No. 10

I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your two despatches
Nos. 50 and 52 of the 12th and 14th July last enclosing correspondence
on the subject of the Bill authorizing a Loan of $90,000 which has
recently passed the Legislature of Vancouver Island.

I regret that the Assembly has neglected to provide ways and means
for the expenditure of the Colony, and has preferred adopting a Bill for
defraying the indispensable public Services by means of a Loan to be
raised at the high annual interest of 12 per cent.

Such a course appears to me to be objectionable in the highest
degree but it is to be hoped that after the union of Vancouver Island
and British Columbia, the united Government may devise some more
legitimate and fitting manner of providing for the public wants.