GREAT NATIVE MEETING AT WAITOTARA.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXX, Issue 4416, 15 May 1875, Page 3

GREAT NATIVE MEETING AT WAITOTARA.

(prom a correspondent.) Papatupu, Waitotara, May 6.

The great native meeting which has just been concluded here was called by the Waitotara natives, to determine the rightful owners of the land on both sides of the upper part of the Waitotara River. The date fixed for the meeting was the 28th April, and on the Ist of the month the natives began building a large whare for the acconrt modation of the visitors, being 66ft. by 16ft,, hut being only intended to serve for the present occasion it was only roughly put up. As a great number of visitors were expected, the Waitotara natives, to obtain as cheaply as possible the large quantity of provisions that would be required, went to Wanganui with three of their own carts, and brought from there all they required, which consisted of about eighty gallons' of rum, several cases of brandy, twenty bags of sugar, twenty casks of biscuits, and half-a-ton of flour. 1 The large whare having been finished, the Wangaehu natives were the first to arrive, which was on the 24th, and were welcomed in the usual Maori style, the intorvening time till the 28th being passed in private meetings and preparations for the great day. The Ngatimanui natives (Taranaki) and the Ngatiapa (Rangitikei) next arrived, on the 28tb, and the Wanganuis, under Major _Kemp, early on the morning of the 29th, which was all that were expected, there being about 400 present at the time. f All the visitors having arrived,, the distribution of the food was the next thing done. The Waitotara natives first brought the potatoes (270 kits) and placed them in front of the large whare in four rows and four tiers high, and upon this were next placed twelve kits of kumeras and about a dozen kits of taro j and above these twenty-six large pigs and a large quantity of fish (fresh and dried eels, dried schnapper, and shark), the grog, biscuits, flour, and sugar being plaeed alongside of those. The Waitotara chiefs then made several short speeches, naming the tribes that were to partake of the feast. Mete Kingi divided the food equally among the different tribes (the women of the different tribes now cooking all the food required by their respective tribes) ; the Waltotaras having previously done all the cooking. , _ , The next day (30th), with the exception of a war dance by the Wanganuis, by Kemp, was almost entirely devoted to feasting. On the Ist May the business part of the meeting began. A map of the disputed land was laid off by strings and pegs, each string denoting a river or stream, and the pegs mountains, and hills, the different claimants naming and describing these and the surrounding country, the one who knew most of these having the first claim, ! every word being carefully written down by four natives belonging to tribes who had no interest or claim in the land. The meeting continued till 3 o’clock, when rain put an end to the proocoedings for that day. The next day being Sunday, the Wanganui natives would not allow them to sit; but business commenced at an early hour on Monday morning (3rd May.) Each of tho claimants having had their say, tho judges (two natives from Rangitikei) gave their decision in favor of Homi, a Waitotara native, but the Wanganuis were not satisfied with

this decision, and demanded another _ trial. The Taranakis, however, seem to have given it up for a bad job ; and most of them started homeward that night. ' Next day the Wangannia made a map of their own, and had. the whole evidence gone over again, which was concluded next day ; when the judges again decided that Hemi was the rightful owner of the land. And it is supposed that he will now offer it to the Government for sale. The Wattgauuis are not at all satisfied J hut nows came of the death of an old native at Turakiua, and the Wangaehu and 1 Turakina natives started home that night, and the Wanganuis followed at daylight next morning, to have a tangi over the coipse, they having entirely cleared out the whole of the potatoes, flour, rum, etc., in six days. Thus ended the great meeting, which has been the talk of the natives here for the last six months.

The meeting passed off pleasantly enough, it will be seen from the foregoing report, so far as the natives were concerned ; but the European settlers in the vicinity did not fare so well. A native correspondent writes under date May 7th : The great native meeting is over at last, but none of the Government officials came down. Indeed, none of them have been within three miles of the place so far as I have seen. I suppose there is very little chance of anything being done till the meeting of the Assembly, but the sheep will be nearly all starved by that time. The Maoris who came to the meeting brought over 200 horses with them, and they have eaten up nearly all the feed, so that there is scarcely i, bit left for them now, and it is so late in the season that it will not have time to grow again before the cold weather sets in.