a by-word.  The criminal, Edward Doyle, paid the extreme penalty of the law for stealing in a dwelling in the Bay of Islands and “putting John Wright in bodily fear.”  Governor Bourke issued a special proclamation expressing hope that Doyle’s punishment would be a warning to evil-doers in New Zealand.  Governor Darling, as already mentioned, prohibited the inhuman traffic in preserved and tattooed heads by attaching thereto a penalty of L40, coupled with exposure of the trader’s name.

In England more than one influential believer in colonies had long been watching New Zealand.  As early as 1825, a company was formed to purchase land and settle colonists in the North Island.  This company’s agent, Captain Herd, went so far as to buy land on the Hokianga Estuary, and conduct thither a party of settlers.  One of the first experiences of the new-comers was, however, the sight of a native war-dance, the terrifying effects of which, added to more practical difficulties, caused most of them to fold their tents and depart to Australia.  Thus for the first time did an English company lose L20,000 in a New Zealand venture.  The statesmen of the period were against any such schemes.  A deputation of the Friends of Colonization waited upon the Duke of Wellington to urge that New Zealand should be acquired and settled.  The Duke, under the advice of the Church Missionary Society, flatly refused to think of such a thing.  It was then that he made the historically noteworthy observation that, even supposing New Zealand were as valuable as the deputation made out, Great Britain had already colonies enough.  When one reflects what the British Colonial Empire was then, and what it has since become, the remark is a memorable example of the absence of the imaginative quality in statesmen.  But the Duke of Wellington was not by any means alone in a reluctance to annex New Zealand.  In 1831 thirteen Maori chiefs, advised by missionaries, had petitioned for British protection, which had not been granted.  The truth is, not only that the Empire seemed large enough to others besides the Duke, but that the missionaries stood in the way.  As representing the most respectable and the only self-sacrificing element amongst those interested in the islands, they were listened to.  It would have been strange had it been otherwise.  Nevertheless, the growing trade and the increasing number of unauthorized white settlers made it necessary that something should be done.  Consequently, in 1832, Lord Goderich sent to the Bay of Islands Mr. James Busby to reside there as British resident.  He was paid a salary, and provided with L200 a year to distribute in presents to the native chiefs.  He entered on his duties in 1833.  He had no authority, and was not backed by any force.  He was aptly nicknamed “a man-of-war without guns.”  He presented the local chiefs with a national flag.  Stars and stripes appeared in the design which the chiefs selected, thanks, says tradition, to the sinister