Gosset to Fortescue (Parliamentary Under-Secretary)

I have just returned to Town. Your communication of
the 21st followed me in the country which will account
for my delay in acknowledging it.

2. To comply with its command, to repair to British
Columbia by August the 31st, (could I start this instant),
would be an impossibility, the journey outwards being one
of seven weeks, but as I deemed it my duty to make no secret
at the Colonial Office of not wishing to return to B. Colbia
in the position of Treasurer, it was perhaps termed with a
view to elicit my intentions in official form.

3. Permit me to assure you, that in due deference to
your right to the earliest information, such official
intimation would have been furnished by me many months since,
had I not understood that my presence in England was deemed
useful to the Colony, and I could not have ensured it, had
I once placed myself at the command of another Department.

4. I make these observations to remove the impression,
somewhat indicated by your letter, that I have hitherto
protracted my stay under equivocal pretences.

5. There can however be offered no better evidence of
the sincerity of my previous observation, that extended leave
was but (pro forma) sought under the supposition of my
attendance in London being still required by His Grace the
Duke of Newcastle, than that, now informed to the contrary,
I hasten respectfully to tender the resignation of my
appointment.

6. It is with unfeigned regret that I contemplate a
severance of my connection with the Colonial Office; and, I
should seem ungracious were I not to state the circumstances
which lead towards it.

7. By revised Treasury regulations, I am (as a second
Officer of Royal Engineers) compelled, ere two years more
expire, to elect between, either return to my Corps, or
resignation of my military prospects: and, my present
appointment in British Columbia would not enable me to
incur the unavoidable expense of a journey out & back within
that time (an outlay of 800£ to 1000£ for a family), still
less justify me in relinquishing the rights of nearly 25
years service under Her Majesty.

8. I may have lately been persuaded by friends, that with
my knowledge of British Columbia & Vancouver Island, I might
have hoped, in some higher position than my present one,
to have made my adhesion to the Colonial service, permanent;
and that, my experience of the Ceylon model of Government,
now to be adopted in British Columbia, might have proved
useful to a colony, in whose progress, as one of it's early
pioneers through four rough years of hardships, I cannot but
be interested, and whose development, under the form of
Government suggested by me in a despatch to Governor Douglas
so long back as 1859 and lately pressed upon your notice,
I may, not unnaturally, have entertained a desire to influence.

9. As in Ceylon, where such conduct was encouraged and
approved by its experienced Governor Sir Henry Ward, whose
good opinion it was my great fortune to gain, and hold to
the day of death; so, in British Columbia, I have always
always endeavoured faithfully, and without fear of consequences
to myself, to perform my official duties, and, which is not
without its influence in a distant colony where the incorporation
of English customs has a powerful value not always appreciated,
to fill my position as a Government Officer—socially, avoiding
indecent greed or undignified speculations & relying only upon
the Public Service for reward—I trust therefore that my
services abroad have not merited the disapprobation of Her
Majesty's Secretary of State for the Colonies.

10. In lately expressing my reflections upon the affairs
of British Columbia & Vancouver Island, although not insensible
to the fact that in doing so I may have been deemed troublesome
and pragmatical, I have acted solely from a conviction that it
was my duty to give your Department information, and, in pursuit
of desired ends I have sought only access to your (i.e. Col
Office) ear and declined the proffered aid of Members, in
Parliament—careful, as I trust I showed myself even in my
communications to you, to stir up as little dirt as possible
in remedying evils.

11. So much egotism it has been repugnant to me to utter,
but some explanation seemed due to myself, in case I may
have been misrepresented or misunderstood, for, if I am to
quit the Colonial Service, I should desire to do so, not under
a cloud, but carrying with me an agreeable impression of the
light in which my conduct may have been regarded.

12. I avail myself of this, perhaps my last opportunity,
gratefully to acknowledge the courtesy & kindness with which
I have been treated by the Colonial Office ever since I
accepted service under it in August 1855, and I request that
you will do me the favor of laying this letter before His
Grace the Duke of Newcastle to whom I feel indebted for many
evidences of his consideration, and whom I would in conclusion
most respectfully thank.