EUROPEAN WARFARE WITH THE MAORIS.

Westport Times, Volume III, Issue 367, 3 October 1868, Page 7

EUROPEAN WARFARE WITH THE MAORIS.

Past experience of European warfare with New Zealand natives points out that the mode hitherto adopted by our forces following the Maoris into the bush is very unsatisfactory, for as yet, it has usually resulted in the loss of many valuable lives with no adequate return in the shape of successes. It would appear to be a much better plan, instead of our troops being sent " bushwacking" after the Maoris, if the n tive system of proclaiming cm Icatis were adopted and lines were drawn by us in disaffected localities, and notice given to the rebels that if they passed over the boundaries they would be shot, but would remain unmolested if they kept in their own quarters. Another point in our manner of carrying on the war seems capable of improvement. The system of erecting heavy earthworks and redoubts, which require to be manned by large forces to be of any use at all, might be abandoned, and cheap and simple wooden block houses put up instead, which would be quite sufficient to resist musketry, and c >uld be guarded by a much smaller number of men. A military man of many years experience in this colony, both as a soldier and a civilian, has pointed out to us that such a blockhouse—put up after the French model—and manned by about twenty men, would be capable of resisting a force of 500 natives. Whoever has seen the Martello towers, on the coast of Kent and Sussex, in England (only they are built of thick and heavy material to resist artilery), will know the sort of structure suggested. They are built in a circular form, and have a gallery running round the top, where the men sleep, and to which they ascend by a ladder, and at the bottom is a well, where provisions and amtnunitition are stored. At suitable intervals there are holes in the walls, through which the fire of the soldiers can be directed on to the enemy. A succession of block-houses after this model, built of timber, tongued and groved, co lid be put up at a trifling expense, compared witli the enormous sum now spent on " native purposes," and could be cheaply manned by small garrisons, whose lives would be in much

less danger than under the present systems, arid their services much more available. Were it not that the electric telegraph could be so easily destroyed by the enemy it would be worth consideration whether the different blockhouses should be put into communication with each other by this means, and there are other matters of detail which would have to be debated, but it certainly cannot be controverted that some alteration in our mode of warfare with the natives will have to be resorted to, if we are to put down rebellion with as little unnecessary waste of valuable lives, and at as little pecuniary cost as possible. It has been well said by a New South Wales contemporary that if New Zealand is to remain a British Colony she must -be thoroughly conquered, which she can hardly be said to be up to the present time, and the feW remarks we have been led to make on the mode in which we have hitherto fought against the Maoris, and the suggestions we have thrown out, may. not-be, unworthy of the notice of those whose 'duty it is to' brjng the present desultory with the rebels to a successful termination.—Wcelihj[Express.