NEW ZEALAND WAR.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume IV, Issue 134, 10 June 1869, Page 2

NEW ZEALAND WAR.

The following letter containing au entirely new proposition for putting an end to the war has been addressed to the Secretary of State for the Colonies by one Colonel D'Arcy, late Governor of Gambia: — My Lord, — My experience in bushfighting in India and Africa will, I trust, be accepted by your Lordship as my excuse for venturiug to trouble you with a suggestion, which may, if carried out, possibly prevent future outbreak in New Zealand.' In a leader of the Times of 29th January, this sentence appears: — " The Sepoy foughtagainst men of his own race; the Sikh helped to save our Empire in 1857; the Negro serves uuder our colours against Negro kings on the Coast of Africa. Why should not the New Zealand Native be equally amenable to military discipline?" Such is nofc quite the case. Hindostan and. Africa are large continents. The Sepoy recruited in Oude has no sympathy with the Native of Mysore. The Sikhs have never been called to fighfc against a Sikh; the plunder of Delhi-was always his ambition. Countries beyond the Sutlej were to them a terra incognita, and the negroes of Equatorial Africa, first emancipated and then disciplined fco the profession in our West Indian Islands, have nothing iv common with the halfMoorish Negro of the Senegambia, against whom he is generally arrayed. I doubt very much the expediency of enlisting Maori to fight Maori — all natives of one island. In New Zealaud a difficulty presents itself in forming a permanent force from the settlers — labor is too valuable to admit of tlio compulsory idleness of Europeans, where intelligence is so much required in a new cleariug ; I am of opinion that a small corps d'armee might be raised afc Freetown, Sierra Leone, and shipped as a permanent Colonial Force to New Zealand, consisting of 500 rank and file of Zouave Iv fan try, Colony-bom Euglish blacks, including 100 trained gunners ; if ths Colonial Government would entertain such a plau, I most rospectfully be* to offer my services to enlist and train the volunteers, having served a long apprenticeship in the service, and, moreover, I am very well known on the West Coast by the people, who would follow me willingly. I have, &c, G. D'Arcy/.