THE MAORIE TITHE.

Auckland Times, Volume 3, Issue 148, 8 November 1845, Page 2

THE MAORIE TITHE.

Among all the miserable crotchets which Mr. Clarke found the means to maggot in the brain of Captain Fitzroy, there is no one more manifestly stupid in itself; none so likely to perpetuate discord, and provoke future feud, as the reservation of a tenth of every land purchase for the Maorie benefit. "It is not provided by whose selection or authority, or in what particular locality this drawback is to be made ! !" If a person buy of Te Whero-whero, five acres of land near Auckland, half an acre is to be cabbaged (after his payment is complete) and that very half acre, may be all in the allotment that made the purchase desirable; again, if a cottager purchase one acre for a home and garden, he is to reserve onetenth of this paltry allowance for the squalid presence, and almost certain encroachment of the poor dear innocent black. In larger purchases, the difficulty is equally obvious. Maorie custom is to hold possession, not by right, but by might ; and the experience of the Hutt, and of Taranaki, should ha/e warned the Governor how extremely dangerous it is to leave the New Zealander any loop-hole by which he may insinuate a renewed claim.

And then again, it may be urged, cui bono, what will be the use of all these patches of dissention upon every man's land ; what the utility of this novel conveyance of "fee simple." We can only, in the wildest flights of our tortured f mcy, suppose that His Excellency hoped thereby that the Maories would separate from their respective

tribes of fellow - countrymen, settle down quietly on their tenths, and prosecute his favorite scheme of "amalgamating " Nothing can possibly be more visionary than tins; the taste of our countrymen is surely undervalued; it will be the work of years; the present generation of Maories must pass away and a new one rise up, educated ifi Christian faith, and in European refinement, before this can occur; in th Q mean time these "tenths" will form an everlasting source of bickering and debate, most sure to delay the amaW, mation that is so dear to His Excelheart. If His Excellency i n everlasting watchfulness for Maorie j n , terests, must create a "tithe, (subsequent to payment and pure base), in Maorie favor, why not have imposed an equivalentgroundvrent, redeemable on delivery of the grant; an d made a "Savings' Bank,' 1 or some other adviseable receptacle for the "sops in the pan ;" he thus provided for his darlings. We have urged these remarks repeatedly, but in excuse of such tautology of argument, we may observe that the purchasers under the system, are desirous to obtain His Excellency's authority for the adoption of a more rational measure ; and the total abolition of this provision, even though for an equivalent, before he leaves us. We have observed in a former number of the Auckland Times, that in New South Wales, the Church and Corporation Act, which provided for a reservation of a large portion of the lands in favor of religion, education, and other obvious purposes of charitable duty, have always been more [than abundant We hope that His Excellency before he goes away, will provide for the removal of this very objectionable regulation. Shakspeare says :

" I wou'd not keep a comer in the thing 1 love For foul toads, &c," The buyer of a section would much rather pay a trifle more, than have every one of his 640 acres subject to perpetual dispute. And the small occupier may say, that if he is to have one corner, or perhaps, the very centre, perhaps the valuable road frontage of his purchase, occupied by the pigstye wigwams of the natives; his grant has no occupancy for him ; and he will pray His Excellency, as we do for him, that this monstrous piece of gunsmith suggestion be abandoned, while His Excellency has yet the power and grace to do so.