WAIKATO.

Daily Southern Cross, Volume XVII, Issue 1379, 1 March 1861, Page 4

WAIKATO.

There is not much stirring in this District. The Europeans are busy harvesting, as a thriving people ought to be at this time of the year, but the natives in consequence of existing circumstances have less harvest than usual. We fear that the entente cordiale between our own authorities and such Maories as have shewn themselves, we will not say friendly, but at all events, not hostile, lias resulted in an idea on the part of the latter, that allegiance is an article possessed of a marketable value, to be repaid in flour, rice and other articles of consumption. At all events they are discussing the question at Whaingaroa, and have invited their friends from Waipa to join them and go into flour, sugar, tea and Waikato politics. At the same time Wm. Naylor is really doing his utmost to protect European settlers, and we have good authority for saying that but for him our countrymen would before this have had to leave the district. So critical is the state of the native mind in Waikato, that Naylor's authority alone prevents his tribe joining the ranks of the insurgents at Taranaki. Waikatos, 400 strong, who had joined Wm, King's party at the Waitara, are expected to return to their own district ink Aotia and Whaingaroa. They were daily looked for at the latter place on the 6th inst. Various reports are likewise being circulated amongst the Waikatos in reference to late events at Taranaki. They speak of 47 lolled, and 100 wounded, as the native loss in the last engagement ; and they say that in the fight at Matarikoriko the troops were firing at the Maoris after the latter had exhausted their ammunition, and appear to enjoy the joke of the manner in which powder and lead on our side were expended upon an unseen enemy. Some natives headed by Riwai of Whatawhata passed through Whaingaroa on the 6thJ They had been at Taranaki, and seemed to hav^p had enough of fighting. The European settlers in Waikato appear from all accounts to be under no apprehensions in reference to their own safety. — Ibid.

Since the arrival of the English Mail, extracts from most of the leading English papers in reference to New Zealand have appeared in these columns. The opinions of the fourth estate in that mother country, ■which still rules our destinies with an imperial sway, are not to be lightly regarded : our private fortunes and the future of the country of our adoption may depend on the impressions created by them in the minds of our imperial legislators. A well written article, elegant in diction, graphic in its treatment of imaginary facts and assumed theories, dainty in its style, but reckless as to its assertions, is perused after breakfast at his club by some worthy knight of the shire, some youthful lordling, or some ambitious debater fresh from the Union and anxious to deliver himself of a brilliant maiden speech, and becomes the text of an evening's oration at Westminster, calculated to do the greatest possible damage to the cause of her Majesty's subjects in these islands. On the other hand an honestly written commentary on the events which have brought about the present state of things in New Zealand must necessarily turn out a grave matter of fact composition, true but not poetical, and affording the imaginative writer or the would be brilliant speaker no field on which to distinguish himself. The interesting savage becomes a discontented subject, ungrateful for past favours, and mulishly determined to ruin himself in the same way as his fathers did before him : the unscrupulous settler gloating over the idea of murder and plunder, becomes a respectable English farmer, anxious for peace, though fearless of the dangers of war, scrupulously mindful of the rights of others, but determined to stand up for his own, — that prosaic John Bull who pays Ms taxes, but insists on having his moneys worth ; — whilst the unrighteous invader of Naboth's vineyaid is merely a British officer, determined as Representative of the Queen to do his duty. It is not to be wondered at therefore if many writers at home in discussing the subject of New Zealand, have elected for the plausible, pseudo-phi-lanthropic side of the question, and preferring to avail themselves of the opportunity of making brilliant, sarcastic remarks on the conduct of those in power, to the nobler task of promoting the real good of European and Native, have run wild in their premises and deductions, in a manner to be morally excused only in a speaker at a debating society — and even there to be lamented. There are two leading journals in England which will generally be found taking opposite sides on most subjects social and political. One may guess what the " Saturday Review" will say on any given topic, if one has only perused an article in the " Times" on the same question, more particularly if the great Thunderer has taken a common sense view of it, for in that case it is immediately incumbent on the " Review" to a&tound its readers by putting common sense quite at defiance. Both these papers give us articles on the present war in New Zealand, and follow their usual course. We published them some time back in juxta-posi-tiou in order to give our readers an opportunity of comparing the two. The " Review" Ukes, in its search after originality, a cynical view of our lelations to

