The Press. SATURDAY, JANUARY 7, 1865. THE LATE MAORI PRISONERS.—II.

Press, Volume VII, Issue 684, 7 January 1865, Page 3

The Press. SATURDAY, JANUARY 7, 1865. THE LATE MAORI PRISONERS.—II.

How were these prisoners really treated ? and how ought they to have been treated ? Whatever may have been Mr. Fox's faults as a politician, however lightly his opinions or his principles may sit upon him, no one will ever say that he is other than a kindly disposed and humane man. It is therefore no wonder that he indignantly repudiates the idea of having treated the Maori prisoners with cruelty. But the question is not, did Mr. Fox intentionally put them to torture, but was their treatment what it ought to have been ? The baby does not realise the torment it inflicts when it pulls off the legs and wings of a fly. The ploughman does not mean to injure the unseen toad when he drives the harrow over him. But for all that, if we want to get a true estimate of the real cruelty practised, we must try and get at the views of the toad and of the fly. We have before us two sets of papers which were laid before the Assembly last session, one comprising voluminous memoranda and correspondence on the subject of the treatmeat of these prisoners ; the other containing the reports of the medical attendants and officers of the Native department, in charge of them. The first peculiarity which strikes one in these papers is, that they prove, or rather assert, too much. If these accounts are true, \he Natives were not only not aggrieved, but were satisfied—indeed rather more than satisfied, delighted, at the life they led in the Marion hulk. For example, Dr. Sam, in his half-yearly report, writes as follows :— The prisoners, as a rule, are a healthy, Troll developed, muscular set of men, with strongly marked intellectual expression of countenance and shrewd features. Many of them are disposed to study, and it is gratifying to notice their eagerness in the pursuit of knowledge. The hulk is in every respect adapted for the accommodation of the people it holds, and in no instance of my experience with prison ships have I seen men under confinement look so cheerful, satisfied, and comfortable, and so well behaved as the Maoris in the Marion. There appears to be a universal sense of gratitude, and it is pleasing to observe how adequately and carefully everything has been arranged to satisfy the wants and conduce towards the health of a race of men whose hitherto existence must have been in a great measure inconsistent with the ideas of European living. There are certainly some who look dejected, caused without a doubt by old age and long-standing disease ; but even these make the best of it, and are strongly con-, vinced that their treatment on board evidently tends to prolong life. Capt. Dinnin, the superintendent of the hulk, writes in the same self-congratulatory strain:— Owing to the indefatigable exertions of Mr. White, in connection with the professional skill of Dr. Sam, the prisoners enjoy an amount of comfort far above the ordinary prison rale, and it is most gratifying to observe how pleased all on board seem with the arrangements that hare been carried out for their well-being. And throughout the whole of these daily reports the burden of the song is the same, that the prisoners are comfortable, grateful, and satisfied. But, it is stated on the other hand, that the facts are very different. It is asserted that some 220 prisoners were crushed into a greatly insuflicient space, where they lay on the bare boards, and that all attempts to attain cleanliness were necessarily insufficient, the very chemical solutions usedfreelyto prevent disease, poisoning the atmosphere almost as much as the odours from over crowding. Which of these statements is true? We gather from the papers that the Marion hulk was a vessel of 102 feet long and 26 feet at her greatest breadth, with a measurement of 347 tons. Mr. Fox asserts that " according to the regulations under the Imperial Passenger Act there was space on the two decks for 280 persons." This is a startling assertion; for every one who has been concerned in emigration knows that it takes a thousand-ton ship to carry 300 emigrants. It is not, therefore, conceivable that 220 passengers could be carried in a vessel of 347 tons. Mr. Fox relies on making out the measurement from both decks, but he forgets to say that for several weeks the prisoners occupied only the main deck, the lower deck being filled with coals, and he also forgets that the English passenger laws forbid emigrants being carried on the lower deck at all. Nor does he notice the fact that a certain amount of ventilation room is required under the Passenger Act which was not afforded in this case, at all events to the inhabitants of the lower deck. This attempt to justify the treatment of the prisoners by a reference .to the Passenger Act is so obviously a violation of truth as to throw the utmost discredit on the whole of the statements which the papers contain. Indeed it needs but to be said that, counting the guards and the officers, there must have been 270 or 280 souls on board a vessel of| 347 tons for eight months, to show that diecomfort must have been excessive and health! impossible. It appears from the halfyearly medical report by Dr. Sam for the half-year from 17th December, 1863, to 17th June, 1864, that there were 16 in the hospital at the commencement; 250 patients were admitted, and 290 discharged, 7 died, and 17 remained, out of a population of never

