Appendix.

I am exceedingly anxious to call your attention, as a Member of the Committee of the Church Missionary Society, to the present position of the case of Archdeacon Henry Williams.

I apprehend that the Committee are under the impression that there is no difference between them and the friends of Archdeacon H. Williams in regard to facts, but that we dissent from the conclusions which they have drawn from the facts. Were this the case. I, for one, should never have engaged in the controversy, for I should have been disposed to submit my judgment to theirs. What we complain of is, that the Committee have been misinformed us to the facts, the very facts which have mainly influenced them in the conclusion at which they have arrived.

For instance. (1.) They have been told (Reply of Secretaries to Mr. Marsh's letter, p. 3), that so early as the year 1830, the Committee had refused to sanction 200 acres of land for each child of a Missionary on its attaining the age of 15. But they ought at the same time to have been told that this refusal had nothing whatever to do with the amount of land which a Missionary might purchase from his own prictate funds; it was simply, (as appears from the account of the transacton to be found in Appendix v. to the Society's Report for 1839—40, pp. 160—162) a refusal to grant so much land from the Society's funds in lieu of the final allowance to the children of the Missionaries.

(2.) They have been told (Reply p. 4) that they had already dismissed Mr. Fairburn for retaining in his possession an undue amount of land. Whereas Mr. Fairburn's separation from the Society arose from a totally different cause, the nature of which I have page 17 explained on the authority of Archdeacon W. Williams, in a paper which I lately forwarded to the Secretaries to be laid before the Committee.

(3.) They have been told (Reply, p. 6) that Archdeacon Henry Williams purchased his lauds subsequent to the year 1840, when the Committee expressed their strong objection to such purchases. It has since been proved that the Archdeacon's latest purchase was made in 1837.

(4.) The impression has been conveyed (ibid) that the Committee had no knowledge of the extent of the Archdeacon's land purchases, except from Mr. Marsh's statement. But a full account of the extent of those land purchases, together with a rindication by the Committee of the Archdeacon's conduct therein, appears in the Appendix to the Report for 1844-45.

(5.) They were told by the Governor, that the Missionaries could not be pul into possession of their lands without a large expenditure of British blood and money. Whereas in no one instance were they disturbed in the possession of them.

(6.) They were told by the Governor and Lord Grey, that no British subject had a legal claim to more than 2,560 acres of land, and that the land grants of Capt. Fitzroy, so far as they exceeded that amount, were invalid; whereas the Supreme Court of New Zealand decided on June 24, 1848, that the land grants of Capt. Fitzroy were good in law.

(7.) They have been told (Reply, p. 6) that the Committee did not sooner deal with the case of Archdeacon II. Williams, 1st, because they "were very imperfectly informed of these acquisitions of land," and 2ndly, because "the legality of the extended grants being afterwards disputed, they suspended their interference until the result of the Government measures for setting them aside was asccrtaitied." Now in regard to the 1st of these assertions, the Appendix to the Report for 1844-45, shews that instead of being imperfectly informed, they possessed the most exact information; and in regard to the 2nd, strange to say, the Committee in London, passed resolutions June 28th, 1818, based, as Mr. Venn stated in his letter accompanying them, on the supposition that the Governor's page 18 view of the law was correct, three days after the Supreme Court of New Zealand, had declared that it was erroneous!

(8.) They were informed by by Bishop that Archdeacon Henry Williams had made a promise to abide by his proposal, and that he afterwards withdrew that promise. But the Bishop in making this statement, suppressed a most material purl of the Archdeacon's paper, from which it appears that the Archdeacon's promise was consequent upon a promise made by the Bishop himself, which promise the Bishop failed to keep. The Archdeacon's paper in this garbled form, has been inserted by the Secretaries in their "Heply," p. 12, and is there made the foundation of the like charge against him of breach of promise.

I trust it will be understood that I charge no one with intentional misrepresentation: I only maintain that the statements to which I have referred are erroneous. It can hardly be necessary to shew that these allegations were material, and must have had a great influence on the minds of the members of the Committee. I was present at a Meeting of the Committee on March 8th, 1852, when several members spoke on the subject. One urged Mr. Fairburn's case as binding them in justice to act in the same way by the Archdeacon, Another assured me that the Committee when they passed their Resolutions in 1817, had no conception of the extent of the Archdeacon's land. And another commented very severely on the obscurity of his statements in regard to its extent; so little were they aware that the Appendix to the Report for 1844-45 contained accurate information respecting it. The breach between the Committee and the Archdeacon, may be traced entirely to the error into which the Committee were led concerning the legality of his title to more than 2,560 acres of land. In February, 1847, they disclaimed "all power or desire to interfere with the private property of their Missionaries only requiring them to keep in their own possession no more land than the Governor and Bishop jointly might see fit, and "leaving to their own decision the mode of disposing of' the remainder. In June, 1848, they peremptorily required the Archdeacon, on pain of dismissal, to renew his consent to the proposal of the Bishop, namely that he should accept of 2,560 acres, and that the surplus should be restored to the native page 19 owners. Whence this difference between the resolutions? In 1847 they believed the Archdeacon had a legal right to the whole of the lands for which he had received grants from Capt. Fitzroy; in 1848, they believed that he had no legal right to more han the 2,560 acres offered by the Governor. This may be proved undeniably, by Mr. Venn's letter to Archdeacon H. Williams accompanying the Resolutions of June 27, 1848. "It appears that you dispute the alleged illegality of the extended grants of Governor Fitzroy; but after the declaration of their illegality by Earl Grey, the Committee feel themselves bound to treat them in that light, and that there should be no hesitation on your part in giving them up to the Government, to be disposed of as the Government think right. At the time at which the Parent Committee adopted its Resolutions, 22nd February, 1847, they presumed that the extended grants were legal; the contrary decision of the Colonial Office, had not then been pronounced, as it has since been, against their validity."

I think I have now said enough, and more than enough, to shew how much the Committee have been influenced by these misstatements; and how, I ask, can it be expected that the friends of the Archdeacon should acquiesce in their decision, when they know them to have been wholly misinformed in respect to the facts on which they based that decision? My confidence in the justice of the Committee is my excuse for troubling yon with this letter.