the Government and to the* Mtive. The sentimental vein has been nearly worked out in pulpits, pamphlets, and papers, and the Reviewer, unable to draw his inspirations from Exeter Hall, is reduced to borrowing from the Manchester school. The little bill for the little war of races, as he facetiously calls it, is the main thing to be thought of. Justice is a minor consideration, and as for so vulgar an idea as that we colonists have a right as Englishmen to our lives and properties, and that if we are not allowed to protect them ourselves, those who forbid it are bound to grant protection ; such an idea seems never to have entered into his mind. With his cold-blooded calculations of pounds, shillings and pence, he leads one to infer that in his opinion, but for the expense of the whole thing, war and murder and plunder at the Antipodes might be regarded with indifference. As it is, however : The controversy is by no means one on which Englishmen c»n afford to look with indifference. 'I he last New Zealand war is stated, on good authority, to have cost several thous»nd pounds for every Maori we killed. There it no ground for believing that the present contest will be a cheaper luxury. A New Zealand war has, therefore, this amount of interest for the English public, that it is only a circuitous mode of expressing the more familiar idea of an extra penny or an extra twopence on the Income-tux. If this extract really expresses ideas prevalent in England, we have indeed cause to be thankful for such warm sympathy with us in our troubles. But we are inclined to regard it differently : it is merely the " Saturday Review" out of temper. Its feelings were too deeply interested in the great champion-fight not to have rendered a reaction probable, and this is one of its symptoms. So deep was the interest taken in the state of Tom Sayer's light elbow, that exhausted nature has had no sympathy left for a British Province, bloodstained and devastated, and a once thriving population driven into exile and beggaiy. To speak of war as a " luxury" to be dispensed with merely on account of its cost, may be very amusing in London, but is not quite so much so in Taranaki. The writer however, condescends to a discussion of the merits of the whole question, but it is merely a rechauffee of what we have seen much better served up at this end of the earth : yet even here the " Review" still keeps up its character for originality by treating in a flippant style a subject which all thoughtful men in New Zealand hold to be entitled to at least a serious consideration. It occasionally however ventures beyond its depth, and hazards a remark showing the absurd ideas about New Zealand current in England, and the confidence with which men are accustomed to urge them. If Mr. Cowper, desiring somebody's estate for the Crown, were to buy of one of the tenants on the estate what the tenant professed to be a valid title to it, were to send it down to his ooti solicitor for investigation, and were then to march in the Grenadier Guards to take possession, the proceeding* would be precisely analogous to that which the natives of New Zealand ore now engaged in resisting by force of arms. A writer who can see any analogy between " somebody's estate" in England and nobody's estate in New Zealand, between a tyrannical prohibition to sell or divide by one tenant in common, and a refusal of a bond fide owner to j surrender the deeds by which he holds property, j is his own ablest opponent, and need hardly tell his readers what we find a few sentences lower down, that : " Probably no one on this side of the globe is in a condition to unravel j the complicated threads of the dispute." The admission holds good as against the writer making it, but not necessarily further. Turning over our English files we arrive at another paper well got up, abounding with news, coat one penny, yclept the " Telegraph." It must be allowed its say likewise on the subject of New Zealand ; and knowing as we do the wide circulation which this paper has obtained at home, it is as well likewise for us in New Zealand to know what it circulates in our regard. A long article from its columns will be found in this day's issue of the " Cross." The same is not calculated to do much harm, for it arrives at the correct conclusion, though only after wandering through a maze of devious lines of thought and reasoning ; but some of the little escapades made by the writer en route are worth alluding to, suggestive as they are of the extraordinary obliquity of vision with which most men seem to be afflicted, when engaged in surveying from a distance the aspect of New Zealand affairs. The approved style of modern newspaper writing is to apply a very severe blister in the commencement of an article, and to conclude with a soothing salve. The " Telegraph" follows the fashion in the article before us. Of course every thing hitherto done in New Zealand has been done wrong : this point is given with illustrations drawn from imagination, but evidently not by anybody acquainted with New Zealand, or indeed any other land we know of. We have eel ponds on hill sides, and potatoes in swamps, and are indignantly told how wrong it is to deprive the aborigines of these natural riches handed down to them by their forefathers. We have also a striking comparison drawn between New Zealand and Australian aborigines, and to this point we Would draw our readers' attention, for it gives. Us the key to one of the most extraordinary phenomena of the present day ; namely, that by common consent we are supposed to live in an exceptional country, and that men's conduct in New Zealand is not to be judged by the same standard as in other countiies. What is good for John Chinaman is not good for John Maori, or to judge by the article from the " Telegraph," to which we are referring, we have different moral obligations towards the aboriginal in New Zealand and in Australia. A Christian writer compares a race of human beings to kangaroos, and actually gives us to understand in almost so many words, that in his opinion we are doing great wrong in being as severe with an intelligent warlike people, as would be justifiable with a merely " helpless race." Our opinion would rather be that the latter were to be treated with indulgence ; but no — such is not the opinion amongst many. The Australian is not an interesting man, nor Australia an interesting field for missionary labours, and there is more indignation in the mother country over one rebellious Maori shot in fair fight, than over fifty black-fellows and lubras slaughtered in cold blood. Even the right of the natives of Australia to their waste lands is supposed by the " Telegraph" to be absurd, compared with that of the New Zealanders to theirs; — Kangaroo v. enlightened Squatter, the former; rapacious Settler v. Edifying Example, the latter ; — whilst, if we examine the merits of the two cases carefully, we shall find that from a humane point of view, and unless one wishes to see a race of human beings exterminated, the right of the Australian to his broad extent of hunting country, was more to be respected than that of the New Zealander to his untravefsed tracks of bush and fern. The former is indeed like the kangaroo : he recedes before the march of civilization : from the occupation of New Holland his destiny was determined : the wide extent of the Southern Continent was required to preserve his race. The New Zealander te different. He

