PARIHAKA TOLL GATE.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1536, 4 September 1912, Page 6

PARIHAKA TOLL GATE.

CHARGE FOR A BISHOP .£IOOO. Tho Anglican Bishop of Auckland (Dr. Crossley), who recently returned to Auckland from a visit to the Taranaki portion of his diocese, inado the following statement to a ipresa interviewer;— "My visit to Parihaka, that famous lib tie Maori town to tho west of Egmont impressed me very much. The (own was erected by the Maoris after the last war, and it was where tho policy of passive resistance to the pakeha was rigidly continued by the Natives. At one timo it contained 2000 6o 3000 inhabitants; now it has 150 to 200. Aβ an index of the antagonism to the Church, it is interesting to recall that a toll-gate was erected ed by tho Maoris, and the charge for a bishop was .£IOOO. Wo drove up in a motor to this deserted littlo town, beautifully situated under Mount Egmont, with the sea in the distant foreground. ■ I had a long interview with Tcmatckino, one of the old chiefs, and we had much conversation on religious matters. There is no church in Parihaka, and the re vligion, such as it is, seems to bo a strange compound of Old Testament theology, wrapped up in ancient Maori law. : Tor instance, tho old chief assured me that his descendants migrated from Babylon, and produced his Bible, with which ho was very familiar, to prove the fact."