Decadence of the Maons

Feilding Star, Volume XII, Issue 128, 21 April 1891, Page 4

Decadence of the Maons

In modern, times, there have been three of what may be termed historical ..oauaes. tending to the decrease of the.Maqri race. There were the/great wars of Hongi between 1 820 and ;} 1831 ; the wars,; in Waikato, ■ Tarauaki, and the East coast between I 1860;aii^- 1870"; ;atld~th"e~]Jand Court - devastations, from; 1870, up till, toe present time. The . two . firsts tiamed. causes affected the Maoris very seriously.:. ..When civilised nations . are at war, and send bodies of trained men to fight, as a : rule the^ home social eystem is not yory much disturbed ; but with the Maoris the case was very different.' ; Women went into the field, and. they, 'with their children, were with the, men in every beleaguered pa.'.';:'* Many women i were actually shot in b'atfl ? e,4t being; impossible to dis» tiuguinh them from the men. Then the w^lTole'of the people were kept in a constant - state of iexcitement^ and alarm.. "Women trailed about in the biiair in storms,' and suffered great^privations from want of shelter a«dl want of food. /F,ew ( of the child reii jj&r^jn these circumstances could survive; ' Then, when ,th<3 1 r war concluded;! 'came" the LWd u __Theße ■ nec^eSitat*e3~gTeat7 gatherings of hundre^ds^of Maoris arpundsbinß. Hotel, at a from their" 'settlements/ . TKeife. ■ ttey , lay , 'Huddied . ; f or months under some'Vre'tcHed^/applQgyVfpr.a^. tent, themselves' insensibi whenever /they vxould; with . poisoned alcohol, and, dying, .rapidly , wjth fever anifi^consump.tira^ the^Land^GouTts^ w^ere more' fatal than a- ; warT4-Auc^a^d*He^d'.j, 11 ..