often smile,” he said, “when I think of the ideal Canterbury of which our imagination dreamt, yet I see nothing in the dream to regret or to be ashamed of, and I am quite sure that without the enthusiasm, the poetry, the unreality if you will, with which our scheme was overlaid, it would never have been accomplished.” “Besides,” he added, “I am not at all sure that the reality, though less showy, is not in some respects sounder and better than the dream.” Captain Simeon, who early in the year had been appointed a Resident Magistrate, succeeded as agent for the Canterbury Association.
Mr. J. R. Godley was, indeed, the founder of Canterbury; it was he, almost single-handed, who formed the Canterbury Association in London. For the first two years of the settlement, he held the position, except in name, of Governor of Canterbury. Standing between the London Committee, supremely unconscious of its own ignorance of colonial affairs, on the one hand, and a justly indignant band of colonists on the other, Mr. Godley achieved the marvellous feat of retaining the confidence of both. Both, in fact, recognised the truth that the whole of Mr. Godley’s life here was devoted to the single-minded purpose of promoting the highest interests of Canterbury and of the settlers under his charge. An opportunity was afforded him on his return to England to emphasise the lessons he had learned here in colonial government. The occasion was a banquet tendered to him at Greenwich, and attended by many of the foremost British statesmen interested in colonial affairs. It is pleasant, incidentally, to note that his old Canterbury opponent, Mr. Thomas Cholmondoley, was amongst the men who assembled to do him honour.
The following extract from Mr. Godley’s speech is taken from the report in the “Morning Chronicle,” of July 21, 1853:—
“Many of you have the power of exercising, directly or indirectly, great influence in the affairs of British
