THE WAIKATO MILITIA.

New Zealand Herald, Volume I, Issue 229, 6 August 1864, Page 6

THE WAIKATO MILITIA.

A great deal has been said and written about the men of these regiments, as to their uselessness as settlers —that they would inundate the country with crime and pauperism, that tiny would neither settle down upon the lands allotted to them, nor to any other useful occupation and employment. Immediately after their first introduction we find that a cotemporary did not hesitate to stigmatise them in its summary number for England as a useless and worthless body of men playing upon the word, " villein," in a manner anything but complimentary to them. On the floor of the Provincial Council chamber itself, thev were spoken of by a prominent leader of the pcace-at-anv-price party as the scourings of the streets of Dunedin and Melbourne —and the organ of this party contained inuendos against them from time to time, which we need not now repeat. How signally the men of our "Waikato regiments have praci ically given the lie to their calumniators, we have only to refer to the police sheet, the savings' bank returns, and their services in the field and in the camp. Considering the number of these men, it is astonishing how few of them have been arraigned for crimes committed against the civil law, and we believe also that the same remark applies to delinquencies against the military law. The fact is that anions: them are several of the sons and relatives of our most respectable country settlers—many are small freeholders themselves—-and the very fact that f hoy enlisted for such a service, as they did, proves them to be men of energy and will, whose efforts, directed rightly, will place them bye and bye in a position of social and political importance in this Province. In our issue of yesterday we drew attention to the pleasing fact that no less a sum than £11,92.3, received from 1050 depositors of men of these regts., had been invested in the Auckland Savings' Bank since the Ist of January last. This gives an average of £11 per head, and if continued even at this rate during the continuance of their term, will enable the careful and frugal to settle successfully on such excellent hind as that allotted to them. AYe trust that the officers of the several regiments will use their utmost endeavours to inculcate a spirit ot thriftiness and saving amongst the men, and confirm those already imbued with these feelings in the necessity of practising selfdenial and restraint for a time, as a present means to a more independent and affluent state by-and-bye. It will be for their own interest to do so. At any rate, in the case of those who intend settling on their own lands, to have an industrious, sober, thriving population around them, will enhance the value of their own grant. Tho good of the community will, in fact, to men and officers alike, be the good of the individual. The Savings' Bank report, as a whole, is a most satisfactory one. It shows an increase of deposits of £25,197 3s. lOd. over those of the last half-year, the actual amount of money deposited since the Ist of January last being £57,851 14s. 5d., that for the previous half-year having been £32,(J57 105.7 d. We need hardly say that the Institution is a most flourishing one, nor that it is well conducted. It speaks, too, most favorably for the prosperity of the working classes of this province/ There is no rottenness here. —July 20.

The extreme readiness of the Philo-Maori agitators to change their tactics, to abandon one absurd position after another in rapid succession, all equally hopeless and untenable, has, as we before intimated, been throughout characteristic of the party. Previous discomfitures are wisely forgotten; former exposures and defeats are conveniently ignored. Their motto is to return no answer, and to take no ofl'ence. To men in their straits, thoroughness, we may suppose, is felt to be a prime necessity. Boldness is strength. Like Napoleon, they trust for success to the originality, novelty, and audacity of their manner of attack. Hence

