SELF-RELIANCE.

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume 13, Issue 674, 19 April 1869, Page 3

SELF-RELIANCE.

(Prom the Press, 6th AjWl.),

The late despatches from Colonel Whitmore are a most satisfactory re* futation of the objection taken to the policy of self-reliance, from the supposed extreme difficulty, if not impossibility, of raising a European force capable of following the Maoris into the bush. We have never held the alleged difficulty in much account. It has been found over and over again that Europeans, when brought into hostile contact with men of a semicivilised race, speedily become more than a match for them on their own ground and in their own arts. The backwoodsmen of the Canadian forests, for instance, or the trappers of the far West, are as much at home in the woods or on the prairie, and as expert in all the artifices of Indian warfare as the Indians themselves. And so we have always maintained that it would be easy to find a few hundred men in these colonies who, with a little practical training, would turn out as good bushmen as the Maoris. Colonel Whitmore has proved that the thing can be done by doing it. Out of the unpromising material committed to him lie has developed a most effective force. His latest despatch reports the men under his command as being no longer at all intimidated by the bush, as capable of making their way anywhere in it, and of living in bivouac for weeks at a time without inconvenience in any weather. So far then the colony has got the best of it; but what is to be done next ? Is Colonel Whitmore to spend the rest of his days, as he well may, in hunting Titokowaru from place to place in the forests of the West Coast ? Tho chase is as ignoble, and scarcely so useful, as that commemorated by Sydney Smith, of the Dutch burgomaster hunting a rat in a dyke. The game is not worth the cost. Titokowaru may evade the keenest pursuit so long as he keeps in the back country; or if hard pressed, what is to hinder him from retreating into the interior and seeking protection from Rewi ? Colonel Whitmore, it seems* has already found a difficulty in following him, lest he should thereby offend the susceptibilities of neutral tribes. It seems to us that what the colony wants now, Titokowaru's invasion having been repelled and punished, is to secure itself from a repetition of such inroads. We have followed one part of Sir J. Burgoyne's advice; now let us follow the other, We have, driven the natives into the bush; let us keep them there. That may be done with no great difficulty and at comparatively small expense. Let a line be drawn, as far in advance as can be, at such a point as military authorities pronounce most suitable for purposes of defence, and let that line mark the limit of European settlement. Let the natives have the country beyoud to themselves, unmolested so long as they refrain from molesting us. The frontier line might be defended, if required, by a line of posts, occupied in case of need by parties of militia. The settlers within the line should be armed, and called out for exercise at certain intervals; volunteering should be encouraged, with prize-firing, and anything that would accustom the men to the use of their weapons. Then let a strong force of local police be maintained, something after the pattern of the Irish Constabulary. Lastly, a body of, say, 500 men should be kept at the disposal of the General Government, to be at once thrown on any spot where disturbances might break out. We beleive that any part of tho country where this system was brought into operation would be as secure as it can possibly be made under the existing circumstances of the colony; while the whole cost, including payments to friendly natives, would be much less than half the a day which the colony is said to be paying at the present mo menU