No. 5

I have been lately engaged with the aid and advice of Council, in
carrying into effect certain measures for the better Government of this
Colony, and I have now the honor of transmitting to your Grace, minutes
of those proceedings.

2. The first measure recorded in the Minutes, is the appointment
of the following persons as resident Magistrates in each of the several
Districts of this Colony, except Soke, where there is no person
qualified in point 
of character or education to fill the office vizt

Edward Edwards Langford

Thomas James Skinner

Kenneth McKenzie

Thomas Blenkhorn [Blinkhorn]

Pending Her Majesty's approval of those appointments I have issued
to each of those gentlemen severally, an acting commission, as
Magistrate, and Justice of the Peace, under which they will exercise the
Powers belonging to that office, until a regular Commission of the Peace
is received from England. *

3. Your Grace will observe by the accompanying Minutes, that we
have decided on dispensing, in the appointment of Justices of the Peace,
with the qualification as to estate, required by the Act of Parliament,
and that we have also authorised the said Magistrates to make a charge
for their services, in all civil cases only, at the rate of twenty
shillings a day, to be paid by the parties at issue, as part costs of
suit, the reason in both cases for doing so being the 
absence of a
wealthy class, who might afford to devote their time gratuitously to the
public service.

4. The measure that next occupied the attention of Council was the
imposition of a Licence duty on Inns, Ale and Beer Houses, within the
Colony.

The duty on such Licences will appear to your Grace, unusually
large, as compared with the Licence duties charged in England, but that
impression will be modified, when I inform your Grace, that neither
customs nor excise duties, nor any public burdens whatever are borne by
the Colonists of Vancouver's Island, and the keepers of Licenced houses,
nevertheless, make the exhorbitant charge of seven pence halfpenny, for
a half gill glass of inferior American Whiskey, which they purchase at
about five shillings a gallon.

By a return received from the Collector of this Port it appears
that the imports of spirituous liquors for the six months, ending on the
1st day of April last was 4143 Gallons. Of that quantity 1440
Gallons were imported by the Hudson's Bay Company 
for the use of their
Ships and establishments, and also for the occasional demands of Her
Majesty's Ships visiting this coast.

Taking off that quantity none of which is sold to residents of this
Colony, there remains 2703 Gallons of spirits, expended in three
Licenced Ale Houses at this place, giving a monthly expenditure of 474
Gallons, which valued at the retail price of sevenpence half penny the
glass, or Two pounds sterling a Gallon, gives the monthly sum of £948 or
£11.376, per annum, expended by the labouring classes in the purchase of
intoxicating drinks.

The Council coincided with me in opinion as to the propriety of
taxing the owners of those houses in the only possible way within our
power, and deverting a part of their ill gotten wealth to the benifit of
the Colony.

5. That measure was fiercely opposed by the whole body of
publicans, aided by Mr James Cooper, a member of the Council, and
unfortunately for his own credit, and the public good, proprietor of one
of the 
licenced houses,

**

and by other parties, who are preying upon the vitals of the Colony,
exhausting its wealth, and in return, importing from the American
Settlements, unwholesome drinks which are ruinous to the morals of the
people and the prolific source of poverty and crime.

The measure was however approved by all the better classes, and was
carried notwithstanding the excitement and senseless outcry made against
it by interested parties.

6. I do not suppose that the Duty on Licences, will put a stop to
intemperance, but it will prove a check to a certain degree, and at
least, deprive the tippler of a part of the means, he so unprofitably
squanders, and that part will be applied to the erection of schools, and
other useful institutions, to counteract in some measure the effects of
his evil example.

***

7. The appropriation of the sum of £500, made for the erection of
a School house 
will be paid from the Trust fund, the Hudson's Bay
Company having placed the sum of £2000 at the disposal of the Governor
and Council for Colonial purposes.

8. I have only further to remark in reference to the Minutes of
Council now forwarded, that I have appointed John Work Esqre a
gentleman of probity and respectable character, and the largest land
holder on Vancouver's Island, to be a Member of Council until Her
Majesty's pleasure thereupon is made known.