TWO BOOKS ON NEW ZEALAND

Evening Post, Volume CVI, Issue 56, 15 September 1928, Page 21

TWO BOOKS ON NEW ZEALAND

"New Zealand: An Outline History." By Professor John Bawson Elder. London: Humphrey Milford, Oxford University Press. "The New Zealanders." By Hector Bolitho. London: J. M. Dent and Sons, Ltd. Professor Elder's unpretentious "Outline" of the history of New Zealand gives due credit to the missionaries for their pioneering efforts. He refers to their good influences on the Maorils. "Indirectly, by speaking of the strength of Britain and teaching the Maoris to associate with the British the love of fair dealings," the missionaries prepared the way for British rule. This testimony to the ground work done by the missionaries for the New Zealand of to-day is valuable from such an authority, because iv the popular mind the foundations of the Dominion begin with the settlements at Auckland and Port Nicholson in the early 'Forties. The missionaries not only had to convert and train the Maoris—a hard enough task in itself— but to contend with the handicap of the bad pakeha influences upon the Native peoples. Marsden's Mission at Bay of Islands began in 1814, tho Wesleyans began their work at Whangaroa in 1822, and Bishop Pompallier's Roman Catholic Mission followed in 1838. All this was before the official annexation of these islands by Ilobson as representing the British Government, in 1840. In commendably concise form Professor Elder reviews the most important events in tho history of the Dominion, and he does so in less than a hundred pages, including numerous full-page illustrations, a bibliography, and a table of dates. Clearly he has that enviable literary gift of "knowing what to leave out." This little book is a marvel of condensation . Mr. Bolitho's "The New Zealanders" is one of Dent's Outward Bound Library—a handy form of book for travellers contemplating visits to the British Dominions, Colonies, and Protectorates. Mr. Bolitho's introduction contains some personal .'details and the expressed wish that "my time and circumstances would allow me to write the book that New Zealand deserves." He acknowledges the help he has received from the New Zealand Government as to half the contents of the book; for the rest, he says, he has drawn upon his memory. The reader will find no difficulty in ascertaining how much of "The New Zealanders" has been deriv!ed from official sources and how much from, the writer's memory. Mr. Bolitho 'is rather, patronising when writing of his fellow-New Zealanders. "They aTe good people (he admits), smug perhaps, rather narrow-minded. They haven't a great deal of imagination, but they h .ye faith and sincerity and the will to work, and a moral codo which gives them a profound and all-enveloping respect for a home." Also, "even the labour agitators and Socialists in New Zealand fear God and honour tho King in a sane and not bigoted fashion." But the New Zealanders, alas! "pursue culture and uplift with gauche eagerness." Mr. Bolitho writes as if quickly and without much thought given to what ho writes. Intending settlers and tourists will find his book interesting when his facts aro winnowed from his opinions. Visitors will be glad to learn also from tho writer that Tho comfort of tho prisons in New Zealand is equal to tho aTcragc comfort of its country hotels. The book has a map of New Zealand (as end papers). It also contains illustrations in line by that clever New Zealand artist Harry Bountree.