OLD STORIES RETOLD.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 19 June 1924, Page 10

OLD STORIES RETOLD.

—4 THE. “PORANGI’’ LAW. The law is an ass (writes Hajre Hongi in the Free Lance). At any rate, that was Te Pu’s opinion. Te Pu was a young and rather pretty wife, with a. nicely tattooed chin, and she lived with her people at Matariki.' Normariby, in Taranaki.. There was a pakeha settler there who taught his sons to despise and revile the Maoris. Pu was riding home from Haweira one day, when two of the settler’s sons started “cock-shying” at her with road metal. One stone struck her just above her temple. She'fell off her horse, insensible. Passing setlers, who knew Pu, had her conveyed, still unconscious, to her home. A few weeks afterwards there was a ti action fcg assault and damages against the farmer family. The magistrate—the late Captain Northcroft, N.Z.C.—fined the pakeha £5 and lectured him severely. He said further: “In the early sixties, and when war with these West Coast Maoris was imminent, my own mother walked, and alone, from New Plymouth to Wanganui. And, not only was she not molested on her way, she was taken in and treated with the greatest kindness and consideration by the 'natives of the various villages. In that way, and after many days, mv mother reached Wanganui safe and well. And—this is most important—at that time the Maori population in number far exceeded ours. To-day the position is reversed, for our population far exceeds that of the Maoris.” Finally, the plain-speaking ma'gis-tcate advised the farmer to leave the district and settle somewhere else—■which he did. A few days afterwards, Pu came to see me in Hawera. The gash in her head was still bound hip with a handkerchief. She asked Die to accompany her to see the clerk of the Court, Mr Trimble. He asked what he could do for us. I turned to Pu. “Say to him,” she said, “that I have come fbr the five pounds which that pakeha was fined.” The clerk replied, ‘‘But that money is not for you; it is for the Queen.” “The Queen!” repeated the almost stupified ■ Pu. “The Queen r Why for the Queen?” Snatching the bandage off her forehead, and pointing to the scar, she cried: “He did not do this to the Queen; he did it to me! Homai te five pounds! Your law is porangi—it is mad!” But alas! poor Pu had to go ■without. The Queen stuck to the money. “Fifty-one’’ adds: Seeing that war broke’ out between the pakeha and Maori in March, 1860, the whole of the province being affected, Mrs Northcroft’s overland trip to Wanganui on foot must have been attended with very great peril, as the Maoris north of New Plymouth and south as far as Tataraimaka, at any rate, were in anything but a peaceful frame of mind in the late fifties. Just a year previous to war breaking out. Te’Teira".offered' land at Waitara for sale to the Government in opposition to the policy laid down by Wiremu Kingi, and it* inav be said that from then’on to actual conflict the Maori's were bent ©n an attempt to regain possession of land occupied by Europeans in Taranaki. That' Mrs Northcroft was was well treated on long and hazardous journey is a tribute to the southern Maoris.