THE NATIVE DIFFICULTY.

Evening Star, Issue 3203, 27 May 1873, Page 2

THE NATIVE DIFFICULTY.

(from our special correspondent.)

Auckland, May 14.

I have been here four days, and have now fewer positive opinions on the Native question, in connection with Sullivan’s murder, than I had the day I landed at Onehunga. I did not know' so much about the matter then as I now do—hence the difficulty I experience in forming a definite opinion. A stranger, or a Southerner, would bo disposed to consider that in the treating a subject of such vast Colonial importance ns another Maori war, the Press would sink all party feelings, avoid distorting facts, think only of the common weal, and leave its internecine battles until a more convenient season. A common danger should induce, one would imagine, a common course of action. Telegrams and actions are so colored, however, by the channels through which they pass to the reader, that it is impossible to eliminate the truth. Events, in themselves harmless, are made indicative of evil intentions—avowed feelings of friendship are termed only a mask, covering hatred and deceit; while the patience-bear-ing of Government is stigmatised as the fear of the craven. To-morrow morning’s intelligence may put a new phase on the question altogether, so, in the meantime, I shall briefly portray the state of public opinion and feeling ; ray wish and hope being to write the plain truth without fear or bias. ' First, as to the fourth estate. There are two parties and two papers on each side here. The Cross and the Herald appear to be cognisant of the fact that the Province of Auckland comprises not the whole of New Zealand. They have, or appear to have, a knowledge that a war on the Waikato would re-act on Otago and the Stock Exchange; and that it would be wise to calculate the cost of this luxury before it be indulged in. The Star and the Tliames Advertiser are bellicose—wanting war at any price ; thinking the opening-up of Ohinemuri and the possession of the Waikato to be the chief desiderata for the people and the Province. What is the welfare of Otago and Canterbury, in comparison with the death of Te Hira and possession of the Upper Thames? What matter though Tokomairiro be connected not witji rail to Dunedin, nor the two gaps in our railway system filled up, so that a few thousand acres of land can be purchased, confiscated, or stolen from the Native owners?

It is not pleasant to write thus harshly, but every leader I have read on the subject in either of those two last-named papers has been a provocative to a lust for blood, manifesting a selfish disregard to any other portion of the Colony save this, and increasing the difficulty to be contended with. It is quite possible that the paper most extensively read possesses the greatest amount of individual influence: and I am convinced from the number of people I have met with and talked to on the subject, and listened to their conversation, that the Star reflects the opinion of more than one-third of the people in the Province. I believe if the Province of Auckland were polled man for man, a third of the adult population would vote for another Maori war. I had at first written two-thirds of the population of the Province were in favor of war; but from those best qualified to judge, I have been assured that my estimate was excessive, and I have altered my MS. in compliance with this authoritative information. I feel certain, however, that this modified estimate is under the mark.

There is a story related of the llth Hussars; that on one occasion a soldier was walking quietly along the street of the town in which the regiment was quartered, when an officer meeting him and taking note of his gait, said, *• You’re not swaggering, sir I d -n you, why don’t you swagger!” The swaggerers' here must be my excuse for my previous rash estimate. ‘ ’

