BISHOP SELWYN'S ADDRESS TO THE WAIKATOES.

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume II, Issue 97, 13 March 1863, Page 3

BISHOP SELWYN'S ADDRESS TO THE WAIKATOES.

[ From the Sydney Morning Herald.] [Concludedfrom our last.'] Vt e arc not utn.ll aware how far Bishop Selwyn may be excused in speaking in language which seemed to strip him of something of his national character, and in adopting a tone not very creditable to British civilization. "What can tiie Bishop mean when lie sj.'eaks of himself as a “ half caste.” If he be so, then in what relation does he stand to his own countrymenV We are aware that a meaning may be imposed upon these words which it may not be improper to tolerate, though there is but small dignity in such condescensions ; hut delivered as they were to a people whose hostility is undisguised and who met ail Ins advances with coolness and indifference, they were as little creditable to his judgment as to his taste. We should have been prepared to see the Bishop occupy neutral ground in these deplorable times. Perhaps his influence would have been enlarged by his absolute neutrality ; but in denouncing murder and robbery and rebellion, paying homage to a Maori king, and accusing the Governor, to whose hands the honour of the British Hag was so long entrusted, is a stretch of wild disloyalty which nothing could excuse, and which seems incredible in view of the mischief it is sure to accomplish. One thing is perfectly clear to our minds, that, unless by such a demonstration of force such as shall render all idea of rebellion absurd even to the native minds—they will proceed to extremities. There are questions which will have to be decided by war and its inevitable attendants and consequences. The irritation of the New Zealand question is largely due to the impolicy and delusion of Dr. Selwyn. The New Zealand people have many claims to consideration and we should be the very hist to enforce and the very last to abandon tnem, were the hand of oppression upon them. But they have been indulged beyond any example in the history of colonisation. They have never been touched in any of their rights by the hand of power. The Government in all its dealings with them has been scrupulous to follv. ]>

i - v cto even tuicittiGu what no other country would tolerate, and wnat indeed has contributed to that contempt which can only be cured by some terrible lesson. If the Kew Zealanders sink in the scale ol civilisation and become a miserable remnant, as will probably prove the case—for in this struggle they will necessarily succumb—they will owe to a great extent their destruction not to the hands of the settlers—to the negligence of Government or the unfriendless of the British to those madmen who, under the notions of theocratic Government have encouraged impossible schemes of independence; taught them to distrust the representative of the Queen, and led them to suppose that it would be in their power by resistance to compel a European colony to submit to their capricious domination. _______