a—io.

# if trades, and, with thatjii mind, to regard education and training in a new light. Intellectually the attitude of towards education was a revelation of the accumulated effects of civilizing influences. School attendance readily became one of the stages of the life of the Maori you?u. Naturally well endowed with brains, the discipline of the schools fostered with each successive generation the faculty of application, while the success of a few of their kind in the highest schools supplied fresh incentive and the motive of emulation. To-day no movement is capturing the mind of the best-thinking of the Maori youth so forcibly as that which aims, through the most suitable education, at preparing the Maori to.take a fitting place in the life of the Dominion." The conference made a recommendation which is worthy of repetition. It emphasized the need for the supervision, co-ordination, and organization of existing scattered and ill-organized Maori attempts in industrial and farming pursuits—attempts that could be found up and down the country, but which became half-hearted or failed for lack of organization and support. The conference ventured the view " that a civilization which came with a deliberate mission to convert the Maori to the ways of the pakeha should now produce an organization to link up worthy attempts to respond to its demands, to foster and assist them to the point of success." ! HISTORICAL AND PSYCHOLOGICAL BASES. At the moment when it was decided to introduce the legislation of 1929 the position reached was that, owing to the loss of the greater part of their lands, to the tailing-off of the pioneering work of the country, to the attainment of a higher standard of living enjoyed for a generation past in common with other sections of the community with its implications in more varied and costly needs, and, lastly, to the increase in population recorded in the recent census, the Maoris of to-day were experiencing a progressively severe economic pressure. On the other hand, the influences of education, of reforms in health and in living and social conditions, and of the ministrations of religious organizations, had brought about extensive adjustments to Western culture, so that the new generation faced the perplexing problems of civilization with fewer of the restraints of the old regime. The economic conditions compelled the Maori to regard the cultivation of land as the prime factor in his maintenance. They forced him to take stock of his land resources and to consider ways and means of re-establishing himself thereon. So that when the Government determined to make available State resources to assist the Maori landowner it seemed to be the psychological moment for a definite forward movement. It was also a point at which Parliament could take stock of the position and balance the factors which might favour success against the weaknesses, which experience revealed, in Maori attempts at adjustment to the industrial conditions of a pakeha regime. In the words of Dr. Raymond Firth (" Primitive Economics of the New Zealand Maori," page 481), the Maori race had entered " the phase of adaptation in which on a foundation of knowledge rather than novelty the Native tries to build up his culture with a clearer understanding of the nature of the new civilization and the complexity of the issues involved." ' Dr. Raymond Firth's Summary of Phases in Maori Economic History. >~ ~ N , In the work quoted Dr. Firth has made a good study of the economic organization of the Maori in pje-European times. In Chapter XIV he briefly traces the transformation which has been effected since fh'e coming of the white man —the period of transformation during the last hundred years, and the new 1 Maori economy as it appears to-day. In a summary on page 472 he differentiates into four phases tli;e economic history of the Maori since he came into contact with the European. This summary 'may be quoted in full, as a very fair statement from the angle of the competent European ethnologist, who brings to the study honesty of purpose and a sympathetic understanding of the Maori people :^ " Fi*;st came the period of initial impact, characterized by a keen demand for certain specific typ?s of articles, and lasting from the period of the early voyagers till about 1840. During this &ime the Native economic structure appears to have remained practically unimpaired, v. " The second phase was marked by an enthusiastic adoption of the alien material culture, coupled with the extensive use of European productive methods. In some of the most important districts agricultural products of great variety were grown by the Natives, and exchanged for a wide range of tyares. This period was marked by the introduction of a money economy, and by the sinkingoosf s Native wealth in certain specialized mechanical forms of fixed capital, such as mills, farm implements, or sailing-vessels. This period saw no diametrical alteration in the organization \of productive effort or in the system of distribution. Most of the fixed capital was owned; communally, by a tribe or smaller group of relatives, and controlled by the chief of the hapu. In his hands» also, v much of the direction of the work of the community. This period *ot«r after 1860. " The next phase was one of stagnation and reaction, due primarily to social friction and land troubles, precipitated by war between the European and a suction of the Native race. It was characterized by the withdrawal of a large number of from active contact with the white man, by dejection and apathy in regard to constructive effort and the economic prospects for the future. The older people, especially, showed 'a lack of incentive and interest in life. Little change in economic structure appears to have manifested itself in this period which, including the years of war, lasted approximately from 1860 till 1880.

VIII