NEW ZEALAND AFFAIRS.

Hawke's Bay Weekly Times, Volume 2, Issue 102, 14 December 1868, Page 300

NEW ZEALAND AFFAIRS.

. •<;; (From (berStttiidard, 7fch ;'t^|a^^^atj\pj(^i^J|:p^s'^yrai > c^ .-j&y: Maoris i from, ytlie Chatham l : lslanßsy r , was reported to lis \by ]the' Paf nama ■. fully confirmed, : and JifVo,w ; . plan for a J ao , m!9^;df^tfre''. ! inost . ;pfc ; thel tribes ; subdued by

.Genera,! • 'GSjtSer^n^'in 8 ;i864v " The Chatham Island -some 160 ib nificant guard of colonial soldiers, and haying seized ’a.small trading' schooner found their Wy fo : the Northern 'lsland of/ 1 New Zealand; near. Poverty Bay. Simultaneously with this outbreak the tribe of Ngatiruanuis, to which the greater part, of the prisoners be-longed,-and-which is notedifor its:hostility to the whites, suddenly-took the field in force, and surprised? and-cap-tured a small redoubt which had been erected- in their neighborhood. Of the J 25 men who. composed the garrison 10 were killed and. some five or six wounded,'the bodies of the dead being horribly mutilated, after the recent brutal fashion of the Maoris. Since then the rising has spread ahiong the natives of the interior, the. NgatiruanuisLbeing joined by a remnant of the Waikatos, and what is of a graver "significance,, by a company of supposed friendly, natives who were in receipt of Government pay. These are reported to have deserted to the insur gents, carrying with them their breechloader rifles and revolvers. The whole of the district around the captured redoubt is said is said to be in open war and several of the white inhabitants have been murdered and maltreated. In expectation of further disturbances the outlying settlers on the border Were flying into the towns for protection, such forces as were availableregulars; constabulary, and volunteers —were being hastily collected- to meet thd threatened danger. : The immediate scene of this new outbreak is near the native village of Patea, on the confines of the Wellington ahd Taranaki provinces, a portion of territory which was confiscated from the Ngatiruanui as their portion of utu, QY atonement for the crime of rebellion. The district is. remote from the English settlements, and was . one of the principal strongholds of the Kingites in the late war. The colonial journals anticipate a general rising of the same tribes against which we - waged our last regular campaign, and indulge in somewhat gloomy forebodings of another lengthened disturbance of the peace of the island. . How well-grounded these misgivings are may be judged by considering the character of our new enemies and the nature and real strength of the force to which they are. to be combatted. According to all numerical calculation this war ought to present no . serious difficulty to the colonists. . The total number of Maoris how extant in all the islands is computed in a return 'just issued by the registrar-general of New Zealand at 38,540 men,v women, and children. Of these fully one-half may be reckoned as fairly civilised and well disposed to the British connection. Of the other half, a. large portion, though still not well affected towards the white' settlers, retain so lively an impression of the power of our arms as shown to them for the first time in General Cameron’s campaigns, that it .is probable they will hesitate before joining another insurrection. The tribes whom we have most to fear are the remnants of the late Waikato organisation,. the .Ngatiruanuis, with their allies and dependents, the Haubaus of the eastern coast. The : total-. number of fighting men which are likely to be arrayed us, even supposingthat theinsurrection . assumes the dimensions expected, caunotexceed 2000; V V.':

' * Oil the 4 other hand, ?tlie white population s of New Zealand has increased ■'i.^ofasi-t^fee^tit^e.f-^resehi'-nioineiit' iit*- = tle;shortof2oO,OOO. |;A conflict,uaderthesecircumßtances.betweenthe ; alter igihiaL and' the white;* man - might appear to'present no -formidable «§?; pect-; and;-there is; .sombi lexcuse for those' who shbuid deride tlie- fejus -.of and; we

