WHEREAS doubts have arisen as to the validity of a Proclamation published in the New Zealand Gazette, number twenty-three of the year one thousand eight hundred and seventy-three, under the hand of His Excellency the Officer Administering the Government of the Colony of New Zealand, declaring the district of the Town of Westport, as the boundaries thereof are defined in the Schedule to the said Proclamation, to be a borough under “The Municipal Corporations Act, 1867,” by reason of non-compliance with certain of the provisions of sections ten and twenty-two of the said Act, which required that a period of two months should elapse between the publication of notice in some newspaper circulating in the borough district or place to which such petition referred of the petition praying the Governor to declare the said Town of Westport a borough, and of the time when it pleased His Excellency to order such petition to be taken into consideration, together with a copy of the document certificate or notification transmitted by the Superintendent of the province in which the district to which the petition referred is situate that he assented to or that he did not dissent from the prayer of such petition—the said petition having been taken into consideration and the said Proclamation having issued before the expiration of two months from the publication of the matters aforesaid in such newspaper: And whereas it is expedient that an Act be passed for the purpose of validating the said proceedings and the said Proclamation: