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extension of tine was requested by the Promoters,it was refused by the letter of the Colonial Secretary of 18th. May, 1886, and the refusal was apparently acquisced in.
The fact that these applications for extension of time were made by the experienced Solicitors for the Promoters and Company, shows that it was then generally supposed that the time-limit applied equally in the case of both the Ordinance of 1882 and 1883. Probably the technical point in connection with section 4 has been discovered since.
The Government so far from placing obstacles in the way of the Promoters passed in due course an Order in Council approving of the draft grant of powers submitted by the Pro- moters and giving the necessary assent thereto.
It, seems, however, that the intended grantees could
not. get the requisite funds,so the actual Grant was never made.
The Company might have commenced in 1884, as far as the Govern- ment was concerned, if the approved proposed grant had been made and the money had been forthcoming.
It was only after a lapse of some 9 years after the Ordinance was passed that a further application was made for
the assent of the Governor in Council to some grant to construct, entered into apparently not by the surviving promoters but by certain members of the original synticate (see Mr.Danby's letter
of the 26th. September, 1892,)and when this error was corrected, Sir George O'Brien (then Colonial Secretary) in his letter
of 14th.April /93 stated that though the Government were pre- pared to consider an application as regards Tramways 1 and 5 upon full details and description of the project being sub-
mitted for consideration, the Governor was not prepared to
approve of the proposed transfer as regards Tramways 2, 3,
and 4. In his further letter of 6th. May, 1893, he stated his
reason to be becuase the circumstances have altered since the
Ordinance was passed, and it was not then desirable that those
Tramways