No. 16

I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your Despatch No.
156 of the 30th November enclosing a letter from the Attorney General
of British Columbia in which he urges the necessity of retaining in
the Colony the Deed by which the Hudsons Bay Company reconveyed
Vancouvers Island to the Crown.

I am of opinion that it would be advisable that the original
Deed should be retained in the Record Office in this Country and that
an attested Copy should be kept in the Colonial Archives.

An Act can be passed, if your Law Officers think it necessary,
declaring that the attested Copy shall be conclusive evidence of the
contents of the Deed in any Action at Law or Equity.