recklessly destroys himself if we leave country to fight about ; but is capable of being converted into a civilized being, if induced by law, — and the strong arm of the law — to exchange undefined wealth in acres, for exchangeable real property ; to feel a pride in the results of his own labour rather than in the useless possessions handed down to him by his fabulous forefathers ; to become a man, rather than a mere tool in the hands of designing men. The " Guardian," once the organ of Tractarianism, gives us an article worth reading: clever, though ambitious of distinguishing itself by saying something smart but not complimentary about Ireland and the Irish, and introducing it according to the old German saying, like Pontius Pilate into the Credo j but at the same time containing many elements of truth, though crude and undigested. We re-publi&hed in oar issue of the 29th. It ventures however boldly to give as its opinion, that the Governor is right, and William King wrong, instead of talking ambiguously of the main point at issue. The article concludes by a recommendation to try the effects of Government House training on the minds of intelligent natives, and the writer appears to consider the idea a new one. The " Examiner" gives a downright, straightforward opinion about the war, recognizes difficulties inseparable from all dealings between two laces of different degrees of civilization, but does not cavil at the necessity of governing New Zealand and Middlessex in a different manner. As it takes the common sense view of the question, we need not allude to it here at any length : our readers in New Zealand have not, we believe, to make up their minds on the subject of the present New Zealand war. At the same time we re-publish it, as it is as well to see that the more reasonable part of the English press are beginning to understand what we long ago understood in this Colony. The "Army and Navy Gazette" takes a practical, professional view of the war ; does not think it necessary to insist on the fact that the natives are to be reduced to obedience, but goes at once into the minutiae of gaiters, tinpots and tomahawks. — Febr. 15.

