THE WAIMATE PLAINS DIFFICULTY.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIV, Issue 5616, 29 March 1879, Page 3

THE WAIMATE PLAINS DIFFICULTY.

We are -glad to leam upon good authority that there seems to be a strong probability of a peaceful solution of the native difficulty being arrived at. A large number of the original owners are said to be entirely opposed to fighting, as they fear that they may lose the reserves which have been promised to them. These men have expressed a wish to meet the Native Minister on the ground. Hr. Sheehan will start for Hawera on Sunday. The Wairarapa Daily yesterday published the following as authentic: —“The Hon. Mr. Sheehan, when at the Parihaka meeting, demanded, the surrender of Hiroki. _ This was refused. He (Sheehan) then explained to the natives the course ho was about to pursue respecting the Waiinate Plains, and was engaged doing so for about half an hour, when Te Whiti, in violation of the promise he had made before the Native Minister began speaking, . interrupted him and made one of his most violent and fanatical utterances, characterising the action of the Government as theft, and accusing, the Government of being the murderers of McLean—not Hiroki. , After the Native Minister had left Parihaka—the same day—a meeting was held by the natives, and Te Whiti decided that the surveyors should be turned off three times peaceably, but that on tho fourth time they were to do as Hiroki did. Accordingly a party went down on Monday and removed the survey camps as already reported. The motive for Te Whiti’s action is perfectly plain.. For the last seven or eight years he has deluded the people by assertions of prophetic and even God-hke powers, Lach year at his annual meeting he stood pledged to do various wondrous miracles. This year he was to have raised the dead, to have restored all the confiscated lands, and to have ascended tOheavenwithSirG.Grey. Noneof thesethinga came to pass, and bis speech at the late meeting was one of the lowe-t and most hesitating he has ever been known to deliver. As a consequence the people begin to murmur, and numbers left Parihaka in disgust. To save himself he has thrown himself into the hands of a more violent party. So far as the Government are at present advised, Titokowaru is not a consenting party to any violent mea- . Bures, and it is believed that Government will take the necessary steps -to vindicate the authority of law. Tho Lyttelton Times in an article advocating peace at any price says :—“ In one moment the colony would lose tho fruits of the policy of pacification so carefully established by Sir Donald McLean, and so patiently and successfully carried out by him ' and by his successors in office till the present time. The boast of our statesmen that native troubles have become essentially things of the past would in an instant lose the beneficial force it has exercised upon the public opinion of Great Britain, And.all this is to be faced for—twhat 1 Primarily to make good a threat which the IS ative Minister ought never to have used, find which he permitted himself appar- . ently in an unguarded moment to employ. Force will make the threat good, and give the colony the confiscated land after it has Jought hard for it. The sale of the land will make the fortunes of a few people, and put a few thousands into the public exchequer, probably not enough to recoup the expense of the fighting. The game is not worth the candle. It would bo better never to acquire tho land at all than to do so at a price equivalent to the stoppage of the colonial development for at least a generation, with all its attendant evils. But the alternative of war is not the loss of this land of the Waimate Plains. To retreat from the position now taken up is only to postpone the acquirement of that country. In the long run it must come into our hands : it is merely a-question of time. The patient policy of Sir Donald McLean was founded upon the principle that time is the best ally of the white race. V Even now the last terms offered, over a year ago, are under consideration in the King country. When the offer of these terms was seriously entertained, and accepted os the basis of .negotiation, we oom- , moated upon the fact; as the best sign of a coming final and peaceful settlement that had yet appeared. We looked upon it as the chief result of ; the policy patiently followed by Sir Donald McLean, Sir George Grey, and Mr. Sheehan. Our remark was that the fruit of the tree planted by the first of these three was about to he gathered by the two last. We can only regret'that a similar remark cannot he made with respect to the result of the Parihaka meeting. If the Native Minister thought the time had arrived when the offer of liberal terms can bo safely supplemented by the use of a threat, when he could go to the native prophet with a lucrative peace in one hand and vigorous ! war in the other, the removal of the surveyors .ought to convince him that his thought was wrong. The reality of Te Whiti’s influence with his people has been for years recognised and made much of, and Mr. Sheehan’s presence at Parihaka was a strong testimony in its favor. It is impossible to believe that this influence is lost because Te Whiti has consented at last to do what a large section of his people has for a considerable period wished him to do. That he has done it ,is clear proof that the threat of the Native Minister was premature. . The colony can very much better afford to do without the Waimate Plains for a generation or two than to lose its credit, public and private, for a much shorter period. The loss to the land revenue of the proceeds of land sold there will be’great, hut unless the title was safe, that source of income ought not to have been counted upon. . One error in judgment cannot be justifled by circumstances that have grown out of another. ' The natives, in removing the surveyors, have, we are. tdd, shown the best of ~„ good temper.; The best course for the Government is to withdraw from their land sale and look . equally ; pleasant. .Negotiation and !patieuco .will. give . them all they want. The burning of‘powder-is unnecessary, and would ; be incalculably mischievous.: