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coming, as now, simply to tell the colony that they cannot go any further unless further concessions are conceded, is calculated to raise opposition on the part of Parliament, and to paralyse its efforts after the large concessions which have been made. 19. What are the concessions made ? —I have recounted them so often. 20. Will you kindly state them again ? —First of all you had the alternate blocks. 21. I am speaking of the present contract?— Well, the abolition of these blocks. 22. That is not the present contract ? —You had one contract. That contract was varied. 23. Are there any other concessions beyond the proposals made to the present Government ? —I say you cannot go on if the concessions are made. Wo were informed if the conditions previously asked for were granted there would be no difficulty whatever. Now, you come again with the present proposals, which I told you were, in my opinion, fallacious. You call what you want a 3-per-cent. nominal guarantee; I say it is an actual guarantee, and Ido not concur with the basis on which it is made. 24. Are you aware that the proposals are subject only to the company finding the money ?—Of course I understand that. But you have put in proposals based on receipts so much under different headings, then you put expenditure at so much under different headings, and then the colony is asked to concur that the receipts are correct, and the expenditure is correct, and it is to give a guarantee. Then you go Home and ask for the money, and say this is on a Government guarantee. Those are your proposals. The receipts may or may not be correct. Ido not know who gave the figures, but I should like the Committee to compare the figures with the figures that I will put hi later on. You say the expenditure is so much, and that Mr. Maxwell agrees with the estimates. I say if Mr. Maxwell gave us the estimates we should be able to place greater reliance on them. Then you say we will allow you to appoint an officer to see that the works are being economically managed, and the accounts kept correctly, so that nothing may be charged that should not be charged. In the first place, I say that you would require to have a highly-paid officer whose cost would be added to the 3 per cent., and I say it is simply impossible for one officer to do the work. All these things, in my opinion, show that, instead of being a nominal guarantee, it would be an actual guarantee. That is my opinion of the guarantee system. lam not in favour of guarantees of this kind; and I may tell you this, that I am speaking the mind of the House on the matter. I remember the Meiggs proposal of a guarantee system, and if you look at the debate in reference to that you will see that the general opinion of Parliament was against a guarantee system. 25. Was not the Meiggs guarantee for interest as well as capital ?—Yes; but it was still a guarantee. It is the principle I object to. 26. This is not a guarantee of principal, but a guarantee of interest ?—Of course, these proposals are more rational and reasonable, but at the same time there is the principle of guarantee. I am only speaking for myself, and I simply say that my experience has taught me that guarantees are dangerous things. 27. What experience have you had of guarantees ?—I have had a little privately and some publicly. 28. Will you give some of your experience?—My experience is that they are always considered nominal when you give them, but I have always found them to be actual when you come to the fact; and I think many others have come to the same conclusion. 29. You are speaking of personal guarantees ? —I say that publicly and privately it comes to the same thing. 30. But if I tell you the figures are correct, and that therefore as far as possible there is no such contingency of loss ?—You may say they are absolutely correct, but you base them on an estimated tonnage. Suppose something happened to block you for a considerable period, then the receipts would not come in, for you would not carry the goods or the passengers. That would disorganise your finance, and you would, perhaps, lose three-fourths of the year. If you lost, say, £15,000, it would come off the guarantee. 31. You seom to have forgotten the trust fund to meet contingencies of that kind ?—Your trust fund is £300,000. It is finance, and that is all you can say of it. 32. Will you define what you mean?—lt is very good on paper. 33. If you have a trust fund in hand to guard against contingencies, is it not against ordinary possibility that the Government will be called upon to pay ? —There is so much risk. Suppose you carry coal; the consumption of coal will increase; but suppose some steamship company said, "We are not going to let the East and West Coast Railway take the coal; we will bring boats and facilitate its carriage." You could not compete with them ; and if you did not carry the coal the guarantee comes in again. You have all these things to meet, and the risk falls on the Government. 34. Is it not a fact that when the company was formed a Eoyal Commission had reported on a certain traffic on the railway, and that by evidence produced by the Government, and Government officers, the company were induced to undertake the construction of the railway. Do you now infer that the Government wish to withdraw from the evidence taken at that time ?—I say the Government do not withdraw from anything. The estimates of receipts from the carriage of goods were based on a normal state of things; but the company took the risk of an abnormal state of things occurring. Now you come to the Government and say, Give us a guarantee. That is the difference. 35. Are you not assuming conditions which you never assumed could have existed when you induced the company, on this evidence, to take up this line ? —Certainly not. If you look at the evidence there you will find it was discussed that you could not carry on against steamboats; and the margin of the guarantee is not 50,000 tons a year. I say the Government took no risk. This is the normal state of things, and they give the returns taken at the time.