MISCHIEVOUS ADVICE TO, ' NATIVES.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume XXI, Issue 50427, 2 May 1878, Page 2

MISCHIEVOUS ADVICE TO, ' NATIVES.

(From the " New Zealand Herald.") '„ -> With . painful pertinacity Mr Daniel Tookeyj of the Thames, continues* to write and, publish letters, couched ist ft style of insolent bravado, respecting the discreditable, because anonymous;anc|djsloyal, letter which he addressed to cegt&n. natives at the Thames, and in which ifo endeavored to' prejudice them againßt^iKe Government;: and to stir up 'strife and difficulty in. regard to certain lands on which, negotiation of some kind -is still peridirig. -We should have thought that detection and exposure of what is in- all all honorable minds deemed a mean and underhand process — that of w^itirig.an. anonymous letter with the intent Tto derange the work of colonial administration — would, as a rule, close a culprit's mouth. Some people, however, consider it , . proper in such a case %0 "brazen it ou^i •, " and this is the role which Mr Tookey has assumed. He has chosen to blink the ugly fact, that he not only wrote an anonymous letter with a purpose 'Jxd dared not avow^ until, to his astonishment, he found he was discovered—but, being a licensed interpreter, the very fact of which implies that trust was reposed in him by the Colonial Ministry, — he surreptitiously betrays that trust, and seeks to set the natives against the Government of the colony, and to damage their policy and prestige with the natives. There has been too much , of this interference. It is no excuse now set up that he acted as amanuensis. His license was not given" to him to enable himtoinjure'the Government policy; and sow disaffection and trouble. Sundry native - officials, and native interpreters, have too 'of ten had special objects to gain which did not always consort : with what was desirable for the public welfare, and have exercised in too many instances the powers their position bestowed on them in a manner to further private and to: frustrate public interests;, as the archives of the Native Office and the Native .Land Office can tell to .this day. It was «$d; r many years ago with a considerable degree of truth, that the Native Office, -prith-all its mystery, was necessary,! because i N many people Jived by it. Difficulties were often created in order to make it appear how necessary the special priesthood of Maori linguists and Maori go-betweens were, and that if the Native Department were but touched, disaster and chaos would come again. We have out-lived that belief : and both the Government and the Parliament will require to stop that system of underhand interference of which a sample has just been unearthed, hut which is only one of scores of cases that never see the light.