When Bishop Harper was appointed to the see of Christchurch in 1856, Otago and Southland formed part of his diocese, and his long journeys on horseback through these districts were among the most arduous and adventurous labours of his episcopate. He retained them until June 4th, 1871, when, as primate, he consecrated the Rev. S. T. Neville to the bishopric of Dunedin; and on the same day, as bishop, resigned these southern portions of his original diocese. But there was another claimant to the office--one, moreover, who was considered by the English episcopate to be its rightful occupant. How could such an extraordinary situation have arisen? The blame must lie (as Bishop W. L. Williams points out) somewhere between Bishop Selwyn and the Archbishop of Canterbury (Dr. Longley). Something that was written by the former in 1865 caused the latter to select, and eventually to consecrate, one of his clergy, the Rev. H. L. Jenner, for a diocese which was not yet formed, and for a people who always protested against his appointment. A mystery still hangs over the precise motives which actuated the archbishop. But perhaps they can be conjectured with a fair degree of probability. The letter upon which he acted arrived in England not long after the news of Volkner's murder. It was hard for those who had never left England to realise the difference between the Hauhau-ridden north and the law-abiding south of such a distant country as New Zealand. The archbishop might well think that his best course was to send out another bishop as soon as possible, without waiting for compliance with constitutional formalities. Accordingly he consecrated the Rev. H. L. Jenner "to be a bishop in New Zealand"--leaving the local authorities to determine the exact locality of his labours. But no such ignorance can be pleaded for Bishop Selwyn. When he wrote the letter to the Primate of All England he was fresh from the great synod of 1865, where the whole constitution had been revised, and the procedure in the election of a bishop made more clear and precise. How could he violate a law which he himself had just subscribed? The only answer is that he did not violate it. His letter can have contained no such request as the archbishop imagined. Selwyn himself was as much startled as anyone, when he found what his letter had led to. But obedience to authority was the ruling principle of his life, and, like another Strafford, he determined to take upon himself the whole responsibility for what was done. It was doubtless an act of heroism, but a simple insistence upon the plain truth would have prevented much misunderstanding, and saved the New Zealand Church some years of trouble.