THE NATIVES AND THE MIDDLE ISLAND.

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume II, Issue 108, 20 April 1863, Page 3

THE NATIVES AND THE MIDDLE ISLAND.

(From the Canterbury Press.) Do our readers imagine that the Native question is nothing to them P Are they bored with the constant recurrence to it ? Then call it by any other name. Do not think of it as a Native question at all ; think of it rather as a vast complication of questions which involve the future of the Middle Island. It is a financial question of the greatest importance, because it involves a perpetual drain on our wealth to which no limit is at present apparent. It is a military question, volving, involving the solution of that great difficulty how the Colony is to be defended. It is a political question of no less magnitude than the dismemberment of the Colony, the destruction of the Provincial Governments, the reconstruction of a constitution. Can we in the Middle Island shut our eyes to a subject which is creating political revolution and threatening financial disaster ? There is of course a purely Native side to the question ; we may consider it as regards the Natives alone, and our duty of governing them as best we can. It ought of course to be so considered ; but the constant recurrence to such a subject would be very tedious and uninteresting to those who have no immediate duties connected with it. Put when this Native question is positively modifying our political arrangements ; when it is retarding our progress and threatening to remould our form of Government, it forces itself on our attention whether we will or not. When the Assembly left the matter in the hands of the Governor last year, it left an expenditure going on which the colony would, no doubt, cheerfully consent to bear, provided it saw some definite result to be obtained. It voted £200,000 to recompense Taranaki for its losses in the late war, and it voted it K cheerfully, believing it to bo the final settlement of the account. But what has been done since P Wo have perused the Northern papers with attention, and we are realty unable to state that the position of the colony is altered in

any one important particular since the session closed. When the whole question is one of time, the passage of time with no result is the failure of policy. The mere fact that six months have elapsed and the position of affairs remains unaltered is the effectual break down of the Governnient.' It is the case of a commercial undertaking in which there are vast outgoings and no returns.

_ The first step towards the restoration of a position of security must bo in the establishment of a police force. We hear from Napier that 50 constables are to be stationed there. Need it have taken six months or six days to come to that conclusion ? The relations of the Natives and Europeans at Hawse’s Bay have for a long time been of a very critical character. The gross outrage committed in the streets of the town, of which an account will be found in another column, is but a repetition on a more prominent stage, of the sort of lawlessness which has been growing for some years in that district. Mr. McLean, the new Superintendent, no doubt acted with judgment in staving off a struggle between the English population and the Maories, for .which the former are not prepared. But why are they not prepared ? Why is not the civil power sufficiently strong in that district? Talk of the law being carried into Maori districts! Why here is a chief who declares in the middle of an English town and on Queen’s land that if a Maori does wrong ho shall be given up to the Maoris to be tried by Native law. It is not the Bishop or Philo-Maoris who submit to this dishonour; it is a government of men who have always proclaimed the necessity of force. We confidently believe that every act of this kind costs the country tens of thousands in the future.

So a ,2ain with regard to Taranaki. The war, so far as Taranaki claims are concerned, is still ragin" at that place. We say this is positively true so far as financial results arc concerned. The General Assembly has declared that the Taranaki settlers shall be recompensed for their losses. But their losses accumulate every hour. A Taranaki settler's loss depends on his being kept from his farm, and compelled to live in town, and do nothing. Sir George Grey begged the Taranaki

men not to go—not to leave Taranaki. They are content to wait. They live in hope. But the As* sem bly has recognised the principle that they are to live in hope at our expense, not at their own. We can’t retrca : from that position. If £260,000 were duo to them last year, and they have waited at the request of the, government that is of the colony, the bill is daily increasing. And that bill we in the Middle Island have to pay. It would have been far cheaper to have bought up the whole property of the settlers, andgiven the settlement to the Taranakis and Ngatiruanuis, and to have located the settlers, elsewhere, than to have allowed the present state of things to continue. A do-nothing Government is costly beyond all calculation. Now Sir George Grey and his Ministers have gone to New Plymouth. We most earnestly and cordially hope that they will be successful. Wo shall be ready to load them with applause. if they are so. But we are bound to hold themselves responsible if they are not. The tiling hbs to bo done. They have accepted the chance of honor if they succeed, but with the certainty of disgrace if they fail. They shall have their reward. We do not believe that if Tataraimaka had been occupied a year ago the war would have been renewed. We do not believe it will be renewed now if the Government insist on Tataraimaka bein<* given up forthwith. There are reports that William Thompson has sent to the southern tribes to beg them to give up Tataraimaka. We do not know if this is true. But it is very likely. Bishop 3elwyn’s words, and the Governor’s visit have not been without effect—they cannot have been. We confidently believe the Maoris will not fight for Tataraimaka. They know it is ours. In tlie meantime the rapid tide of population is rolling ou. The impatience of delay on the part of the European population in the settlement of this question is growing apace, and the favorable moment will have been lost for ever. One year more of the present Government and the doom will have issued which will have consigned the Maoris to a tomb, and have left a scar on the character of the New Zealand colonists which will never be erased.

That will be the result of the Government by pottering.