ribal divisions. A severe snubbing from Mr.
Busby's official superiors in Australia was the only consequence of
this attempt to federate man-eaters under parliamentary institutions.

The still-born constitution was Mr. Busby's proposed means of
checkmating a rival. In the words of Governor Gipps, this "silly and
unauthorized act was a paper pellet fired off" at the hero of an even
more pretentious fiasco. An adventurer of French parentage, a certain
Baron de Thierry, had proclaimed himself King of New Zealand, and
through the agency of missionary Kendall bought, or imagined he
bought--for thirty axes--40,000 acres of land from the natives. He
landed at Hokianga with a retinue of ninety-three followers. The
Maoris of the neighbourhood gravely pointed out to him a plot of three
hundred acres, which was all they would acknowledge of his purchase.
Unabashed, he established himself on a hill, and began the making of a
carriage-road which was to cross the island. Quickly it was found that
his pockets were empty. Laughed at by whites and natives alike, he
at once subsided into harmless obscurity, diversified by occasional
"proclamations," which a callous world allowed to drop unheeded.

Yet this little burlesque was destined to have its share in hastening
the appearance of England on the scene. Thierry had tried to enlist
the sympathies of the French Government. So also had another
Frenchman, Langlois, the captain of a whaling ship, who professed to
have bought 300,000 acres of land from the natives of Banks Peninsula
in the South Island. Partly owing to his exertions, a French company
called "The Nanto-Bordelaise Company" was incorporated, the object
of which was to found a French colony on the shores of the charming
harbour of Akaroa, on the land said to have been purchased by
Langlois. In this company Louis Philippe was a shareholder. In 1837,
also, the Catholic missionary Pompallier was dispatched to New Zealand
to labour among the Maoris. Such were the sea-routes of that day that
it took him some twelve months voyaging amid every kind of hardship
and discomfort to reach his journey's end. In New Zealand the fact
that he showed Thierry some consideration, and that he and his
Catholic workers in the mission-field were not always on the best
of terms with their Protestant competitors, aroused well-founded
suspicions that the French had their eye upon New Zealand. The English
missionaries were now on the horns of a dilemma.