The Evening Star : WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, The Morning News and The Echo. FRIDAY, DECEMBER 30, 1881.

Auckland Star, Volume XII, Issue 3555, 30 December 1881, Page 2

The Evening Star : WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, The Morning News and The Echo.

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 30, 1881.

Fix tho canto that lack] auttlanca. For tho wrong that needs (csutauc For the (utura In tho distance. And the good tbat we can do.

It is incumbent on tho Native- Minister or some of his admirers to furnish the public with something like a plausible reason for the ruthless destruction of crops now going on tit Parihcka. In a month or so these crops, planted by the industry of the natives, would bo fully ripo and ready for the sustenance of the largo Maori population, who, as we learn from our own correspondent's visit to their settlements, are in a state of extreme destitution along tho const. Yet the Constabulary—the official guardians of property and preservers of law and orderhave been turned into tho rich fields to deliberately tear up and destroy the food of tho people. There is no pressure so far as we can yet discover, near or reunite, to extenuate this act of unmitigated vandalism, which seems to havo been entered upon for tho sole purpose of shewing tho natives how utterly ruthless we can be. Tho action is one as unprecedented as it is dishonouring to a civilised Government, and we wait with an eager expectation tho high reasons of State that are presumed to justify it. They must be very powerful Indeed before they will be accepted as sufficient to account for so wanton an outrage, which, if committed by Maoris upon tho cultivations of settlers, would be quoted as an exhibition of wholly barbarous instinct. The example set to the natives ia a most lamentable onr, and the colony will be fortnnate indeed if the precedent is not some day pleaded by the Maoris in excuse for their own depredations upon the homesteads of outlying settlers. What answer have we to such a plea in view ot the wilful rooting-up of five hundred acres of nearly ripened crops, by order of the Government, in a time of perfect peace, and during the absence of the planters? The proceeding is so utterly incomprehensible that we leave any attempt at explanation to its authors. Until tbat explanation is given, the act can only be looked upon as an exhibition of high-handed power, exercised ia wanton destruction, and as 'such it must ultimately recoil upon tho beads ot its perpetrators.