No. 23, Miscellaneous

1. I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your Despatch No
38 dated 16th September 1864 on the subject of the Crown Lands and
Civil List of this Colony.

2. I have deferred entering upon this subject in the hope of the
Legislative Assembly arriving at some definite and reasonable
decision upon it.

3. The Legislative Assembly was in Session when I assumed the
Government of this Colony, and a Select Committee occupied in taking
evidence as to "the present condition of the Crown Lands with
reference to the proposal of Her Majesty's Secretary of State for the
Colonies dated 15th June 1863 to hand over the Crown Lands to the
Legislature."

4. Their proceedings extended over a period of eight months and I
now transmit a copy of the Minutes of Proceedings of the Select
Committee accompanied by a Report dated 14th June 1864 and
Resolutions on the same subject dated June 29th 1864.

5. The manuscript of some of these documents was very imperfect and
there was consequently great delay in having them printed.

6. With these documents before you it is unnecessary for me to
trouble you with any lengthened remarks upon them. No analysis of
mine would make them intelligible where many Members of the Assembly
sought to prove opposite and different things.

7. I do not attach much weight to the Evidence which has not been
taken on oath, and it is difficult to form a sound opinion upon a
matter surrounded by such complications and conflicting statements.

8. There are nevertheless some extraordinary facts connected with
the sale and management of the Crown Lands disclosed in the Minutes
of Proceedings before the Select Committee which I apprehend are new
to Her Majesty's Government.

9. If the question is to be re-opened, and the Indenture between the
Crown and the Hudson's Bay Company dated 3rd February 1862,
reconsidered or questioned, it can only be done effectually and
fairly by a Commission appointed to inquire on the spot, where books,
papers, maps, and evidence could be produced, and in the event of a
new Chief Justice being appointed he might fitly be entrusted with
such a duty. I am not however in a position to recommend that course
if the question can be settled and an agitation detrimental to the
best interests of the Colony put an end to by any other means.

10. I have endeavoured by every means at my disposal to effect a
settlement of this question, but in vain. There are various and
conflicting interests which under the existing form of Government in
this Colony are wholly beyond my control. I have no public officer
in the Assembly to advocate the real interests of the Colony or to
correct misapprehensions and even misstatements which have entered
largely into the numerous debates which have taken place.

11. The question will again shortly come before the Legislative
Assembly in connection with the annual Estimates and salaries of
officers which with the exception of that of the Colonial Secretary
I have declined to charge against Crown Revenue till the conditions
proposed in the Secretary of State's Despatch, 15th June 1863, are
accepted or modified by your authority. I will communicate the
result when arrived at.