nothing; is too ouire or eccentric. "What they lack in argument tliey, more than atone for in readiness and vigour of assertion. The !;:fest illustration of these pen and ink etchings of Philo-Maoricharacter has just been presented to the public, in the form of a contribution on the subject of Confiscation, which appeared in the jS r ew-Zeuhuiih-r a few days ago. If we were to judge by the " wanton waste" of inference and mis-statement with which, to serve a purpose, Maori antecedents are handled in the document before us, we should certainly be disposed to conclude that this is the last "frantic effort we shall witness of the men who for so long a time have successfully deluded the unhappy Natives of this country with false hopes of immunity from their crimes, and who now, in the crisis of their despair, are risking everything, even to the last shred of reputation, if only tliey might avert, or even for a time suspend, the one dreaded calamity of their lives—the threatened loss of the Maori lands. It has just been discovered, according to the authority of this writer, that Confiscation is a thing unknown to Maori history, " it is not customary among the natives of New Zealand." They know of nothing so wicked as " fighting for the mere acquisition of land." (Of course, the colonists are fighting for the Diem acquisition of land !) " It is quite clear," says the writer, "that the New Zealanders in their inler-tribal wars never fought for the acquisition of territory ; they considered themselves at liberty under cer-tain-circumstances to slay their countrymen, but not at liberty to take possession of their estates." It is admitted readily —it could not be denied —that the Maori is a most bloodthirsty warrior ; he fights solely or chiefly for revenge and military renown, and in the pursuit of these objects will slay the last victim that may fall within his grasp, but then we are told he has a deep moral abhorrence of an act so dishonorable as that of possessing himself of his fallen enemy's lands. These he is described as magnanimously handing over to the remnant, if any such there be, of the tribes he has slain in war. lie will murder in cold blood, he will lay waste whole districts, and will not disdain even to appropriate Bin all chattels as "slaves, native valuables, &c.," such as would include, perhaps, the entire moveable possessions of his murdered victims, but the land he will not touch, that would be an act of "common robbery," from which his deeply moral nature revolts. In short, it has just been made to appear to the entire satisfaction of his friends that the Maori is a downright Anti-Confiscationist! He has no belief whatever in such doings. lie laments deeply, iu common with his admirers, the degeneracy of the times, and wonders how an idea so degrading, and so nearly akin to " robbery," that is, his own law of jlTvru, could ever have possessed itself of the mind of t .te Pakeha. Now, supposing all these amusing and most gratuitous Philo-Maori assumptions to be as true as they are notoriously false —what then ? Are we to wait for a precedent from the offender himself bearing exactly on his case before we adopt measures to punish him for his misdeeds? "J3ut do the JNewZr.ttlnndcr. and t he few well-known individuals here who have embarked with its owner in the same " canoe," themselves believe in the truth of what they write ? Are they even consistent exponents of those novel views of Maori history which they would have us receive so implicitly ? Let their own words form this very article answer lor them. " It is admitted," says the writer above referred to, "that certain lands, ticcideii/tilh/ ax il were, ocraxioiwUi/ fell into the hands of the conquerors." And again: "It cannot be denied that conquerors have held possession of lands trrex/ed from neighbouring tribes, for lengthened periods." Nothing akin to Confiscation, however, is supposed to have occurred 011 these " occasions." The little transact ions, we are fold, happened but "occasionally," and then quite " accidentally, as it were !" And to prove yet more irret'ragably that nothing "serious" was intended it is stipulated by the expositor that iu the estimation of the original owners the new occupants in these instances were not considered to have a " valid title." "We should think it very natural 011 the part of the original owners that such would be their opinion, but unfortunately for them the " conquerors" cared little what was thought by any one on the subject. Might was right ; and the territory from which they had ejected or destroyed their vanquished opponents tliey occupied and maintained for themselves, though it might be but "occasionally" and "accidentally." Now, let it' be noticed here for a moment, the kind of historical precedents with which a civilised community in its life-struggle with hordes of lawless barbarians is bated and bullied, with a view to stigmatise and defame its character. Can any sane man discover the remotest approach to a parallel between the well-known practice of civilised nations like our own, in the matter under review, and that which may be reasonably supposed to have obtained under the administration of the savage leaders of those murderous forays of Pagan New Zealanders, which, according to the most credible witnesses, not thirty years ago had successfully converted these islands into a hell upon earth : What object, but to insult the colonists and \illify them by implication before the world, can be intended to bo served by so unscrupulous and systematic a travesty of facts P None know better than the writers of these insidious libels on their lellow-colonists how blood-stained the character of the bona fide New Zealander is ; how grasping his avarice, how reckless his passions, how monstrous his crimes. They know full well that it was the earliest lament of the best disposed of the race how utterly insecure was life and property among themselves, and that it was only the strong hand that could either have or hold. Well may the unsophisticated candour of the savage, in this particular, rebuke the calculating cunning of the artful encomiasts, who, for their own selfish euds. would falsify the character of the Maori, and assign him a position to which he himself confesses he has no claim. The ordinary character of Maori history is too well known in the colony to make it a matter of the smallest consequence in what style Philo-Maori partisans here may choose to particularise it, but we are quite aware that it is not for colonial, but for English eyes that these historical romances are so studiously penned, and we suppose that until we think proper to place ourselves, through an efficient representative, in direct

