THE MAORI'S DECLINE.

Daily Southern Cross, Volume XXVII, Issue 4436, 13 November 1871, Page 3

THE MAORI'S DECLINE.

Captain Cook estimated, nearly a century ago, that; the Maori had, Jong before his discovery of them, seen their best days — that is, the days when their number was greatest. He thought that they had, in the hundred years preceding his visit, caton up about one-fourth of their then number. He felt for them in a largeminded way, for the great navigator and [ discoverer was a liberal-hearted man, and he, in some sort, excused their manners on the score that they had no animals in i the country which they could hunt and j kill, and rook and eat. They had brought I with them when they migrated from the Malay Islands only a dog and a rat "We have Shakspeare's authority for calling rats but "small deer." Better venison they had not, and hence Cook was inclined to look with a philosophic mind upon the way they had taken to for supplying the want of animal food. Had he come to the Islands of New Zealand fifty years later, the English nation might have been saved great trouble with the Maoris, and the British exchequer a large outlay. It is possible that nearly all of the natives would by that time have oaten up one another, for there can be no doubt that such a taste as they were cultivating would have greatly increased by what it fed upon, and that in satisfying it a larger number would i have to be killed than could have been conveniently eaten — whilst fresh. The Maori had to eat his man quite fresh, for he knew not, never knew, and does not know now, the virtues of salt as a seasoning to, or as a preservative of, his meat, or as anything that is useful. In the mind's eye wo can see the waste of such food thatmust have been occasioned by the Maori taste. To get one or two bodies for a meal many must have been killed, for it is not likely that the exact quantity wanted for the week's supply could have been obtained at oasily as by hunting or by purchase of animal food. It had to be fought for, — to be obtained by band to hand warfare. The surplus food was dealt with in this way. The bead was cut off and the brains having been taken out it was dried in the sun, stuffed with leaves and kauri gum, and then half baked before a slow fire. It was ever afterwards kept as a household ornament until the I while man came to the islands, when these heads were all purchased for museums and travelling shows, and the other " aids to science " for which such ! things go. The head being off, the body was laid upon stones that had been previously heated by fire. Being laid upon them it was then covered up with branches of fern, and further covered with earth. The heat of the stones slowly baked it, and the covering prevented any escape of vapour. Six hours afterwards, this baked meat was uncovered and put I away until wanted on a platform supported by four sticks, where it remained until required for breakfast, dinner, or | supper. Captain Cook did much to put an end to this kind of feeding by leaving numbers of pigs on the islands, and by ! supplying the Maoris with potatoes, turnips, carrots, maize and corn. These latter are cultivated to this day in little patches about the Maori dwellings, and the natives live thereon literally from hand to mouth. Before they got this vegetable diet they subsisted upon the ; roots of fern ; upon stray rats, and upon j stranded whales and sharks, and such ■ lisli as they could catch without fish i hooks. These and the " animal food "to j which we have alluded constituted their j sustenance. Birds there were none worih shooting for food, and had there b^en any the Maoris had no powder. A Moa would have wade a meal for a large ] family for a month, had that gigantic j bird existed in (ho M-Aories' time, which , is very doubtful, and had the Maori j possessed any means of catching a bird ! that could see about ten miles around him at a glance and could run faster than an j express train, a matter which is still more i doubtful. The pigs we regard as having ; done more to suppress the cannibal taste, ' or to satisfy it, than anything else that | can bo looked for as an argument [ in that way. They increased and I multiplied, and replenished all Now i Zealand, and up to forty years ago had ; the ijreat honour, which pi^s never riovcM 1 before had, of constituting tho , whole Fauna of a 1-irgo country. The ! \vr< telied rat disappeared befoio them, and I here were ncwr a people who could, | like tho Maoris, have so sensibly s-ud j " please the pi<s," looking to tin* gr*at ! importance that these an i Mais muse have ' had in their c^pr. 'I he trouble .>f oitch- ' in,,' them was greatly in the pigs' favour, for a veiy little trouble suits a Maori j who is nol bent Ujxm robbery or vuigeance. A mother pig with :i lar<jo young family were the ei->y \icMins, and they were not always secured without a ha! tie of which the Maori often could slio'v the scai-6. The pigs are now the only animals in the three Islands of New Zealand forllu'sportoian'sph'nsure. Pi nice Alfred was treat- d to a pig hunt there on his late vijit, m the same way that lie i \\;\i U'eiii'd to an elephant hunt at the Capo. Alter all, tho elephant looks mit a larger pig, and the long-legged New Zealand boar must hare given the better sport. There is a great Darwinian point about these pigs that must not be overlooked. When Captain Cook loft them on the Islands, the pigs were of our ordinary farmyard kind, — the type of which every Englishman knows — but Iho constant working of the pig in rooting at the fern trees for food gradually lengthened his snout to a very appreciable extent. Having to poke that nosealnaysinto Che ennli has lengthened it and strengthened it, until it is quite a distinct sort of snout from tho snout of its ancestor and progenitor, the Captain Cook pig of a hundred years ago. Let Darwinians reflect upon this, as it bears out their theory about the grasping properties of the monkoy'a tail, that such was brought about by the fears of those monkeys whose hold was insecure, those fears drawing out the vertebra? gradually, and giving it, in time, prehensile properties, or, to put the formula in I other words, " That which is required by the necessities of animal life is furnislied by nature," and we might add " and that which is not required is taken away," as we find tho fishes in the Mammoth caves of Kentucky to have no eyes. Sight not being required there, the eyes that were not used gradually faded, and in progress of the species were not reproduced. We will return to our Maori, who is gradually fading too, and not being reproduced at all in requirement to keep tho species upon the earth. There are many more men than women now, and but. i'ew children, a sort of thing quite out ',of the order of an increasing people, in , w Inch there are always more women and children than men. Looking at them lying about in their dirty villages, tho matter becomes understandable to us. Fighting men they are all, and bulldogs at that. That is their great characteristic. It is good in its way no doubt, but must be allied to other qualities to make it of good to its owner. Down Whitechapel why we could pick up any Sunday morning twenty bull-necked, bull-doggy, fighting men, who for a stake of five pounds a side will punch each other to death for hours together. These men will fight, and will do nothing else in the way of

