POTBOY TO "PRINCE."

Press, Volume LXIV, Issue 19213, 20 January 1928, Page 15

POTBOY TO "PRINCE."

A STORY OF EARLY NEW ZEALAND. TE PEHI'S PROTEGE. tTKOM OCfi OWN fIOE&ESPOXDEin-) LONDON, December 24. In April of 1817, a sailor named George Bruce was admitted to Greenwich Hospital. There he spent his last two years, spinning yarns to his fellowpensioners of his days in Australia and New Zealand. The yarns were so astounding and so often repeated that some of his hearers committed them to writing and made a memorial biography of them. The volume was put away among the Hospital records until 1898, when the so-called diary came into the possession of an Australian collector, and is now in the Mitchell Library at Sydney. A writer in the December number of tho "Cornhill Magazine" uses the diary as the basis for an article on the remarkable career of this Limehouse potboy, who at one time was the tattooed protege and son-in-law of the famous chief, Te Pehi. George Bruce, the son of a Shadwell distillery worker, was born in 1778. In 1789 he was sent to the workhouse for playing truant from his work. He was then sent to sea in a fishing smack, but ran away from that, afterwards becoming a" pot boy at the "North Country Pink," an inn in the vicinity of Limehouse. A career of petty larceny found a climax in the breaking of a haberdasher's window, from_ which George extracted two handkerchiefs. He was convicted of housebreaking and sentenced to bo hanged. Even the law in those days-thought twice about hangnig a boy of thirteen, and so he was shipped to Sydney as a convict. After many vicissitudes he was pardoned and sent on board the man-of-war Lady Nelson. At that time Te Pehi was being entertained in New South Wales by Governor King. The Maori chief was sent back to New Zealand on board the Lady Nelson, and during the voyage —a rough one—the chief was very sick and had the attention of George Bruce.

I Dictator of Bay of Islands. George responded nobly to all demands (the writer of the articlo soes on to say), showing himself a perfect steward as well as an accomplished valet; when To Pehi reached home he refused to part with the paragon, and sent a message back to King: "If you want my George you will have to come and fetch him yourself." King, as it happened, did not particularly want George. Further, when he in his turn started across the Tasman Sea to return Te Pehi's call on his way to England, he ran into still stormier weather, and cut out the New Zealand visit altogether. So, after giving King, seven months' grace, To Pehi had his valet tattooed, made him a chief, and quito in the spirit of the best legends, married him to his own youngest daughter. Who now so exalted—and yet so condescending—as our George? For two years he was the dictator of Bay of Islands trade and the cynosure of its society. When Sydney traders put in for a cargo of timber, or whalers for fresh provisions, there was George to show them round and give them inside information, and convince them that but for his friendly influence they would have had to drive much more unequal bargains. He was not greedy; it was not for money or for other rewards that he made himself so useful. It was sheer love of power to do things, of position as a universal benefactor."

Search for Gold. His generosity was his downfall. In 1808 there arrived in the Bay of Islands the General Wellesley, a trading brig on the lookout for timber. George found the timber for her. Her master, I one Dalrymple, was after more valuable produce; he had heard, he told George in confidence, that along the sandy beaches near North Cape men had found gold. What about it? The eager young chief knew nothing about it, but was far too proud to say so. Where would be his credit with white visitors if he had to admit ignorance about anything in the Maori country? So he hinted wisely (foolishly, as a matter of fact) of mysterious knowledge, of matters bruited about among chiefs only. Well, then, said Dalrymple, would he come along to North Oape and act as guide? George hem'd and ha'd, hesitated, and/delayed; in the end hii adventurousness won the day—he never really grew out of boyhood—and he agreed to join, ths General Wellesley as guide, provided he might take along his wife and two young Maori friends, and provided, also, that, whatever the result of the expedition, the four would be brought back to the Bay. The trouble was, of course, that ho had not the vaguest notion where any gold might be. North Cape he knew, and miles of sandy beaches, but none gold-bearing. So back and forth they cruised and up and down long leagues of beach, scrabbling in the unauriferous sand; and at last the master mariner's patience gave way.

Entertained by Indian Vlce-Kegent. George, his wifo, and his two Maori companions, were carried to Malacca, where the three men were enticed on shore, and left to their own devices. The unfortunate wife was carried on to Penang, and sold to a certain Captain Boss.

In this crisis George rose to tho occasion. He interviewed the Governor of Malacca; ho clamoured for justie; he was a Prince of New Zealand (every now and then he said "the Prince of New Zealand" for greater effect), and demanded the instant restoration of his Princess. The Governor, accustomed to Malay princes whose personal appearance was no guide to their pretensions, took him seriously, and sent him on to Penang in H.M.S. •Scourge. At that settlement —which had just been made a separate presidency—the new Governor was all agog to justify his appointment and distinguish his administration. A maltreated Prince from a far-off mysterious island kingdom was something right into his hands. He recovered the Princess, slightly damaged; he did his best to find the pair a passage back to New Zealand; failing in this—nor was he really sorry to fail, for he hoped to impress Calcutta with his diplomacy—he persuaded Admiral Drury to provide them with an astonishing demonstration of deference and hospitality. Lord Minto himself set the example of entertaining them regally, and for three months Anglo-In-dian society overwhelmed them with every sort of kindness.

George eventually got back to Sydney. The Maori wife died. The Boyd massacre took place at the Bay of Islands. George went about Sydney assuring everybody that this was Te Pehi's revenge for the kidnapping of a daughter and son-in-law. Not only did that foolishness do himself no good, but it ruined poor Te Pehi, whose only connexion with the affair was that he had rescued the four survivors. For a gang of whites, who believed that he was paramount chief in the district, and therefore responsible for the masaere, raided and burnt his village; following on which the "Whangaroa tribe raided and slaughtered him for having interfered with their scheme of complete vengeance, ~- '"•'- -

Memorial to Colonial Office. In due course the es-eonvict got' to London, and memorialised Earl Bathurst, then at the head of the War and Colonial Department, for a passage back to New Zealand. To support his claims he represented himself as having "uncoutrouled authority over the Island," suggested that he was the Almighty's destined instrument for the conversion of the Maoris to Christianity—and assured Bathurst that he was on intimate terms wtih Governor Macquarie. Bathurst, a cautious man, passed on the memorial to Macquarie himself. He, a man deeply religious and Highlandly proud, was exasperated with George's elaims to familiarity; he denied every statement in the memorial about which he had personal knowledge, scarified fiercely the rest of it, and demanded that, whatever other action Bathurst might take on it, at least he should never allow George within a thousand miles of Australia or New Zealand. As already stated, George, once "Prince of New Zealand," ended his days at Greenwich Hospital.