An English barque had lately been wrecked upon the coast, but fortunately Mr. Guard the captain, his wife, two children, and the crew, twenty-eight in all, escaped to land. At first, according to the statement of the captain, the natives treated them with kindness, which they soon exchanged, under what pretext, or in consequence of what provocations on either side, it would be useless to ask, for open hostilities. A quarrel was got up between two native tribes, and an engagement followed, in which twelve Europeans, and about forty Maories fell. Guard and his party were taken prisoners. It shows how great an improvement had taken place amongst the natives, that they were not massacred and devoured; but, on condition of returning with a cask of powder as a ransom for himself and the rest, Guard and five of his men were allowed to proceed, without further molestation, to Sydney; where he laid the matter before Sir Richard Bourke the governor. Relying on the accuracy of Guard's narrative, the governor, with the advice of the executive council, requested Captain Lambert to proceed with H.M.S. Alligator, which happened to be lying in Port Jackson, to obtain the restoration of the British subjects, then in the hands of the New Zealanders. He was instructed to abstain from any act of retaliation, and to obtain the restoration of the captives by amicable means; and Guard and his five men returned in the same ship. Soon after the arrival of the party at New Zealand, Guard recognised the chief who was now the proprietor of the shipwrecked woman and children; and the unsuspicious native rubbed noses with him in token of amity, at the same time expressing his readiness to give up his prisoners on receiving the "payment" guaranteed to him. This, however was not the way in which the affair was to be settled; Guard and his sailors seized him as a prisoner, and dragged him into the whale boat in which the party had gone ashore. The cruelty practised towards this unfortunate man, and the fearful havoc committed by the English, we gladly pass over. Such iniquitous transactions reflect but little credit on us as a Christian or a civilized people; and they were, moreover, in direct opposition to the benevolent instructions of Sir Richard Bourke. The British subjects were restored; as indeed they might have been without the loss of a single life, through the intervention of the missionaries, and of the British resident at the Bay of Islands, and the expedition having gained its object by force and stratagem, returned to Sydney with the troops and the liberated captives.