TO MY CRITIC:— "W.B."

King Country Chronicle, Volume I, Issue 25, 12 April 1907, Page 3

TO MY CRITIC:— "W. 8."

TO THE EDITOR. SIR,—I do not propose to continue a controversy unduly, but trust you will allow me space to have this word with " W. 8." According to his letter, the subject has been reduced to an entirely personal matter with my esteemed friend. His most recent effusion is headed : " To my critics : Backblocker; etc." To my mind, this rather savours of assumption. The irresistible desire to parade in the limelight is to be deplored, and were I given to venom or malice, I might make capital out of the personal aspect of the case. If " W. 8." cannot deal with a question impersonally, and on its merits, it is obvious there must be some serious weakness, either in his case, or in its advocate. The original "bone of contention" was the land sale, and certain methods adopted thereat by the Native owners. There has been neither refutation nor justification of the charges then made. Instead, there has been an undignified and pointless tirade against the British race, and because I endeavoured _ to keep my friend to the point, he immediately seized the opportunity to make the subject a personal matter. Britain has been guilty of many mistakes, chiefly those dictated by a great liberal spirit, and an honest desire to do its duty, as a leading world power, in the interests of humanity. That errors of this description have been perpetrated in New Zealand no one will deny, and that blunders through ignorance of conditions, or wrong interpretation of motive, have also been made, is equally obvious,but to charge the race with all the crimes of the decalogue, in its dealings with the Maori, is to class it almost as low as were our Native friends in their prehistoric m an-eating days. However,

I have already made sufficient demands upon your space, and as it is impossible to get a plain and reasonable answer from my esteemed friend, I must, so far as I am concerned, declare the subject closed. I am pleased to reiterate the tribute to my friend's undoubted literary ability, and again counsel him, in a friendly spirit, to adhere to the loftier paths of literature, so that his name may stand yet higher in the estimation of the best spirits of that nation whom he chooses to decry in the interests of the Maori. Shake. —I am, etc., BACK-BLOCKER.