The reasons for such a feeling are iqanifold and evident. There are old sores unhealed, rankling and festering, obtained in the late struggle; there are heartburnings and jealqusies unassuaged; there are survivors Who mourn relatives lost or slain foully; there is a wish on the part of many again to try conclusions, with the nope of a different result; the esprit of race is wounded ; there is an indignant feeling that we have had to fight so hard with a colored people; it is considered by others a sin that Maoris should possess fertile plains and mineral wealth, which the race that should be dominant lacks; some few may perhaps love fighting for fighting’s sake. Further, although it may be considered by some of your readers ungenerous to say so, trade and business are slack, and want a fillip; money is scarce, and is wanted ingreatelf abundance; there are a lot of idlers, military and semi-jnilitary, here. Who yould ]ike W resume’active service f the Pro viqc6 ‘holds only some three-quarters of a millioii acres of unsold estate, while the Natives own fourteen millions, including the debateable land. There are other goldfields known to exist and wished to be opened. Considerations such as these, singly or combined, tend towards producing and fostering the feeling of unquiet I have previously mentioned. It is uncertain whether the representatives of such feelings and ideas may not so complicate matters by precipitate and unwarrantable action, as to preclude a possibility of a peaceful settlement of the present trouble.' There is a number of people here, however, wlio know fully and clearly what another Maori wiir; means. They can see the consequences of such a calamity.’ The Superintendent of Auckland want* to qffer a‘reward for the "apprehension qf Purukutu and his compamohs. VVe have tried the efficacy of this remedy several times before without avail, s- 8 Te Kooti and Tito Kowarau well know; but this phase of opinion is by no means popular, The reflective portion of the people know that war means deserted homesteads and ruined farms ; a cessation of industry and public works; a depreciation of Colonial debentures; a stoppage of immigration; unfinished railroads, that would remain incomplete for many years; a general retrogression; a loss of blood, and a waste of money; a death-blow to our policy of progress ; a time of sorrow and humiliation for many, and a time of triumph for those who have prophesied evil and not good, because they could neither see nor believe. It is impossible, they say, to tell what disasters, socially and politically, war would entail. It would put back the Colony another decade. We are only gradually acquiring a good character as a country adapted for immigration ; all the good our patient policy has achieved would be gone for this century. The money that has been borrowed for a specific and reproductive purpose would be swallowed up in that gulf in which so many millions have already gone. Our debt would be doubled for blood instead of railways. The odds are against us in m ore respects than one. The Maori requires no commissariat, training, or pay. His heart is in his work, and he has a perfect knowledge of a district of which we are ignorant. The country is almost as difficult to travel as when the present Comp-troller-General introduced his celebrated Bill to enable the Queen’s writ to run through it—a countiy, in fact, through which it has never even yet limped. The effects of the last campaign are also socially felt. The Maori improves by the conflict —our youth deteriorate. When drafted to the front, they improve not in their morals, but become a card-playing, rum-drinking portion of the populace when the, warfare is over. It gives them an inclination tq loqnge ipstead- ■e£ working through life, and warfare means not only a waste of power in the slain, but in the living—a turning of s man to the worst possible use next to that of hanging him. Where are the means, they ask, and the munitions of warfare to be found ? What will be the amount of compensation we shall be called on again to pay, and what will be the additions to our pension list ? War means ruin for the Waikato people for their lives, and stagnation for the Colony for years to come. It may sound like political blasphemy, but the question is asked and discussed by men who thus think : “Is the blood of Sullivan worth such a price /” Let every man answer this question according to his individual conscience. There are very few here who admit our general tone of opinion relative to Native affairs. We have been taught by Northern newspapers and Northern senators that the Maori people are British subjects, as much as the dwellers in Clerkenwell or Canada. There is no doubt such is the fact. People holding both extremes of opinion acknowledge it, but in a different manner to ourselves. We consider if a man enjoys the rights and privileges .of citizenship, he should be amenable to its laws, and liable to punishment when be breaks, them. We cannot understand,, if a man kills another, cuts off his head, tears. out his heart, and carries these sanguinary trophies about in a time, of pgapq, why he should not bo hanged. They ft fafttfa