more than 214. Now this return, to say the least of it, looks hardly compatible with the language in the reports as to their wonderful health. So much for the evidence supplied by the papers themselves. But it seems that there were persons who visited tho Marion, and who formed a very different view from that put forward in these papers. Dr. Makinnon, the principal sanitory officer in the army, on paying a casual visit to the hulk, was greatly shocked at the scene he witnessed, and brought the matter under the notice of the Governor. And we have ourselves conversed with those who have been on board the hulk, and being old friends of the Natives, and personally acquainted with the Waikato chiefs, were not only inexpressibly shocked at the state of things, but listened to the mournful complaints of those who, we are asked to believe, were living in a state of grateful and happy submission to their lot. Most of the chiefs taken at Eangariri, such as Takerei Te Rao and Tioriori had never sided with Rewi Maniapoto and the more violent of the tribea? They had done their best to maintain peace. Tioriori especially had written an urgent letter to beg the Taranaki tribes to abandon the Tataraimaka—advice which was unfortunately set aside in favor of the more warlike counsels of Rewi. There is evidence that Tioriori exerted himself, when hostilities had commenced, to save the lives of the settlers by giving them timely notice. And there is very strong reason for believing that in the fight at Rangariri, when Captain Mercer was shot down at the foot of the parapet, this brave chief received two balls in the attempt to remove the wounded man out of the range of fire. When Waikato was invaded, and still more, after so many had been killed and wounded at Koheroa, all hope of peace was abandoned. It became then a last struggle for hearth and home ; and many joined in the defence of Rangariri who had earnestly deprecated the' violent proceedings which originally led to the war. Whatever crime these men may be considered to have committed, all reasonable men must admit that there was in their special case great allowance to be made, whilst the gallant defence they made as Rangariri excited the warmest admiration on the part of the General, and the troops generally. Some of these chiefs were men of high blood and great wealth in their own country. We have heard men say that they had sat down at Takerei's table to a good dinner, served on a clean tablecloth, with English crockery and with English knives and forks. When that chief held out his hands, reeking with perspiration and dirt, and said to a visitor to the hulk—" You, Mr. , you have seen mc in the Waikato —look at mc now," —there is something so natural and so pitiful in the complaint that it tells at once the tale of what these men felt. When Reihana and Hapimana were set free on parole, and allowed to go to the Waikato to see their friends, we are told what occurred. After Borne words of welcome Reihana (one of the prisoners) stood up and said : Here comes this spirit (like) Jonah "who was swallowed by a whale, and after lying in its belly thre** days and three nights was cast on shore. Here ire have come to ask for a wind, for a fair wind, so that we may be blown on shore (or wafted to the shore). If a fair wind is not given to Oβ, our dwelling place must still be on the sea. Listen again to the language used by Ihaia .Te Manga, one of the escaped prisoners, to Mr. White when he. went after them to try to persuade them to return to Kawau. He is complaining why they ran away from Kawau — We gave up ourselves, our land, our arms : you punished us until we gnashed our teeth under it, and wished to return to our people and our lands. I requested the Government, when in Auckland, to allow mc to visit my people at Waiuku, promising to return, but you refused my request. We have given up our men, given up the King, given up the land, given up the man a, given up all, and yet you keep us in bondage. Now that I am free, I will not go back. Is not this just what any brave men would have felt. They cannot understand that they have committed any crime. To them it was simply a fight, nation against nation, for their hearths and homes. We had not even dared to try them under our own laws. Nay more, we had not dared to try them under that horrible distortion of law—the Suppression of Rebellion Act. They had never been convicted of crime; and yet we shut them up for long months in a dark, crowded, and dirty hulk. And this we did to men whose whole life had been spent in the open I air, and in the freedom of their native hills. We thought that they were savages and would know no difference between a bed of fresh fern and a damp and dirty deck. Above all, we crowded them all together, chiefs and people, boasting that no man had less than 20 inches of board to sleep on, forgetting that many of these men -were- , chiefs, with all the pride of and were gentlemen of nature's finest mould. It may be an easy matter 'for the coarse and ignorant of our own race to eneer at a Maori gentleman; but those amongst uawbd

know them well—men of high education and polished manners—men who having the souls of gentlemen themselves, can recogniee the fellowship even under a dark skin or a strange tongue, and many such Englishmen have lived amongst the Natives, and have enjoyed their open-handed hospitality, —these men, we say, know that there are amongst the Natives men of truly gentle mind and manners, to whom such treatment as that to which we exposed these prisoners was acute misery and bitter indignity. Was it wise to deal with them so ? Was it the action of a generous foe ? Was it worthy of our great name and country ? We might say —put it on the lowest grounds— will it pay ? Look at it in this light—cannot the Natives make a large part of this Northern Island untenable to us ? Have they not made us pay three millions to get one small bit of country. Can we afford —will England afford—to colonize New Zealand at the point of the bayonet ? The thing is simply absurd. We cannot, and England will not do so. Then does not common sense dictate that we should win these Natives to our side. ? Here was a great chance. Had we had a noblehearted set of men at the head of affairs—men who had any sympathy with brave men, or any admiration for great deeds —they would have so treated these 200 prisoners as to have sent them over the length and breadth of the islands imbued with a sense of the justice of our law, and the generosity of our policy. These prisoners might have been made missionaries of peace. In the mode of treating them lay the saving of millions of money, and the establishment of a spirit of confidence and trust which, could we onco create it, would be a more efficient guardian of peace than ten thousand bayonets. But instead of all this we made the iron eat into their souls. Far better as a matter of policy to have shot them down at llangarm than to keep them for eight months, and then send them abroad to preach to their fellow countrymen that in all future struggles it were better to die than to be taken " prisoners of war."

Arrival of Roberts, the Champion Buliaud Plater. —Our knights of the cue, and all lovere of the fascinating game of billiards, will be delighted by an advertisement which appears in our columns this morning, announcing the arrival in Christchurch of the champion billiard player, Roberts. His extraordinary performances in the Australian colonies and in Dunedin, when contending at enormous odje, and almost invariably with success, against the beet colonial players, hare been witnessed with delighted interest by thousands of spectators. Arrangements are in progress for allowing the public of Canterbury an opportunity of seeing some of these wonderful displays of skill, and no one who has any liking for the game would willingly miss the chance of seeing to what a pitch of perfection it can'be brought in the hands of this consummate master. Princess' Theatre. — The reproduction of the " Octoroon" drew a large house last night at the Theatre. The cast of the piece is quite new; Mr Sail of course appeared in the character of Salem Scudder, and Mr Inglis as Fete. Mr South made a good McClosky—in the last scene especially ho appeared to advantage. Zoe (Mrs Hall) and Dora Sunnysides (Miss A. Wiseman), were both ably represented. To-night the Lyeter troupe perform " Martha."