"3. It shall be lawful for the Governor in Council from time to time to set apart within any such district eligible sites for settlements for colonisation, and the boundaries of such settlements to define and vary." "4. For the purposes of such settlements the Governor in Council may from time to time reserve or take any land within such district, and such land shall be deemed to be Crown land, freed and discharged from all title interest, or claim of any person whomsoever as soon as the Governor in Council shall have declared that such land is required for the purposes of this Act, and is subject to the provisions thereof." Section 5 provided for compensation to persons whose land has been taken, provided that they had not been in rebellion. (3) Before Native land was treated as Crown land, open for sale and settlement, proclamations were generally made so declaring the land open. See, for example, section 6 of the Immigration and Public Works Act, 1873, and section 247 of the Land Act, 1885. It is not necessary to point out that if the Crown in New Zealand had not conserved the Native rights and carried out the treaty a gross wrong would have been perpetrated. Since the recognition of the Native rights so often made, there may have been interference by legislation with Native land, both before and after the ascertainment of title. If, however, there were such interferences, they have been based on the theory of eminent domain. There have been statutes passed providing how Native lands may be leased, but a similar kind of interference has been witnessed in the United Kingdom in the case of the Irish Land Acts and the Scottish Crofters' Statutes. Such interferences did not destroy the title of Natives. Native lands and freehold lands belonging to persons of the white race have also been taken under such a theory when it appeared it was for the interest of the State to do so. In such cases compensation has been awarded. To interfere with Native lands, merely because they are Native lands, and without compensation, would of course be such an act of spoliation and tyranny that this Court ought not to assume it to be possible in any civilised community. The decision of _Wi Parata v. Bishop of Wellington_, 3 J.R., N.S., S.C. 72, does not derogate from that position. It only emphasised the decision in _Reg. v. Symonds_, that the Supreme Court could take no cognisance of treaty rights not embodied in a statute, and that Native Customary Title was a kind of tenure that the Court could not deal with. In the case of _Tamaki v. Baker_ (1901), A.C. 561, the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council recognised, however, that the Natives had rights under our statute law to their customary lands.