hard work. Cadge they will without ' shame, and loaf about with pipe in mouth and sponge upon others, leaving their wives to wash and mangle and slave for their benefit. Work for their living, in the sense of steady labour, these men never will. All that is the Maori. This I Whiteehapel breed will band together and have faction fights with other similar breeds. That is the Maori also. These Whitechapellers, hating labour of all kinds, will hate those who pursue it—interfering with and annoying, and worrying in every wny those who will work, whilst they idle. Of such is the Maori all over. Those " Roughs " of London, and their like, the " Beds " of Paris— will cajole and shuffle, lie and swindle, and so also will the Maori. "We were in com pany with three of them for four days on board a steamer in one of our coasting excursions, and had, then and there, plenteous evidence of their qualities. They were men of mark too amongst the Maoris — one of them had tried once to make himself king over them. These men were always trying " to come the old soldier " over us, in a regular Jeremy Diddler way. Borrowing was their great point— extending from money to tobacco ; and borrowing was enly another name for sponging or begging. Draughts and cards they would play, and always stipulate for a stake which they had no means of paying, nor inclination to pay either when they lost. They would beg only a pipe of tobacco and then take a h and ful, borrow a penknife — and pocket it, and try to sell anything that they had saleable— for six times its value. We had once before, over twenty years ago, been with similar company to our three Maoris, and that was a compay that a steamer was carrying, amongst others, down the river Thames in London to a prize fight. When we got off that steamer we had lost purse, handkerchief, gloves, and everything that could well be borrowed or filched from us. Australians have been taken to England as pugilists, and so have Americans, while negroes in plenty have entered the fistic ring, but yro don't remember that a Maori was c ver taken to England for that purpose. He seems to have been overlooked by the " Fancy" and the ommision should be amended. He will go readily and will fight well and " sell" his backers also as readily as he will fight. They may take our word for it that he will do nothing but for his own benefit. And yet, ye gods, how the Maori can fight ! We were shown a spot where less than two hundred of them had withstood the British soldiery to five times the number, and that for two days and a night. The Maories had only the advantage of raised ground and some earthworks hastily thrown up. When on the second day they were appealed to by General Cameron to give in, as ho was loth that such iren as they had proved themselves should die, they returned tho Roman answer, "ask him which it is that he thinks is to die" and so fought on until they nearly all fell. The rest fled still fighting. If such as they were could be got to fight for other people than themselves we would back them, as soldiers, against all the world— including the present Prussians. We can't say more. And yet tkese people decline, and decline, before the white man. His working powers paralyse the Maori, and the latter gets sulky and morose at tho sight of his busy brother, and becomes careless of life and everything else. He feels that he lias lost his place in the land. He is not only no longer number rmn there, but he is nobody at all. His proud spirit is broken. He feels that his wife cannot think much of him, and that she sees the white man work and support Ins wife and family, whilst she, poor devil, is called upon to work and support her lazy, do-nothing Maori lord. Do we never see the same thing amongst ourselves ? We have soon it. It is not unusual to see a superior workman put his fellow's nose out of joint, and to turn the satisfied into the dissatisfied man, who will then lose energy and spirit and become careless and reckless. It is not all of us who can stand the sight of the prosperity of others, and boar quietly to J 1)0 beaten in tho race of life. Tlie Maori ib not the only one \\ ho loses heart in the r.ico whon lie 's not only collared but pa«se,l mil Tho-se acquainted with am u.»l lite will tell us how many horses "shut ii])" entirely v. hpn that event happens to them. It is a pily, nil things considered, and humanity especially, that the Miii/n cannot be got to leave New Zealand and «o bick to his own Malays, or oine oilier island, where he might besj;in life anew, with the addition of .m assortment of animals to Year and feed upon — to prevent a further decrease of his species. The Maori with the form an 1 strength of an athletic man lias the mind of a child. He will not trouble himself to learn the English language. Th'» hnglishman has to le.irn the Maori's and communicate with him therein. The British Govern merit h.ivo set up a native court at Auckland in which justice is done in the Maori tongue. The court was sitting in January when we were in Auckland, and we visited an English court of law doing its work in another tongue. The Maori is never satisfied with a decision unless it bo in his favour a decision against him be looks on as an injury, aud broods over it in Oorsican fashion. "In the ease of Fox v. Walker, to recover from a Maori upon a promissory note, the cause of action (says an Auckland paper) his been dismissed. It appears that, in negotiating such instruments with Maoris, it is essential to make them understand what they nre doing. If they say they don't understand, the Maori is rid of his liability." The paragraph quoted we cut from a New Zealand paper, and it shows the difficulty of dealing with men who can say that they understand or not just as it may suit them. A nice way of getting rid of liabilities, and kind treatment iudeed on tho part of the British. The Maori's disinclination to learn the language and conform to the habits of the white settler keeps him back altogether in New Zealand, and prevents him competing at anything -except fighting. Ho wi'l not become servant to the settler in any way, and his only friendship for him is for what ho can get out of him. Both Pakeha and Maori are now left, by tho removal of the British troops altogether from Now Zealand, to shift for themselves on equal terms. The terms are not equal, however, for the white settler is thinking of working aud progressing, and of leaving those who are to come after him better off than he is himself, and the Maori is thinking of nothing of the kind ; ho is on tho contrary idling about and dreaming of the next cause of quarrel that lie can pick, and tho next fight, and of that great honour to be achieved amongst the Maories— that of being the first man in the battle to kill one of the enemy. If the white New Zealand settlers intend to hold their own and to come out of the next scrimmage with honour, they must adopt the Prussian fashion of living, and devote much of their time to military matters and to learning a soldier's duties. To do that the cash book and the bank book must be neglected for a time, aud the acquisition of wealth be postponed to the more sensible question, of the means