.long ffifmwHihh-New^Zealiui^'diffienlty^tr .manner littleconsideration, Jiqwr ( eyer, qf.the ’£§culi& insurrection, will lead us to a truer es* J tinmte.jof{ situation. Inr the' hrst pjacei’ .although af , is; true* that the. population sis /jiahouf six;, timeb“• greatei; thanthatofthe hatiyes, yet: we = must remembertliat;the,force of the Maoris iscpnceiitrated,in ; one .island, while that/, of ,the [-Etirbpeans is mauily in another. Clwing to the superior .attractions presented by the southern island _for European settlement it is there where the great bulk of the white population is to He found. ; ,o‘n the other hand^,, the home of the Maoris—the centre of th eir power—is in the north ern island. 0fthe.38,540 natives only 1433 are returned ip the census as inhabiting the southern island. Thus the numerical disparity is .very much, lessened between the Maoris and the Europeans, if we come to reckon not the whole number on: each side, but the number residing iu the northern island, which has been always, and must ever be, the only seat of war. For all practical purposes the southern provinces are nearly as far removed from the Maori difficulty as are the colonies of the Tasmania and New Sbuth .Wales. It is the northern settlers only who are exposed to danger, and it is they only who have to furnish the .means of combatting it. Making further allowances for the extraordi? nary natural difficulties of the country the conflict is by no means so one-sided as it would appear at a first glance. The European settlers are scattered along the coasts, and are mainly resident in seaport towns. The Maoris have possession of the interior, with its impenetrable fastnesses, its dangerous morasses; its precipitous and unexplored mountain’chains. The settlers, by the very nature of their avocations, are obliged to live in more open; country. The Maoris can congregate their armed men in considerable numbers, ami are. always ready for war. The settlers have their own business to attend to, and cannot afford to ;be perpetually watching the Maoris. ; Under these circumstances they complain, not without reason, of the serious inconvenience of having; what is really a foreign power in their midst, able,.to.select its own time for attack and robbery. They plead that,they came to the country under the impression that it was a British colony, and it is rather hard that they should be obliged to fight the; Maoris at their own expense in order to assert the sovereignty of the Queen of England over New Zealand.. They declare that this: is an imperial question. That although they may be justly called upon to protect themselves against enemies of their own making, it is scarcely fair that they should be expected to bear the brunt of a war, the object of which on the part ,of the Maoris, is to throw off the British supremacy and to proclaim their own independence.

It has been absurdly represented, by some of the more ignorant of the systematic maligners of the British settler at- home, - that the- colonists make a profit out of such wars, and that they cultivate them as a kiud of mercantile investment. How true this is we may judge from the history of this present outbreak, which is precisely similar in character to all other outbreaks which have occurred in New Zealand. The fact that at one of the most critical points on the frontier, in the midst of disaffected tribes, a redoubt, garrisoned by 25 white men, represented the whole warlike force of the colony, cannot be said to confirm the theory which charges coionists with seeking occasions of quarrel. . The preparations which the colonists were able to make, after the intelligence of Ihev surprise at Turoturomokai, afford further illustration, of the supposed rapacious and bellicose character of our> people. To avenge, the'slaughter of the garrison of the captured redoubt and the murder of the> neighboring settlers the commandant of the local forces had- asked the Government to increase his little airmy? ; , For economic reasons,” however, Colonel was only able 'to; obtain one-third of what he askedfor,dndfbr these,: he had to go recruiting-ini Weh forms us of these tremendous, preparatibhs; itesteits chief of th^defehce

of the tow;nship(anS)p v rbvihse ;of»Tara-, nal&iippii the • ** friendly” tribes,. and forces The exptession of such a hdpe surely proves to im the easteifcp bfW spiritfthe very reverse ’to|thffrw^ tribute<f tbfthe'New" Zealand teolonists by. : 't)ieir;deltra^i^m;Enjgiani^ : . 1 . ;;^lirifus "trust that the friendly natives and-the .Taranaki irregulars together may prove equal to the : occasion, 1 and that they will be able to suppress this new Maori insurrection before it attains the dimensions of ; another : New Zealand war; ' It is well to however,? hojv small an enemy is able to disturb the peace of a New Zealand province;, to remember, also, that: in this instance the provocation, is come entirely from'the natives; and that; in any* event 1 the colonists are not responsible, unless it be through their weakness, for this turning out to be a war in reality.?: ' - .