The Daily News. MONDAY, MAY 27. WANTED—A MAORI SEDDON.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume L, Issue 59, 27 May 1907, Page 2

The Daily News. MONDAY, MAY 27. WANTED —A MAORI SEDDON.

Tli -re is no dominating ••haracler. among the MaorU in New Zeulund. '1 here an; manv Maoris, however. •»' great roiineineiit and education. There are dreamers. Kvery Maori is a dreamer. Most of them know exactly what will set the Maori on th? same pi,me as the pakeha. hut there is no Mauri oi them all that lias the requisite push to plate him there. The .Maori is not to blame. If he were more practical ih'.m theoretical he would not be eharneterieally Maori. The Maori likes to shine. He is capable of the most brilliant scholastic attainments. He :s willing enough to work very hard indeed for such a position as will give him the good opinion of Maori and pakeha, but in the coniomu humdrum every-day endeavor of life he is mostly content to lie dormant. Men there are among the Maoris who out of their pakeha knowledge tell the less-schooled native how to reach the level—commercially and so on --of the white man. Jt is usually told to the Maoris in excellent oratory. Jt influences the dusky home exactly as the great picture inllueuees the art-lover. The art-lover is not able, to go away from a view ol a great picture and paint a similar one.

To be plain, the Maori has been told to do things, hut not shown sufficiently how to do them. There seems to he a more or less determined effort on the part of the Government to give the Maoris an impetus to help themselves. The necessity to help oneself not being present, few men, either white, black or brown, do so. In a country where the Governments are largely given to spoonfeeding the people, and where the people have got into the habit of requiring to lie spoon-fed, there is a danger of overdoing assistance, even to Maoris, whose salvation as a people we have so often pointed out. lies in the ability of the more influential and dominant Maoris to make tlwir fellows help themselves. In a speech which was almost faultless in nutter and ideal a short time ago, the Native .Minister, in that charming way of his, told the Maoris that they should pay rates and taxes, anil do other things their pakelia brothers did ill order to become a part of the system to which the said pakeha belongs. Then about the interest, that might be stirred up by getting the Maori to take part in affairs. The .Maori is great in council, and not so great in practice, but if he could he persuaded that lie was a councillor whose, counsel was of value to the pakeha and incidentally to himself, his native love for praise might spur him on to practice; which is of in finitely more value to him than theory or long speeches or poetical oratorv.

In short, to make the Maori see tlie real need of following the advice, but not the practice of the Native Minister, it is necessary to make him loss of a Maori. The Maori is, as tlie Native Minister said, by nature something of a husbandmall. His sole idea in being a husbandman. with fl large store of food, was that if he was well-fed he must perforce be a strong warrior. There is now no need for strong Maori warriors. Therefore. tlu ro is, from the same viewpoint, less need for .Maori husbandry, if th; 1 Maori was Mill engaged in tribal fighting, he would still be more largely engaged in tilling the ground, because a man who is forced to live an active life, hales inactivity. Unquestionably the retrogression ol the Maori has been duo in a great measure to the fact that he his been treated like a child in the past. His individuality has been lost; he sees no need to accept responsibility, merely because he has not been asked to accept it. He can organise a tangi or a race meetiing. and his management of many things that are of no real benefit to liini are excellent. He seoius to have the power of managing affairs, but nothing to spur him <»n—except in individual cases where his vanity is the motive power—to exertions for the good of his people. The Maori, like nearly every other kind of person, wishes to excel in some particular line. The accordoon player of the I kaianga is something of a hero. I