of keeping it when acquired. One bnttlo well fought and won will quiet tli» Maories for a long time, but (In* lew of one will unhinge everything with such men as the M.aoriea for victors. Every year fights for the white --eltler, however. Time is rapidly swooping away the Maori, and he is disappearing like to the clouds that sweep his mountains' summit. His new diet is> said not to nourish him as his former one did. The fern root that he fed upon before Captain Cook introduced the potato n said to have contained morn than twice as much of nourishment. We all know the bitterness . with which Cobbett spoke and wrote of the potato as an article of lood for the British labourer, and his views seem to be supported by its effects upon the Maori's constitution. Consumption frequently j visits his unclean and unventilated dwelling, and he has taken to bad methods of preparing his food for eating. His maize and potatoes and corn are macerated in water and left so for days, and then dried in the sun and not eaten until they become in a half rotten and decidedly bad smelling state. " High " venison may be a good thing, but the " high " living of the Maori is decidedly bad. We tried to eat with them, but found nothing that our eyes or nose would let us partake of. Again, to help him 'out of the world, he has taken body and spirit to tobacco, which blessing of civilisation makes him lazier than ever, and to which he devotes the energies of a life time. The female Maori does the same. The filthy pipe and the poisonous weed are never out of their hands. Tobacco, that has ruined the constitutions of half the Americans, is doing the same for the Maories. Many of them add the aid of spirits to the tobacco. Wo all know whither tend idle habits, bad dwellings, bad food, want of clothing, broken spirits, and the use of tobacco and spirits ; and we soe how many powerful agents are thus working together for the improvement of the Maori off the face of the earth.— J.H., in Melbourne Leader.