The New-Zealander.

New Zealander, Volume 3, Issue 198, 22 April 1848, Page 2

The New-Zealander.

Be just and fear not: Let all the ends thou aims't at, be tliy Country's, Thy Ron's, and Truth's.

SATUR D A Y ~ APRIL 22," 1848.

Since the hour in which the Maorie confided " the shadow of the land " to the sceptre of Victoria, and Queenly supremacy assumed the place of Patriarchal and conflicting sway ; since the hour that beheld the independent Islands of New Zealand metamorphosed into legal Possessions of Great Britain, theie has probably been no discussion fraught with deeper import to the present and future prosperity of the infant acquisitions, than that which took place in the Commons House of Parliament, on the 13th December last. Our readers, consentaneously with ourselves, have no doubt, experienced a lively satisfaction in perusal of the energetic debate with which, in our last issue, we presented them. We hail that debate as an omen of happy promise for our future destiny. Its tone and temper is cheering. The anxiety expressed for the prosperity of New Zealand, notwithstanding the ignorance evinced by nearly every speaker with respect to local detail, is generous and just. It offers a convincing guarantee that, — differ as politicians may with respect to measures, — the true interests of the Colony aie anxiously studied, and that an earnest desire to understand our position, and to render justice to our legitimate claims is alike predominant with the Senate and the Nation. Grateful to us as • such an impression must needs be, it is, perhaps, yet more gratifying to find, that in this instance, we are indebted to the sagacity and firmness of Governor Grey for suspension of a constitution, with nothing save the adroit complicity of a Chinese puzzle to recommend it — a constitution, which, if capable of being worked at all, would have been infinitely less tolerable than the Dictatorship, with which Mr. Hume, in the plenitude of,. his admiration, hoped the Government would invest our much commended ruler. It is fortunate for New Zealand, that his Excellency should have proved so succesbful in demonstrating the mischievous fallacies of the pet bantling of my Lord Grey's creation. Peace be with the abortion. May it slumber in undisturbed tranquility during the five years it has been condemned to lie "in ordinary " a.mid other precious piles oi Colonial

office lumber.'' May it be imbued with the principle of the Sadducee, and no " resurgam " chaunt its requiem. For the honor of our native, and the peace of our adopted land, we rejoice at the vigour elicited in discussion of the meditated infraction of the Waitangi tieaty. That stumblingblock of offence — that bitter source of suspicion — that unrighteous evasion of a solemn compact — thanks to the unflinching justice of a British Parliament — is likely to remain for ever in abeyance. The rectitude of purpose — the frank, fearless, English independence, which prompted Bishop Selwyn to pen his eneigetic protest against that umvoithy attempt at spoliation — however censured by the Ministry, or eulogised by the Church party — has been of yeoman sen iee 'in rivctting attention to the premeditated wrong. Surely Mr. Hume, and those of his inclining, when they ventured to stigmatise liis Lordship as " a turbulent priest" and "agitator," must have given but a very supeificial investigation to the question at issue, or have passed unconsidered the motives which induced to so decided and to so praiseworthy a step. Were his lands or his livings involved by any rebellious outbreak, that the enforcement of a fraud so iniquitous might evoke ? Was it agitation to pioteot against a violation of the plighted faith of a nation whose pioudest boast it is to preserve unstained the meanest af her pledges — whose unsueiving fidelity to Bvery engagement has rendered her illustrious for an integrity the admiration of the world 1 Was it turbulence, when the rumblings of a volcano were murmuring in his ears — when the sorry consequences of lecent and inglorious strife were stamped upon his heart ? Was it turbulence in the pastor and the patriot, when a renewal of those sanguinary struggles seemed impending, to step manfully forward in advocacy of peace and justice 1 For a turbulent, meddling priest, none can entertain a more inveterate antipathy than we, but in a matter of such vital consequence we deem the political demonstration of Bishop Selwyn not less honorable to him as a philanthropist than imperative as the head of that body by whose mediation the treaty, sought to be evaded, had been ratified. Beside?, as a right-thinking, high-minded, English gentleman, it was no less his duty to save his countiy from an act of Punica Fides, such as rendered Carthage a bye-word and a reproach to the ancient world ! Who could read Earl Grey's deliberate despatch otherwise than in Mr. It. Palmer's appositely expressed summary of contents. " You have recognised," said the honorable member, " certain territorial rights in the natives already ; do not go beyond that ; and take this principle (?) as your guide in future, that they have no territorial rights at all I " " You will scrupulously fulfil the treaty of Waitangi," writes Lord Stanley." " You will consider it as an ingenions fiction wherewith to hoodwink savages," implies the ordonance of Earl Grey. Which instruction an upright man ought to obey, the Bishop has practically promulgated. His reward will be an approving conscience — the gratitude of his fellow-colonists, and the commendation of all u ith whom honor and honesty are esteemed attributes worthy to be cherished. We aie neither the champion 1 ? of the Church Missionaries on the one hand, nor their apologists on the other , we cannot, nevertheless, forget the benefits the general body has conferred in contemplating the paitial wrong that a few may have entailed by clutching too eagerly the " dirty acres," and when we behold them denounced, and that with indiscriminate acrimony, by men " Perchance accountant for as great a sin," we must not forbear a word or two in defence of an association whose claims upon New Zealand — take them all in all — are of the highest and the holiest. If they have been covetous of the soil, they have, notwithstanding, been earnest in their endeavours to purify the soul. If they grasped at territorial acquisitions, they purchased them with numberless social privations and with many peisonal perils. Whatever their demerits, through their agency, and that of other Christian bodies, the cannibal has abandoned his disgusting orgies, and the path of civilization has been paved. By the Gospel, not by the Sword, has New Zealand been subdued, and despite Mr. Aglionby's objection, that its natives have been overpraised for moderation, we must concur with Mr. Palmer, in asserting that their warfare was not only conducted in a remarkably civilized manner, but not unfrequently ennobled by a dash of chivalrous magnanimity. If a loathly Ghoul, — (slain at Ruapekapeka) did, to gratify cannibal longings, mutilate a British officer, civilized England is not without example of a butcher who forfeited life for a like unnatural indulgence, the monster having slaughtered a helpless female to satisfy his brutal curiosity. Let Mr. Aglionby peruse the narrative of the assault of Badajos, and when he blushes at the atrocities there detailed, let him not forget that the semi-savage Heke manfully rescued a mother and her children in the very whirlwind r>f excitement at the sack of Kororarika. Could he have learnt such forbearance, had the march of the soldiery preceded, that of the missionary ?

The Iticiunn D\rt bungs us English intelligence to the 27th December, being ten days later than that received via Sydney. On the 20th, the Marquis of Lansdowne moved an adjournment of the House until the 3rd of February. On the 1 7th, a long and inteiestmg renewal of the debate on .Jewish disabilities ensued, and on the motion of Loul John Russell— " That it was expedient to remove all civil disabilities at present existing and affecting her Majesty's Jewish subjects, with the like exceptions provided in the case of the subjects ol* her Majesty professing the Roman Catholic faith." On a division, ihe numbers were Foi the motion . . . 253 Against it 18b' Majoiity for ... 67 Murders in Ireland, we are sony to say, ivere on the increase, and a stringent " Crime md Outrage Bill," for that unhappy land, had been passed by a large majority. The dissentient Bishops were still hotly oplosed to the appointment of Dr. tfampden to he See of Hereford, an appointment to Avhich he Marquis of Lansdowne intimated the in.ention of Government to adhere. The Bishop )f "Rochester regretted this, not upon grounds personal to Di. liampden, but because he luui io doubt of his doctrinal condemnation if ■xamined by a competent tribunal.