In the South. The “Star and War” party maintain the King Natives are and have been in a state of rebellion ; the killing of Sullivan was an act of wilful aggression by them: a challenge, to battle to which wo should respond, for the time of settlement of accounts with the Maoris” has come. The other side declare the act according to Maori usage, almost justifiable homicide, as Pukurutu only wanted payment for land he had neglected to claim. The man was a Hauhau fanatic, possessed of peculiar notions —if a British subject a very ignorant one, not well up in our laws of jurisprudence - in fact, a savage, to whom indulgence should be shown. It is highly probable that some of the advocates of this opinion may believe the Maori not as ignorant of the moral code as they would make it appear. The Maori has demanded “ utu” for blood from time immemorial. The war party declare, singularly enough, the murder to be the natural result of the Government Native policy during the last four years. When people talk in this strain, they, of course, are beyond argument. The source of the whole trouble others maintain is the confiscated lands. They are more bother, have cost and will involve more outlay than they are worth. The confiscation at the first was a political error, which it is quite possible the Imperial .Parliament would not sustain. A Maori has no more right to lose his estates in perpetuity for rebellion than Smith O’Brien. It will thus be apparent that the position is a difficult one. A section of the community clamoring for war, another portion shrinking from such a contingency until all other means are tried and found to be without avail; an instructive dislike to condone the spilling of blood, combined with an earnest desire to protect life and promote prosperity; a knowledge that prudence and cautiousness by many wijl be termed cowardice, when rashness will entail disaster and death ; while the fact that the Natives in a short time could bring some 1,200 or 1,500 armed men into the field forms no unimportant portion of the complex problem. The difficulty of its solution cannot be over-esti-mated. I have found one most satisfactory mode of dealing with the malcontents. I hear what they have to say, and then remark —“If you were at the head of the Government, will you kindly tell roe, sir, what is the first step that you would take under the present difficult circumstances?” They invariably stammer and walk away. Those who seek by ill-advised clamor to add to the difficulties of the situation, certainly cannot be aware of the magnitude of the issues involved, of the evils that may spring from their injudicious conduct, or they must, as the Lyttelton Times declares, be the Hauhaus of their race.

