This Act and “The Gold Fields Act, 1858” shall, save so far as the latter is varied by this Act, be taken to be and construed as one Act, and shall have the short title of the “Gold Fields Act, 1858, 1860.”

The phrase “authorised person” shall include all holders of any license or mining lease, Ministers of Religion and Schoolmasters, and any Warden or Commissioner for the Gold Fields, or Constable or other person employed exclusively in the Government service, and the servants of any such person respectively there residing with and in the actual employment of any of them and not mining for Gold either permanently or occasionally, and all holders of agricultural and business leases not mining for Gold either permanently or occasionally and their servants as aforesaid, and all females and all children under the age of fourteen years, who shall only reside and not mine for Gold upon any Gold Field.

Subject to the provisions hereinafter contained, it shall be lawful for the Governor by deed, from time to time, to demise for agricultural or business purposes to any person for any term not exceeding seven years from the making of the lease any land within a Gold Field not exceeding ten acres in the whole, subject to such rent, costs, and conditions on the part of the lessee, his executors, administrators, and assigns, to be paid, observed, and performed as to the Governor shall seem meet.

Provided that if at any time after the granting of any such lease the land thereby demised or any part thereof shall in the judgment of the Governor be deemed to be highly auriferous, it shall be lawful for the Governor or any person appointed by him to give notice in writing as hereinafter mentioned of his intention to determine such lease.

At the expiration of three months from the delivery of such notice to the lessee or occupier, or to some servant of one of them on the demised land, or from the affixing of such notice to some conspicuous object on the demised land in case there is no occupier or servant as aforesaid thereon, such lease shall become null and void and all interest of the lessee, his executors, administrators, and assigns therein, shall cease and determine.

Provided nevertheless that such lessee, his executors, administrators, or assign’s, shall be entitled to compensation on account of the determination of his lease, and for any improvements he may have made on such land during the subsistence of such lease to be ascertained in manner hereinafter contained.

Such compensation may be settled by agreement between the lessee and any person appointed by and on behalf of the Governor.

If the amount of such compensation shall not be determined by agreement then and in every such case the matter in difference shall be settled by arbitration by two arbitrators, one to be named by the Governor or some person deputed by him for such purpose, and the other arbitrator to be named by the party interested in such lands and, the matter in difference shall be determined by the said arbitrators or by any Umpire to be appointed by them before they shall enter upon the reference, and if any arbitrator or Umpire appointed under this Act shall die or refuse or for seven days neglect to act, another person shall forthwith be named or appointed to supply the place of the person so dying, or refusing, or neglecting to act in the same manner as Such last mentioned person was named or appointed: And further the said arbitrators or Umpire shall determine by whom and how the costs of the reference and award or Umpirage shall in each case be paid, and they or he may summon and examine upon oath any witness and administer the oath for that purpose.

Every lease of any lands, estate, or rights by the Governor, made in pursuance of the “Gold Fields Act, 1858, 1860,” may be made in the usual form between the Governor of the one part and the lessee of the other part, and in any such lease it shall be sufficient to call or describe the Governor by the style or title of “the Governor of the Colony of New Zealand,” without naming him, and any such lease may be executed by the Governor by signing his name thereto.

All covenants on the part of the lessee, his heirs, executors, administrators, and assigns, and all powers reserved to the lessor, his heirs, executors, administrators, or assigns, in any lease implied; and all other covenants, agreements, stipulations, reservations, and conditions expressed in any lease made in pursuance of the said “Gold Fields Act, 1858, 1860,” on the part of the lessee, his heirs, executors, administrators, or assigns, to be made, entered into, reserved, or undertaken, to and with the Governor, shall be deemed and taken to be made, entered into, reserved, or undertaken to and with the Governor for the time being, and when and so often as the present Governor, and any succeeding Governor shall cease to hold such office, shall, by virtue of this Act, be vested in and be enforceable by his successor in the said office.

The Governor for the time being may bring, prosecute, and maintain any action of ejectment or other proceedings for recovering possession of any lands so demised, and may sue and distrain for any arrears of rent which shall have become due for or in respect of any parol or other demise from him, or any predecessor in office, made in pursuance of the said “Gold Fields Act, 1858, 1860;” and also may bring, prosecute, and maintain, any other action in respect of any covenants, agreements, stipulations, reservations, and conditions whatsoever, contained or implied in any such demise; and in every such action or other proceeding shall be styled the “Governor,” without being named.

No such action or other proceeding shall abate by the death, resignation, or removal from office of the Governor.

Nothing in any lease made in pursuance of the “Gold Fields Act, 1858, 1860” shall extend to charge the person of the Governor or the heirs, executors, or administrators of such Governor, or any of his or their own proper lands, tenements, goods, or chattels, with or for the performance of all or any of the covenants, conditions, or agreements in such lease contained on the part of the Governor.

Any district proclaimed or to be proclaimed a Gold Field and subject to the provisions of this Act and of the “Gold Fields Act, 1858,” shall not be subject to the provisions of the “Waste Lands’ Act, 1858,” or the several Acts, Ordinances, Bills, and Regulations specified in the Schedule thereto.