OUR TREATMENT OF THE MAORIS.

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume 15, Issue 800, 30 June 1870, Page 4

OUR TREATMENT OF THE MAORIS.

[Evening Post, June 16. J

We learn from the Thames Advertiser that a meeting was recently held at Shorcland, to consider the question of the native leases on which the town is built, and that one of the speakers at that meeting —the Rev. G. Smale—in the course of his remarks, said :

We all know that a i uneducated people, and people just emerged from harbg.ri.sm, when they crae suddenly into the possession of wealth, are apt to give way to extravagance and luxury. I think the Government of New Zealand are doing the natives a great injury by allowing them to receive such lar.. e amounts as rental for the laada of this township. I believe that in many instances the money which we have paid as vent for our allotments ha= : gone to support Te Kooti and those mei. who are in arm* against the Government. I think these are sufficiently cogent reasons why we should place things in a clear light before the authorities. lam a friend of the natives; I have labored for them for many years, and what I say I speak as their friend, and it ought to have some weight. Ido not s;.e»k as an enemy to the natives, but as their friend, and I am doing the natives a friendly act when [ recommend th;t the Government should not allow large amounts of money, without direction or restriction, to be paid to the aborigines of this island.

We have not the pleasure of knowing the Hew G. Sarnie; but we have no hesitation whatever in cordially endorsing the sentiments he has given utterance to. A fruitful source of much of t!ie trouble that we have experience.] in dealing with the native face is found in the system we have pursued of placing large sums ot money in their hands without being able to exercise any supervision over the manner in which it was spent. No doubt, as Mr Smale says, much of the. money given them, either for rent, or as pay for .services, lias found its way into the hands of our enemies, and enabled them to provide themseives with t lie means of holding out against us; and this is unavoidable, while we continue to employ natives to fight for us The boundary between the friendly and ithe hostile section of the race is so extremely vague, and there are so many different degrees, boih of friendship and hostility, blending in the centre so as to be uudistinguish able, that it must be received as a fact that while we continue to provide our friends with arms, ammunition, and supplies, a portion oi' those, through the usual ramifications of kindred and friendship, will find its way into the hands of our foes. We ■may pass as many "Arms Ordinances''as we please, directed against our own countrymen, but we will never prevent the hostile natives arming themselves while we give arms and the means to procure them, indiscriminately, to the friendlies But, besides thi>-, there is another view of the question. The instances in which the Maoris have been found to make a beneficial use of the large sums paid to them are rare indeed. There are some of the chiefs who have leased lands to Europeans, and and derive from them a fixed income who use. their wealth to a certain extent judiciously; but the great I mass of the inferior men and women, I who receive sums accruing from the sale of land or from any other source, squander them in the most foolish and unprofitable manner. Generally the largest portion of the money is hypothecated to storekeep ers, who have given-credit knowing it was due, and the small balance-is almost invariably squandered in in toxication or in useless gewgaws. We have all seen thousands paid away to Maoris again and again; but how many of them did we find the better of receiving the payment after a few weeks? Like children, they purchase gay clothing and glittering toys and deem themselves at the acme of happiness, or indulge in dissipation, until their funds are expended, but in either case they awaken and find themselves wors'e off than before. When the Manayvatu purchase money was paid,

[hawkers went tip with cart-loads and horse-loads of trumpery jewelry, quantities of which were sold, and 'what with repayment of advances and fresh expenditure, the money left the hands of the na#ves, as fast as they received it. The Wanganui natives, now waiting to receive £15,000, will, when they get it, fling it away in a few .days amongst the publicans and storekeepers of Wanganui, and be no better off than before. All this requires alteration. The Maoris are enormously expensive to the Colony, especially under their present management, and it is due both to them—who are to a certain extent under our protection —and to ourselves, that the money they receive: should prove of some utility to them,; and not be the means of doing us positive injury. We have ever treated them like spoiled children, and pampered them to their serious injury; we must in futiue guide them with a firmer hand, and, asserting our superiority, insist upon exercising move direction and supervision over them.