THOSE FATTENING MAORIS.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 2040, 7 September 1880, Page 3

THOSE FATTENING MAORIS.

To the Editor of the Globe. SIE, —The Parihaka puzzle I think may fairly be ranked ns scarcely inferior to the great Bobs Puzzle of Fifteen, and along with those other incomprehensible subjects which no fellah can find out. You ore aware, of course, that we have 136 of Te Whiti’s noble subjects under treatment now in our local •prison. They may be said to be faring sumptuously at our expense, Hying in luxurious idleness on the primeat the market affords, while we, poor noodles, pay the piper along with the properly tax, and hare to do it all—including the support of those depending on our earnings at a time when the earnings are in a sadly demoralized condition. Verily, we aro a people that delighteth at being humbugged and robbed, spending our substance for nought, and plenteous in mercy to those lazy insolent savages who have openly set our laws at defiance. Surely if there is a people that deserve the name of being the dupes, we have a strong claim to the title. For what other nation on the face of God’s earth would do as we are doing ? Where, in the history of colonisation, has it been recorded that those who wilfully defied the constituted authorities have been pampered and petted in like manner to the way we are practising at present with the Maori prisoners ? Whoever heard of an extravagant dietary scale for rebels in gaol before, such as these prisoners have been supplied with, and are at this moment enjoying? Surely the ordinary fare of prisoners awaiting trial would in their case have been no hardship. And if wo have to keep them, why is it that they should be kept in idleness ? Have we all become Exeter Hall sympathisers after these many years of persecution endured at the hands of the blustering, plundering Natives ? It is said now that we are preparing apartments for the next shipload of these haughty prisoners at Hips Island, and the same indulgent policy, I suppose, is to be kept up there. Everything is to be made ready in proper style to receive the lordly guests. The houses to be put in order, and an exile on the lonely Ripa to be made as attractive and congenial as possible. Why, sir, it makes one’s blood boil to think of the crawling pusillanimity of such work. If we don’t want to kill the poor creatures with kindness—if kindness it can be called to overload their stomachs with two or three pounds of strong meats daily and shut them up in a yard without employment - why not shift the whole lot of them to Quail Island, with a distinct order that those who want to live must work ? Let us have the island brought under cultivation, a matter easy of accomplishment in the hands of a few good overseers. The present Government have shown themselves capable of firmness in enforcing arrests, but to my thinking the good effect of that firmness is stultified ia the Native mind by the indulgence shown the law breakers after they are made prisoners. I may be mistaken, if so, I trust I am open to be corrected. Yours, &c, AN EX WAIKATO MILITIAMAN. Lyttelton, September 4th, 1880.

[_Our correspondent is somewhat bitter against the prisoners. He has overlooked the fact that the offence for which they have been imprisoned is of a peculiar nature. They were taken when endeavoring to assert what they considered a right, judging from Native precedent. According to European law, they were entirely in the wrong, but still some consideration should be paid to the Native view of the question, and also to the fact that our Government has hitherto strained the law in detaining them so long. Even in these hard times we hardly fancy that the public will be anxious to alter the general principle of dealing with the prisoners, for fear of the cost of a few pounds of beef, more or less. — Ed. Globe 1 .

The following letters appear in this morning’s issue of the “ Press ” :