But all these qualifications are beside the question, lie may be an adept business man; but, except in isolated cases, he does not sltow it. He wants incentive, but, above everything, he wants a leader. There is no white man in New Zealand, and no public Mauri man who has shown true leadership to the natives. Many there are who have done incalculable service to the Maoris, but somehow they lack the "destructiveiiess" of a man like the late Mr. Seddoii. Somebody .is wanted to shake their ancient faiths, their super';d i! ions and their modern slothfulness. It is no use telling them they arc slothful, it is the duly of the friends of the race lo show them by example, and not precept, bow to overcome slothfulness. The Native .Minister dealt with that peculiarity of the .Maori character --preference of domicile. The Maori will not live anywhere, lie is not like the Anglo Saxon type which, in its best ex - ; amph'S. takes more pride in making the waste places blossom, than iu earning the ca*v crust from the most fruitful soil within a stone's throw ol the town. It' the Maoris can be made to see that the selling of their freehold waste land

is a lic lie vole lice, and not a pakeha trick to "liv-t" them. ;ilid if they can be made io understand thill lln- Native Minister is desirous of expending tlx? proceeds in buying lands on which the Maoris can he content and industrious, a great", purpose ran be achieved. But tin* Mauri hasn't been to well treated in

many land-dealings villi lite pakeha. and our brown brother is naturally a litlle -.nspicions. .At present. too. the great mass of Maoris do not appreciate the ultimate beiieiiis that might lie derived from the transition li'oiu a lile ot ease and idleness andfull stomachs, to a life of work and struggle for a stomach no fuller. Of course, with the placing of Ihe Maori 011 a level willi the pakeha in relation to possession or leasehold of land, it would naturally follow that the Maori would have all Ihe henelits especially devised to assist the strubier.

It is, as every one should know, better for a Maori to be poor and industrious (ban rich and idle. Although lie is practically unable to help it, he is a giwit drag and handicap to settlement because they produce nothing and are merely an excuse for idleness for the native. • Mr. Carroll said that not all Maoris would be successful farmers. Not all white men are successful fanners either. With acknowledgment from the pakeha that ho considered the Maori as worthy of nnv place in the country as is a pakeha. the Iwhole of the Maoris of New Zealand ; would in time become absorbed into the ' rual life of the country, and not remain

a discontent dl ami apparently inches unit, segregated. ill' no strcngtli In the hoily politic. aml ;i uea leu;- s(o lltem.selves, liy reason ol Iheir inability to reach I heir own ideals their leaders have in view. We believe that, with h-1 [i I'roiil within their own ranks, the .Maoris coul I achieve any success that commonly comes to a proportion of white men. We Know tli it a. hall anil half pakelia stvl * of living is the cause of this decay of the race, anil that the pakeha vices would u >t kill the Maori if the .Maori had the p.ikelia .)inljilion. and an average while man's desire for work. The capacity is there.

Always it is the incentive that is lacklias yet to arise a .Maori who "had proclaim the gospel of work liv working himself. It is eomiminly said iiiat the occasion brings forth the man. t;u( it not been so in the case of the Maoris. Ui;. leaders in the past have led tile .Maori away from the pakeha. an I have battened mi the credulity of lh" niti\e. there is now no road awav fi'mu extinction for the .Maori race, bui

llie road that leads to a pakeha style o! livin .. with a pakelia's interest ami ambitions privileges- and WORK. Tip Maoris liave the basis of all wealth. I hey h ive the land. Krom it is produced everything that makes life livable. It is the only and the prime essential. In themselves they have good brains, good thews and sinews, ami that splendid quality, pride of race. It is for the leader who may come, to spur them to

a competition with the pakeha in all the arts thai make him so powerful in comparison with tliose who are idle, lacking incentive. It is the laek of necessity to struggle, a weakly leaning on their richer brethren in time of stress, the memliean taint in the Maori blood that robs Ilim of his pride and makes him unashamed to be dependent. The MannV great qualities have been oveiated. 1 Lis

amiable weaknesses and his innate idleness have been his undoing. They will still undo him if the big men of his race permit it. It is not to be hopoil that the pakelia will take enough interest in th * race to do for it what a. great .Mauri might accomplish. The Maori wants a colored Seildon, and he has not shown up vet. Ihe .Maori wants a man who will I push liiin into business, shove hint on lo the highways of the world, boost Jiim into the company of the pakehas, not as a. benevolent spectator, but as a keen competitor. Hut there is no hope that the Mauris will do anything further than they are now going unless some vivid soul with a brown skin rounds up the race with the stockwhip of conviction, and yards them into the stockyards of WORK.