secretary to the Governor, Sir William Denison, in 1855, and Registrar-General in 1856, when he inaugurated the present system of registration, and in 1858 took charge of the statistical branch of the Colonial Secretary's Department. In Nov. 1864 he was appointed Auditor-General. In 1879 Mr. Rolleston was created G.M.G. He died on April 9th, 1888.
Rolleston, Hon. William, M.H.R., is the son of the late Rev. George Rolleston, M.A., who for over fifty years was rector of Maltby, near Doncaster, in Yorkshire. His brother, George Rolleston, F.R.S., was the well-known Professor of Physiology at the university of Oxford. Mr. Rolleston was born on Sept. 19th, 1831, and was educated at Rossall School, Lancashire, under the late Dr. Woolley (q.v.). Entering at Emanuel College, Cambridge, in 1851, he became foundation scholar of his college in the following year. In 1855 he graduated with classical honours. Mr. Rolleston emigrated to New Zealand in 1858, and settled near Lake Coleridge. In 1863 he was appointed a member of the Education Commission, which framed the educational system of the province of Canterbury, and in 1864 became provincial secretary and a member of the Canterbury Board of Education. He was subsequently Under-Secretary for Native Affairs and Inspector of Native Schools under the Colonial Government. Mr. Rolleston was Superintendent of the province of Canterbury from 1868 to 1876. From 1868 to 1884 he was M.H.R. for Avon, and in the latter year was returned for Geraldine. He was a member of the Hall Government from Oct. 1879 to April 1882, holding the portfolios of Minister of Lands, Immigration, Justice, Mines, and Native Affairs, for successive periods. In the Whitaker and Atkinson administrations which succeeded, he was Minister of Lands, Immigration, and Mines from April 1882 to August 1884. In 1891, on the retirement of Mr. John Bryce from the leadership of the opposition to the Ballance Government, he was unanimously selected to succeed him. He did much to promote the adoption of the system of perpetual leases.
Rooke, Hon. Henry Isidore Joachim Raphael, M.L.C., J.P., is a merchant in Launceston, and formerly represented Deloraine in the House of Assembly. He was first elected to the Legislative Council in July 1886, and in the following March was Chief Secretary for four weeks in the Agnew Ministry. He is a member of the Executive Council, and Captain and Paymaster of the Launceston Rifle Corps.
Rose, W. Kinnaird, late editor of the Brisbane Courier, was born in Glasgow in 1845, and educated at Kilmarnock and Ayr Schools and at Edinburgh University. Having embraced a journalistic career, Mr. Rose acted as special commissioner of the London Daily Telegraph in the conduct of an inquiry into the condition of the Scotch agricultural labourers, and had considerable experience as a special correspondent in various parts of Europe. He acted in this capacity for the Edinburgh Scotsman during the Turco-Russian war, and was for some time on the staff of General Skobeleff. He was several times wounded, being present at Plevna, the capture of the Gravitza redoubt, and most of the memorable scenes of that bloody and hotly contested war. Subsequently be returned to Edinburgh University for three years, and studied for the Bar with distinguished success. In 1879 he went as special commissioner to the East, to inquire into the condition of the Christian population in Roumelia, Macedonia, Albania and Armenia, and his report formed a subject of debate in both Houses of Parliament. On the advice of Sir Thomas McIlwraith, in 1884 he went to Queensland and was admitted to the local Bar in December of that year. Mr. Rose was one of the commissioners appointed to inquire into the Polynesian labour traffic in 1885, and formed an opinion decidedly adverse to this method of supplying labour to the Queensland sugar plantations as the system was then conducted. At the beginning of 1888 he became editor-in-chief of the Courier, which position he occupied until 1891, when he left for England. Amongst other incidents of Mr. Rose's career were his narrow escape from assassination in Albania, and his imprisonment in Rome on a charge of possessing forged notes which had been foisted upon him by a dealer in antiquities. Mr. Rose is the author of "The Modern Bayard; a Life of General Skobeleff," "A History of Agriculture in Scotland," "Political Ethnology," "A
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