communication with the public mind at home, we must be content to suffer the consequences of our own. neglect. Meantime the designs of the Colonial Government are before the world. They need not, Maori precedents to commend either their wisdom or their justice. AVliat we plead for in this respect is the sacredness and inviolability of truth. We have asserted more than once, and we re-assert it again, that the principle of Confiscation is neither new nor strange to the native mind. This much is admitted, as we have shewn in their own words, on the part of the contra - dictionists themselves. The Jesuitical manner in which that party are accustomed to enter their disclaimers on this as on all other points of native interest, will reckon little against the conclusion. The whole tenor of Maori history proves the fact. Their wars invariably were wars of aggression. Their domestic career as a tribal comiuunit} r presents an unbroken series of rapine and violence and robbery. It may be true, as the JVeiv-Zealander asserts, that these people did not often " raise an army for the ostensible purpose ot Confiscation. It is not necessary to prove that they did. The acquisition of territory would not be ordinarily a leading motive with New Zealanders any more than it is among more civilised "belligerents. The permanent occupation of an enemy's country among any people is a question of policy or convenience only. As for the boasted disinterestedness of the Maori victor in particular, it is a well attested fact that he never failed to exercise the power he possessed in such a manner, and to such extent as best gratified his wishes. He occupied the lands ho over-ran, or he abandoned tliein, as became his necessities or his desires. There was nothing retnarkable in his doing so ; it is the custom of all barbarous and even semi-barbarous tribes throughout the world. The extraordinary exemption so Quixotically claimed for him from these customs, in unblushing contravention of all fact and precedent to the contrary, alone calls for any notice on the subject. It is one ot the wildest flights of the Philo-Maori monomania. The consciousness of its extravagance may be ihbrb thaii suspected from the manner in which the leading proposition is put: " Confiscation is not customary among the natives of New Zealand, never having been recot/ni-sed by Maori law." The thing was practised ad libitum by the Maori law, but it was not duly sanctioned in the statute book of heathen cannibals! Naughty people; we had thought you were such' lovers of your own laws ! yet you would indulge betimes in the dreadful heresy of Confiscation, notwithstanding that it Was " not recognised by Maori law !" And what- pray we ask is Maori law in the estimation of the writer ? "Where is it to be read ? Who are its exponents ? Does he not know that cvry district and tribe of New Zealand has its different usages, maxims, and customs, and that these again are as differently and variously rendered by every successive European who undertakes In interpret them. Maori law, forsooth ! The strong arm and the ready hand is the only Maori law we have ever heard of in New Zealand. No other custom of the race, in virtue of universal adoption, ever attained to the dignity of such a distinction. Their law is the law of expediency, the law of reprisal, the law of revenge—and for once it may be conceded, the Nric-'Lealander is right —the Maori lias 110 law of Confiscation. — July 22.

