Saving the Native Race.

Gisborne Times, Volume V, Issue 111, 20 May 1901, Page 1

Saving the Native Race.

(Lyttelton Times.) From the tone of the replies which Mr AT. Ngata made to an interviewer in Auck. land the other day, it is evident that he ■ has anticipated to some extent the regeneration of the Maoris. He at any rate takes a much more hopeful view of the future of his raeo now than he did some years ago, when, as a young University student at Canterbury College, ho predicted then 1 inevitable decay and extinction. The best antidote to despair is always work, and in the’hoble efforts he is making to raises the Maoris this apostle of education ha& t found the prospect of regeneration not so hopeless as it seemed at a distance. He has taken up a mission which the legends of many native races ascribe to one of their number, some mystorious chief like Hiawatha, borli to raise and unite them. Mr Ngata comes in at a later stage of civilisation than these primitive saviours, and he uses modern methods, but he has the spirit attributed to them. He identifies himself and his interests his people, and though by Maori custom he is the representative of only one particular tribe, yet he has many of those qualities which would fit him to be an “ uncrowned king ” over them all, with an influence very much wider than that of Mahuta. His devotion, his scholastic attainments, and his really wise and farreaching views on the best method of elevating his people, make his own example a shining illustration of the moral and intellectual standard of which the Maori is capable of reaching. “ Wlmt one is, what may not thousands be?” Though we hardly expect a generation of Ngatas in the near future, the existence of even a few, like Dr Pomare and others, proves that the race may yet outstrip every other whose savage origin is as recent as its own.