South Canterbury Times, WEDNESDAY, JUNE 1, 1881.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 2557, 1 June 1881, Page 2

South Canterbury Times, WEDNESDAY, JUNE 1, 1881.

The influence of the Maori King is fast on the wane. Tribes who a short time back acknowledged his mana are now setting his orders at defiance. The other day we published a telegram stating that a prominent Waikato chief and his whole tribe had with contemptuous suddenness left a natire meeting because Tawhiao had peremptorily forbidden the chief to lease lauds to the Pakeha. Judging from a telegram received this morning, the King has evidently determined to assert his authority. It is stated that the principal chiefs of the Ngatimaniopoto tribe, including Rewi, hare been ordered to go into the interior. Rewi has also been ordered to return the Crown grant received from the Government for his new house at Kihikihi, to receive no more pensions ’from the Government, and to pay for all fencing and grass seed sown by Europeans on his land. It is easy enough for the King to order, but will Rewi obey ? He is the most powerful chief in the North Island, His influence is greater than that of the King. No one of the native race has stood more boldly against the encroachments of the white man than the famous chief of the Ngatimaniopotos. For years his “ sullen isolation ” was a by-word in New Zealand. The face of the pakeha was an object he expressed himself os never wishing to see. But a change came over the mind of the old man. He could not resist the blandishments of Sir George Grey and Mr Sheehan. He was induced to visit Auckland, and he was lionised in the northern capital. Rewi’s eyes were opened. The crowds which greeted him in the streets of Auckland when he rode in the same carriage with the Governor taught the powerful savage a lesson. He saw that there was no withstanding the inroads of the stranger. The sad fact had dawned upon his imind that what he and his followers had so bravely fought for could not be. To use a common expression he returned to the Waikato a wiser and a sadder man. From that day it was felt that the native difficulty in the Waikato was at an end. That was the district which was regarded as the bulwark of the native power. It appears, however, that the puppet King refuses to accept the inevitable, and is now making a dying kick to recover the slender

man ahe once possessed. He has so far succeeded in preventing the Queen’s writ running through every portion of the North Island; but as the chiefs,one by one, are claiming a right to dispose of their own lands in the way they think best, -the time is .not far distant when the Queen’s law shall rule supreme over the whole Waikato. It is time that an end was put to the present anomalous state of things. That it will be accomplished peacefully there can he no manner of doubt. Jealousy appears to be a ruling characteristic of Tawhiao. He was Jealous of the influence of Te Whiti, and now he has ordered Rewi to go into the interior, dreading the conciliatory views of that chief. The King in a large measure is the creation of Rewi Whether or not the chief performer will obey the puppet, is a question which it would be difficult to answer. This much is known, that Rewi can shake off his allegiance to Tawhiao without any serious consequence to himself.