The Evening Star FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 6, 1872.

Evening Star, Issue 2980, 6 September 1872, Page 2

The Evening Star FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 6, 1872.

However adverse the result of the division to the Fox Ministry, they have done good service to the Colony. They have initiated a new system, which in its immediate effect, as well as in its bearing upon the future, is most beneficial. We arc very apt to view anything done for the North Island with jealousy ; and this feeling was very righteously entertained when the burden of taxation lay principally upon the Middle Island. The remedy for that, however, is not the question to which we wish at present to direct attention. The Ministry had to deal with existing arrangements, to reduce a chaotic state of affairs to order, and a rebellious population to peace. Two ways presented themselves: either to follow in the wake of their predecessors, and to prosecute a war in which there must necessarily be certain loss without the prospect ot gain, or to content themselves with holding strong defensive positions until the country was so opened up that the Natives could be easily dealt with, because deprived of the protection ot their stronghold—the bush. They chose the latter plan, and have followed it out with success. Instead of a rabble army, made up of the refuse of all the Colonies, they collected a iorce of half the number of picked ami reliable men, and instead of allowing them to become demoralised through idleness and its attendant vices, as their services have never been needed in their military capacity, they have been employed in the construction of defensive works and roads. We have before us the “ Report on Public Works, by the Assistant Eugineer-in-Chief,” which was presented to Parliament this session. The details are very numerous and very curt, but very instructive. They tell us a very different talc from that which is generally circulated of the management of the Armed Constabulary and Natives. Witlings would have us believe that the Government have bought peace by a “ sugar and blanket ” policy': by which wo understand that they have treated the Natives as they would a set of surly dogs that could only bo prevented showing their teeth by throwing them a few bones. This has been too much the fashion with our countrymen in dealing with aborigines all over the world. Yet it is against the law of our nature that such a system can permanently succeed. Men, although savages, are not brutes who can be Held to form lasting attachments for the sake of food and shelter. They have within them human instincts which teach them to meet craft with craft, and which tell them the difference between gifts prompted by kindness and those extorted by fear. From this cause the true .sugar and blanket policy always proves a failure. Even amongst our poor countrymen and countrywomen at Home, unless Lady Bountiful evinces true human sympathy in dispensing her gifts she seldom secures genuine gratitude. But amongst savages, gratitude is looked upon as a vice rather than a virtue. They take what they can get as the price of peace, ami when they can get no more they extort it by war. It is however different when they earn what they receive. Men who give work for wages feel it no degradation to receive what they have honestly and honorably earned \ and herein is the difference between the proceedings of the present and past Governments. The Fox Ministry have ultilised Maori labor in the North, and have thus done more for their civilisation and reclamation from barbarism than has ever been done before. In the report alluded to occasional mention is made of the Natives proving obstructive, but on the ■whole they appear to be employed wherever willing to work. North of Auckland and in the Waikato seven different roads

are in progress. It does not appear that in skilled work the Maoris can as yet be advantageously employed ; but were they can be made useful they are working. Thus between Wairoa and Waimati thirteen and a-half miles are under construction by resident Natives, and two and a-half miles of ditching and road forming across a swamp “ have been executed” by the armed constabulary. The character of the labor employed is not detailed in every case, so that occasionally we are obliged to infer it from the context, Thus on the road from Taurango to Taupo, in the Bay of Plenty District, a distance of G6 miles, we are told of certain bridges, that “ the erection of the first two has been retarded by delay in rock excavation, a kind of work in which the Natives make very slow progress.” On the Makctu and Whakatane Horse Eoad, “ arrangements have been made for the necessary road work near Otaramaku by Native labor.” The first section of a horse road (inland) from Matatu-to Otakia, a distance of 10i miles, is nearly finished, with the exception of three chains of a heavy swamp near the latter place. On this line are 23 culverts, eight of wood and 15 of stone, and one small bridge six feet long. The work has been done by Natives, and the road, as far as complete is in good order. It runs through very broken, swampy, but open country. Near Opotiki, a portion of a road has been contracted for by Natives, and another portion is to be made by the Armed Constabulary. At Wakatane, a road is kept in repair by the Armed Constabulary. In the same district the Militia, Armed Constabulary, and Native Contingent have during the year formed about forty miles of road, including the construction of several bridges and the formation of the streets at Opotiki. We have picked out the first few items that caught our eye from about three pages out of thirteen which the report fills; but they point to the system adopted by the Fox Ministry, which has proved so beneficial.