The Maori As A National Asset

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 4, 26 March 1927, Page 8

The Maori As A National Asset

There is no more popular member of the Maori race than DR. PETER BUCK (TE RANGIHIROA), who writes for THE SUN a striking article on the Maori people. No New Zealander is better qualified to deal with this fascinating subject.

rpHE great interec; that is being taken in questions concerning the Pacific has led to the formation of organisations for the scientific study of the various problems affecting this vast area. The PanPacific Science Congress held its third meeting in Japan last year. An Institute of Pacific Relations has been formed with headquarters at Honolulu. Professor Condliffe, late of Canterbury College, has accepted the position of director, and will organise research work. The Bishop Museum, Honolulu, is continuing its work with an intensive five years’ campaign in the study of the various branches of the Polynesian race. Great attention is being paid to the problem of the native races of the Pacific and the effect upon them of Western culture, or what is commonly understood as civilisation. The results of contact with the white man have not been very gratifying to civilisation. Here however. New Zealand stands unique. J. Merle Davis, an American, says, “The world has much to learn from the white man’s attitude toward the Maori race. What has made it possible for the New Zealander, alone of all British peoples, to assimilate the blood, culture, and of • this coloured race, and to derive a dis-

tinct satisfaction and develop a genuine pride in the relationship?” He attributes it in part to the fact that scattered Maori warriors kept the best part of a British division of regulars busy for a number of years before matters were settled. In addition to magnificent fighting qualities an<J superb physique, the sporting instinct of the Maop was probably unique in the annals of war. This sporting instinct was particularly displayed towards the 65th Regiment or the “HickityPip” as it was called in the broken English of those days. During the Great European War, the representatives of those warriors, who formed the Maori companies of the New Zealand Pioneer Battalion, were paraded in the garde”? of a ruined chateau in Armentieres for inspection by General Plumer, who commanded the Second Army. In his address, the General said: “I have wanted to see the Maoris ever since they came under my command. My old regiment was the 65th. In its traditions, we cherish records of the chivalry displayed by the Maoris towards us during the trying stages of the war in New Zealand.” In the later, more trying stages of the War, the Maoris maintained a full battalion in the field, not on lines of communication but on active service with their division. Between the wars and after, the Maori has devoted himself to a sport with fewer casualties. "Rugby is the national game of New Zealand. It is doubtful whether there has been an All Black team since Rugby started in New Zealand that did not have in its ranks members of the Maori race. The Native team of 1888 created a grea record on the playing fields of Britain. The 1926 team did not have such a successful record of matches won, but returned with a record for gentlemanly behaviour, both on and off the field, that is a credit to their race and an honour to New Zealand.

In the peaceful arts of Rongo, the Maori was no less distinguished than in the activities pertaining to the war god Tu. He came of a race of voyagers and explorers. His Polynesian ancestors r ploited the possibility: of the single-outrigger canoe and the double-canoe and made voyages across the uncharted Pacific that dazzle the imabination. While some writers deny the possibilir s of such voyages, the Maori poet, alter enumerating the names of the colonising canoes of 1350 A.D., sings: The names of your canoes can never be effaced, The canoes that crossed the ocean depths, the purple sea. The Great Ocean of Kiwa that lies before us. Battleships and ocean liners may sweep the Pacific, but the double canoes du' bed out with stone adzes were the first to lak the long sea voyages and the Polynesian explorers who felt their way without the aid of sextant or compass deserved some record in the annals of fame. Of the various branches of the Polynesian race the Maori holds a peculiar position. In the changed

climate of his new home, he displayed individuality and initiative of a very high order. He brought the paper mulberry tree from his tropical homeland to provide bark cloth as clothing. Quickly realising its unsuitability, he experimented with flax fibre. He invented a totally new technique from this material into a fabric .nd thus evolved a variety of garments which for construction, ornamentation and decoration are peculiar to New Zealand. The light- framework of ropical houses made of poles was useless for houses to withstand the more rigorous climate of the new land. He felled the totara tree, split it into slabs and with stone cs trimmed and shaped them to his requirements. With improvement in wood craft, came the great advance in carving that reached the height of artistic craftsmanship in the door lintels and stern pieces of war canoes. He reacted to his environment. With different and better material and a wider field for expression, he developed hi 3 arts and crafts to an extent that environment denied to his tropical kinsmen. . . We cannot fully appreciate what the Maori accomplished and invented in New Zealand by the study of the Maori alone. To get the right perspective, we must study him with the Polynesian race to which he belongs. For comparative purposes the two studies must go together. In the study of the Maori, New Zealand has done its share with credit. The Polynesian Society, founded by the enthusiasm and carried along by the tireless labours of the late S. Percy Smith, has in its journals extending over 35 years recorded a wealth of material. The intense research work of Mr. Elsdon Best has been published in a magnificent set’ of Dominion Museum bulletins. Mr. Best by his labour of love has become a world-wide authority, and the Maori race and students of Maori ethnology owe him a debt they can never pay. The interest taken by leaders of the Maori people and the Government has resulted in the establishment of three boards. They are the Board of of Maori Ethnological Research, the Maori Purposes Board, and the Board of Maori Arts and Crafts.

Vitally connected with the study of the Maori is the valuable material scattered throughout the country. Interesting objects in the hands of private collectors should be deposited in our museums. The functions of a museum as a mausoleum for the dead is an exploded idea,. Museums are laboratories in which students should conduct research work and make objects of w r ood and stone live again by associating them with their uses and functions in the evolution of mankind. In Auckland we have the finest Maori collection in the world. When properly housed and displayed in the War Memorial Museum, we will have not only an institution of which Auckland will be proud, but a national asset of the highest scientific value. Students from other parts of the world will yet regard it as the Mecca of the Pacific area. Polynesian research is of vital interest to New Zealand. The Cook and Northern Islands, Niue and Western Samoa are under New Zealand administration. We should be able to assist in the Polynesian campaign' that has been instituted by the Bishop Museum. By getting a perspective of the whole Polynesian question, we will realise how the climate of New Zealand helped to shape the destinies of the Maori people and make him the highest and most advanced section of the Polynesian race.

The Maori belongs to the Caucasian division of mankind. Climate and the conditions accompanying it stimulated him physically and mentally. On a basis of mutual respect, the two races of New Zealand have intermingled and inter-married. Through wise Governments, the Maori has weathered the transitional period and furnishes the unique example, among coloured races, of a people that are increasing in population and prosperity under civilised rule. In their mythology, traditional history, poetry, arts and crafts and in the people themselves the writer, the poet, the musician, the painter and the sculptor of the future may yet find a rich field in which to develop a national literature and art that will have characteristics peculiar to New Zealand. Who can deny that the Maori is a national asset to New Zealand?