MAORI MEMORIES.

Wairarapa Times-Age, 21 June 1938, Page 11

MAORI MEMORIES.

AN UNJUST BARGAIN. > (Recorded by J.H.S. for “Times-Age”) ; From the reports of Parliament in > 1884, the New Zealand Company’s pub- . lications, and a letter to Lord Stanley, • we learn that many people regarded the Treaty of Waitangi “as a solemn" i farce, which in a foreign tongue bari tered sovereign rule for blankets.” The : Company doubted whether such a ; treaty made with naked savages could be treated as anything but a solemn device for their amusement. The : House of Commons characterised it as ■ injudicious. Settlers not connected with the Company, the Government, or the land sharks were unanimously in favour of the Treaty. From Vattel’s “Law of Nations” we are told that erratic natives of any country have no claim to more land than they properly use, and that all the land in New Zealand did not legally belong to the Maoris. Lawyers, the Press, and Parliament agree with Vattel, and regarded the Treaty as the Magna Charta of the people. On January 22, 1840, the first emigrant ship “Aurora” arrived at “Poneke,” the Maori version of Port Nicholson (Port Nic), and within a year 1200 settlers came. The Maoris were delighted to see so many white women, children, and men, and asked if all the Iwi Ingarangi (English Tribe) had come. They taught and freely assisted the; settlers to build and thatch their houses and dig their gardens. Pigs and potatoes were exchanged in abundance for trifles. There were no quarrels between them and both races lived in full confidence of each other. Colonel Wakefield laid out the town of Britannia in the Hutt Valley. The site was found to be unsuitable, so Wellington was chosen. Though- the Maoris still befriended the'’ settlers” they declared ■that Colonel Wakefield’s alleged, purchase of - twelve million acres there, was a thief’s bargain from 58 Maoris for land owned and occupied by 10,000 of them.