AN EARLY PURCHASE.

Evening Post, Volume LXXXI, Issue 93, 21 April 1911, Page 3

AN EARLY PURCHASE.

HOW THE NATIVES PARTED WITH CANTERBURY. ALLEGATION OF UNFULFILLED CONDITIONS. [j»l TSLZGUA.PU — SI'LCJAL TO THE POSr.} CHRISTCHURCH, Thk Day. An important meeting of South Island Maoris opened at Rapaki o:i Tuesday. The subject for consider? tion is the sale of Canterbury in 1843 under vhat is known a* "Kemp's purchase." Certain conditions of that sale are alleged to have bean jnfultilled, and the nathes have held meetings and petitioned Parliament, repeatedly fcr years past to urge that these conditions should in same way be carried out. The first proposal for this sale wan made au Akaroa during a visit of the then Governor (Sir George Grey) to that town m March of 1848. At that time he interviewed certain Ngati-ahu chiefs, who are alleged to have agreed to sell for the cum of £2000 that part of the South Island lying between the Nelson Block (purchftsed from the Ngatitoa) and the Otago Block (purchased from the Ngatiahu) — both by the New Zealand Company. S:r Gewge Grey issued instructions to Lieut snant -Governor Eyre on Bth April, 1878, regarding the purchase. The officer d-cspatched to negotiate the purchase was Mr. H. Tacy Kemp, and he reported en 19th and 20th July having completed the negotiations on the 12th of that month. He did not. however, set out definite reserves, but merely guaranteed to the natives " their pas and cultivations.'' which, he said, "are cf comparatively email extent. Beyond these 1 have not felt myself authorised in making any guarantee, and. with the consent of the people, have thought it better to leave the subject to be considered and decided upon, between the Government and the company so soon as the survey of the district shall take placf." The boundaries cf the blct-ks sold are particularly described in the deed. Neither the Lieutenant-Governor nor Colonel Wakefield was satisfied with the way in which Kemp had conducted the transaction, and" Mr. W. Mantell was sent to reopen negotiations. He performed the duties in 1 a much more thorough manner, definitely marking out reserves at all places occupied by natives. A perusal of Kemp's report, tns deed of purchase, and Mantell'e report would suggest that the natives have little claim for further consideration, but the natives go on verbal promises made at the time to induce them to execute the deed. The basis on which the company had arranged the Nelson purchase gave the natives as reserves one acre in every ten surveyed. Tho same concession' was given, though not in the actual deed of sale, to the vendors of the Otago block. The reserves to be set aside for the natives were to be ''ample portions for their present and prospective wants." The reserves actually &et aside gave each native an area of ten acres, increased by additional reserves made in 1868 to fourteen acres. The Maoris claim that the areas as described in Kemp's deed diner very greatly from those agreed to by the na"tives. Their intention wa3 to sail only tho coastal lands, reserving the interior for their own use. Some support ap-pea-rs to ba given to this claim by the fact that the VYestland County was mads the subject of a. subsequent purchase by the Government, and it is significant that an area of 300,000 acres was reserved for the natives, giving an average area. to' each native of over 100 acres. It is urged that the grievances of the Ngatiahu aro of recent date seeing that so many years passed before any suggestion of injustice suffered was made by them. For 'one- thing, hoAvever, they were ignorant of the contents of official documents regarding their circumstances. Nothing tangible wae printed until so that their grievances could not take tangible shape. Once aware of their position, however, their efforts to advance their claims have been unremitting. They have spent thousands of pounds in urging them ; they have been impoverishing themselves in the struggle for their rights.