May 16th, don’t know that I have anything fresh to add to the difficulties of the Native situation. The present would seem an admirable opportunity for missionary exertion; the influence they now possess over the people should be manifest—or at least we shsuld hear, it may be supposed, an account of their exertions preventing the shedding of blood. The Waikato Times, in its leader of yesterday, writes on this head what everyone should read. There is a pregnant and lamentable telegram in this morning’s Cross— “ There is little chance of Sullivan’s murderers being given up.” I telegraphed you the same fact some ten days since ; but this, of course, comes from a better authority. It is considered probable, in the event of the Government urging the arrest of the murderers to extremity, that influence and expostulation will be used to detach from the King party proper its affiliated supporters, such as theNgatimaniapoto and Ngatiraukawa. The Ngatimaniapoto Eople have never lost any of their lands, and owing how confiscation follows rebellion, may Erobably pause before they become involved, iving close to the disturbed district, and published at the residence of the first Maori King, it speaks with no uncertain sound. That the Maori is capable of civilisation is an undisputed fact. Now is the time for our missionaries to act; let them go out and explain to the people the position in which they stand, or for ever after hold their peace. Let them go out and say to the Natives, the Pakeha means to live in peace; if you will not allow him, you will undoubtedly cease, io live at all. As regards the condemnation of the Government, we always have, and still believe that the course have pursued is the correct one. They have kept the Natives quiet for a period, during which we have become stronger, and they weaker. If they act now •flith fimpess, and’ fight if necessary, we gonsidqf tfiat their policy has been peifcct. To a race of a composite character like that with which we have to deal, their traditions should not be disregarded. Although considerably imbued with the opinions and knowledge of the whites, they yet feel a kind of hunger for their past manner of life—when the mam of the chief was supreme, and no other authority was recognised nor apparent, save that of the mam of some other still more powerful. It is doubtless refreshing to remember that we are the most godly, virtuous, and proper people on earth, setting a moral code by our example for all others to follow, in our. social, political, and moral relations. It is doiibtless mortifying to our pride to see that all tlje Natives of New Zealand are not so enamored of our ways as to divest themselves the' ipijtincts P.f their nature and the habits or their education— a suit of wornout raiment—and dpn that ethic and social garb we have taken nearly two thousand years to complete. Were they enabled to jump into it and feel no awkwardness in the fit; to find themselves at onco Christians, courteous members of society, acquainted with our law’s, usages, ana customs, it would prove that we had badly used our time in taking such a lengthened period to perform what a savage can achieve in a day. ’Twas thus I heard a gentleman declaim last night—and his are singular. I reproduce them ai some length- “The wonder is,” he continued, Rnpt that Todd and Sullivan have been killed during the last fopr. years, but that the Natives Have been kept by their chiefs under such stem pontrol—and that so few have proved refractory. Is there any other savage conquered people known that has acted so well? Let history answer the question. British men want all mankind to live and dress according to the Briti-h pattern, and every race in every clime to wear the orthodox moral dress coat and white tie. Of course we all know the Waikato Native prefers, at the present time, his own flax undress code of morals ; but it is not impossible that he may yet become in favor of adopting the shirt of civilisation. Besides, the Maori Land Leaguers have something that may be said in their favor. They hold their lands on tribal instead of individual tenure. There is neither the landless nor the disinherited in their midst. One man is not allowed to monopolise and own a whole country side, while his neighbour has not a patch on which to build his house or grow his potatoes. The doctrine that Paley announced of one man having no right to own land while his neighbour has none, is in force among these people ; and the advanced thinkers of the age are in Harmony on this head with the Maori King. The day is gone past for head-money and high-handed justice, and our pretext for the occupancy of the Waikato lands may yet come under judgment. Our late Governor was fond of comparing the position of the Native tribes to the Highland clans at the commencement' of the present century. Is it by any means certain that our Caledonian brethren, at that period, would have willingly surrendered a murderer to the laws of his country—or would not the head of the clan have made some attempt to shield his kinsman from punishment? It is all very well to dec l aim and become indignant because Tawhiao shields his follower, but not a whit worse than to feel the heart rebound at the line, ‘ Wha will dee for Charlie?’ I doubt not, with patience, all will corns right.” Your correspondent is not responsible for these strange opinions. There is a general impression floating through the Maorimind, whether the resultof tradition or Hip utterances of their prophets undetermined, that two future wars have to take place before the final settlement of the differences between the two races can be accomplished. The first one is to be in the Waikato and of a trivial character-* while the final struggle for supremacy is to take place on the west coat in the vicinity of Taranaki. Such a general feeling on both coasts may have some considerable influence in moulding onr future relations. Many of the Natives are yet so uninformed as to fail to recognise the difference between the source and nature of their prophecies and those of the Pakeha. On the principle of Tartar scraping, the assimilated Maori has an inner skin which he keeps concealed—visible only to himself and his brethren. He may laugh at belief in the prophecy-but if honest, would scruple to deny his credence. He is conscious of being unable to compete with the European in the social, political, anil mercantile conditions of life; he sees his people decreasing in numbers around him ; his land and his power melting away ; himself in many instances childless, and his father’s “house gone like the moapainfully conscious of his inferiority he draws a cordon around his lands, and lives in what we call “savage seclusion,” for the purpose of averting or delaying the doom that looms over his people. Well, put yourself in His place. The banging of Kereopa was a more salutary warning to their people than a battalion in the Waikato. It tells them (feat, though the Pleejjyitfergete not j

that a murderer may run for years, and yet suffer punishment. They understand this matter. Let it be distinctly understood that Purukutu is to be had, and when in durance hanged, and a great step will have been taken towards the future prevention of outrage. It is cheaper to do anything than go to war. There is a fruitful cause of trouble springing up in this island. Land speculators take time and opportunity by the forelock in occupying land leased from the Natives on equivocal tenures. They poach on ground they have no right to traverse, get into trouble, and call on the Crown to help them out of their difficulties. The Land League objects to the alienation of Native land, and views with small favor either the lessee or lessor. The Natives who sell and lease their lands love the raiment and the comforts of the European; the Leaguers wish to preserve their land .intact, and their people from civilisation. The former wish to have their property improved by the formation of roads and the construction of tclegrapluc lines; the latter to live only on their unimproved homesteads, after the manner of their fathers. A tribe, howevei surrounded by a clothes-wearing, buggy-driving, money-owning people of the. same race as itself, will find defections numerous, and only the aged, austere, and fanatic remaining among the I’ai Mauire.