The memorial of the settlers of Taranaki to his Excellency is one of the most melancholy comments on the present state of that Province and of New Zealand generally that has yet been published. It is that bitterest and most painful of complaints : the cry wrung from a brave man, when patience and endurance aie at last worn out by suffering. The war has now lasted a year, and those who recollect the state of men's minds in Taranaki when martial law was first proclaimed, and compare it with their present state of gloomy despondency, must be struck with the melancholy change which twelve short months have brought about. The whole male population then turned out high in hope and confident of success ; though they had but one hundred regulars to support them, and though the j town of New Plymouth was open to attack and crowded with women and children. And | they were not hopeful without reason, for the Maori then was more afraid of an open position occupied by settlers then he appears to be now of regularly fortified and strongly garrisoned redoiibts. The native was certainly under-rated at that time, but he has since made good use of his year's appienticeship to the trade of war as carried on in Europe, and is a foe far more to be feared. Had the Waikatos, who are now fighting at Hapurona's pa, been at Waireka, a few fugitive militiamen and volunteers might have possibly reached town that night, but the main body of the Taranaki settlers would have been left on the field. The men who so boldly attacked No. 3 redoubt would have made short work of Jury's house and its haystack. The result of the year's operations is>, that our bravest and best settlers are weary and worn out by harassing duties in the field and in the trenches, and more than anything else by that " hope deferred which maketh the heart sick" : whilst the iusurgents, notwithstanding their severe losses, still show a bold front, and seem less likely to give in than ever. The domestic misery caused by this long protracted struggle can only be seen and fully appreciated at Nelson and at Taranaki, but it requires no great stretch of the imagination on our part to realize it to ourselves. We re-published the settlers' address, to which we have alluded, in our issue of the 19th, amongst other items of Taranaki news, but must again quote two of its clauses. It says : That within the last fortnight a large number of valuable houses belonging to the settlers have been burned, and great numbers of horses and cattle have been carried oft by such marauders ; and recently a most estimable settler has been waylaid and butchered That the pioximity of these bands, and the known existence of large bodies of natives a shoit distance from the town, causes great uneasinebs to the inhabitants, who feel that an overwhelming force might be brought against it at any moment without warning The depredations that have been committed, and the fearful risk to which every one is exposed who ventures beyond the immediate protection of military posts are too well known ; but we do not remember to have previously heard such unmistakeable expressions of anxiety for the safety of the town. It has long been known to be unsafe to sleep without the lines of New Plymouth ; but within, /men if sufficiently on the alert and with proaer precautions, seemed to consider themselves hi comparative safety. The late gallant attack on\our troops — for we cannot describe it otherwis«|— seems to have given rise to the present state\of apprehension amongst the settlers. CoopeVup and hard worked, separated from their families and uncertain as to their future, with sickness amongst them, and a dreary round of monotonous duties — only variegated by the melancholy occupation of occasionally following jo /the grave a comrade or military friend brought up by the " Tasmanian Maid" from the \Vs«ara, after some engagement which will never Bring the war one day nearer a successful issue than it was before — it is not wonderful that they are beginning to take a desponding view of the state of affairs ; it is rather surprising that they have so long kept up their spirits. The people of New Zealand, and of Auckland more particularly, cannot bnt feel the deepest sympatey with them in their misfortuues, but it is next to impossible to give anything but sympathy. Even the Government, either are or seem to be precluded from acting in the matter, and it will be interesting to know what answer his Excellency will make to the following appeal with which the memorial closes : Your memorialist*, therefore, earnestly pray that your Excellency will be pleased to visit this settlement, to judge personally of the »tate of affairs, and to take such meaiures as to your Excellency may seem fit. The faces of kings have from time immemorial been supposed to shed light and blessings around them : whether Queen's representatives have the same power is unknown ; but we fear much that the simple presence of his Excellency would not have the effect at Taranaki, which Taranaki settlers imagine. We believe that he has already "judged personally of the state of

affairs," anji as for "taking mq^vsiires'* ,lit;tjle power remains to him. We need not- allude to bygones at any length, but we believe 1 that lie has already, — since the commencement of the. war, — experienced, how small is the power ; ,for. -good where the power of action ia limited. — February 26.