?—Yes. 618. Did you go into a calculation?—Yes. 619. When you went into that calculation, did it proceed on the basis of £6,000 being the vaiue at that time, or £6,000 being the value forty-eight years hence?—At that time, of course. 620. I see in this document which has been produced this morning that Waymouth says, " Present value of the purchase-money (£6,000) at the date of the expiry of your lease —namely, forty-eight years"? —The words "present value" is a technical expression. It means what you would pay down for a sum of money due at a certain future time. 621. How did you understand this statement of Waymouth's—" £6,000 at the date of the expiry of your lease—namely, forty-eight years " ? Did you understand this to be the value on the 23rd September ?—Yes ; on deferred payment. 622. At the time the Board decided to leave the question of compensation to the Government, did you know of any arrangement whereby Kissling was to get back the freehold?—No. 623. Did you at that time know of any arrangement by which Kissling^ was- to pay more than the £632 compensation if the Board demanded it ?—Certainly not. Dr. Giles: Not merely if the Board demanded it, but if the Government had to pay it. 624. Mr. Hesheth.] If the Government had to pay it, or the Board were not satisfied to receive £632 ?—ln any form whatever, nothing was ever before the Board about those two things. 625. Would it have made any difference if you had known that Kissling had undertaken to pay any sum over £632 ?—Undoubtedly it would. 626. Can you tell us, please, what was the precise reason for leaving the amount of compensation to the Government ?—I can only tell you what influenced my mind. I feel this : that the present legal owners —the Trustees —of that land hold a public estate, and that it is an educational endowment: that is one reason. And il believe that some day or another the Government will enter upon the land of these educational trusts and use them for the purposes of education in a broad way. I believe that that weighed with me somewhat. And, further, this consideration weighed with me : we held this particular piece of land ; it was given by the Government itself for a particular public purpose; and they come and say, "We want this land for another public purpose." It was not for us as reasonable men to stand in their way on the one hand, or to make them pay an excessive price on the other hand. That was my belief. I raised those views at the Board —I cannot say whether they had any weight or not —when we arrived at the resolution that was passed. 627. Was it speaking from a sense of security that the Government would do justly ?—Undoubtedly. I think, as a matter of honour, we were bound to leave it to the Government. I should like to say that I should not deal in that way with the whole of that estate. Those portions of the estate given, for instance, by Sir William Martin or Bishop Selwyn, I should resist the Government in taking them for any purpose to the very utmost, unless they replaced them with an equal amount of land somewhere else. I disapprove of selling part of the endowment under any circumstances whatever. 628. Dr. Giles.] You mean, you make a difference between land given by private donors and the Government? —Undoubtedly. I think they are sacred trusts, and they should be kept as land. 629. Mr. Hesketh.] Did you know of any expression of a wish by the Board to dispose of or to sell the land? —No; I was very much astonished at that. I have never had any knowledge of that. 630. Had such an idea ever been entertained, to your knowledge, at any of the Board meetings ? —It W as certainly not entertained at any of the Board meetings since I have been a member. 631. Did you know you had any power to resist the Government in taking the land ?—No ; I certainly did not. Ido not think any member of the Board had that knowledge. I should have felt, and I believe the other members of the Board would have felt, that resisting the Government was merely taking steps to extort from them whatever you could get. 632. You knew that Kissling had instituted legal proceedings, and that those proceedings were put an end to by the passing of a statute ?—I had heard that in a general way, without understanding the details of it. 633. Supposing the Board had known that they could have resisted the Government, and had also known the other fact, that the law required the Government to offer any surplus land to the Trust Board, do you think that would have altered the action of the Board ?—So far as the first question is concerned, for my part I should not, except perhaps going the length of saying,-" I do not think you want five acres of land for a fort." I think we might have made that representation to them. *s 634. If the Board had known that under the statute of 1882 the Government were bound to offer any surplus land back to the person from whom they took it—if they had known that—would it have altered the action of the Board? —I do not see how it could have altered it. 635. Would you have remained passive when you became aware afterwards that the Government were going to give the land to Kissling?—ln that case we should have felt all the more secure.