The complete failure of that temporizing policy which wan all along pursued in this country under the auspices of Sir George Grey, has now become matter of history. Its results are before the world. Adopted in mistaken lenity—pursued under successive humiliations —it has terminated at last in anarchy and sad disaster. That such would be its end was all along the firm belief, not only of all who were possessed of practical information on New Zealand affairs, but of many besides who formed their opinion in the matter simply from general principles. The whole system of treatment adopted by the governing power towards the natives was essentially and radically wrong. It was founded no doubt in the best intentions, but it is equally certain it was founded on false principles, and in amazing igorance of the laws which govern human nature. New Zealand as a field for European enterprise for twenty years, has in consequence been held in check, while the Maoris themselves, I'or whose especial benefit the system was adopted and followed up for so long a time, have, been well nigh ruined through its means. "Whether Sir George Grey himself was the apostle of this temporizing policy in New Zealand, or whether he simply adopted what was already partially prepared to his hand, it is now of little consequence to enquire, but it is quite certain that it was not until after his arrival in the colony that it assumed that com pass and breadth offormwhiehitultimately attained, and which entitles it at the present daj- to rank as an institution of the land. Under his supervision it was organized and kept in motion. Through his influence it was fostered and encouraged, until its operations have extended to the remotest native district, and its power for good or evil is known and felt by every tribe and subdivision of the Maori race. It was by its means that the first New Zealand war was closed. The compromise then made by the Governor of the day with belligerent tribes in the midst of defeat and disgrace to our arms, was effected, as 'it were, in the first bloom and heyday of the temporizing policy. Blankets and sugar, flour and tobacco, were freely distributed to the men that sacked Kororareka, on the very daj- ou which the outrage was committed and in the very midst of the despoiled Europeans. From that time until the end of Sir George Grey's first pro-consulate, a loug and dreary era presents itself in the history of the colony, during which the famous do-nothing policy dragged along its corrupting and enfeebling career. Anything tending to devclopc the resources of the country, in an European point of view, during that period was systematically and zealously discouraged. Whatever might endanger the relations of the Government with the haughty overbearing natives or disturb the quiet manipulation of the large sums annually expended upon them and among them by the Governor from Imperial sources, was kept at the utmost possible distance. Nearly every European channel of enterprise was closed. Emigration there was none. Political life among the colonists was .entirely extinct. Grass

might grow on the streets and highways of the Colonv, hut the natives and their.fnbnilg must not be disturbed. In-those drlys.every one did 'homage to the silent system. It was the .Saturnian age of "peace" to the man whose ambition it was to secure for a iimo thc.passivc quiescence of the native people. Of course Sir George Grey now stood hirrh in the estimation of his clients at home and elsewhere. He was the champion of" Imperial interests in the colony, the hero of the Aboriginal Protection Society, and th& idol of Exeter Hall; And would he not deserve the praise he received at their hands? JEladheuot economised in pence and expended in pounds ? Did he not " check" the colonists and " encourage" the natives ! And had he not successfully relieved both races alike of the onerous task of having anything to do in the matter of looking after their own affairs ? Unquestionably he had achieved all this. He had fulfilled his labour, he had accomplished his hire and lie would have his reward. But the day dawn will break even, over sleepy hollow. The ITomc Government at length became weary of a colony irhosß talented Governor would persist in the ungracious course of giving them no trouble. They felt they must do something on their own account,"and possibly, by way of experiment, to ascertain whether or not any Europeans still lingered on an island whose aboriginal inhabitants were not being daily "roh- " bed or shot down," they hit upon the notable device of Hinging a Constitution Act of home manufacture (only a bungled affair it is true) broadcast upon the colony. They had tried to do this before, but Sir George Grey in the coolest manner possible turned key upon the Imperial parchment and Ordered the irresponsible coach to drive on. Possibly he held too accurate an estimate of his own position to risk the experiment a second time. But he did not long hesitate to make his election. The governor of this colony is a man of foresight and of taste withal, and he felt intuitively that there would be something indecorous in placing representative institutions side by side with his own flour and sugar policy. He foresaw what was coming aild like a man who knows when the right thing is to be done, he voluntarily determined on a short visit to England. The sequel is soon told. His successor in due time arrived in the colony. But though the high priest of the mysteries was himself gone the policy he had inaugurated remained behind him. Colonel Gore Browne, simple man, had no established ■ reputation to boast • on the score of the management of aboriginal tribes ; he was well content, therefore, to follow 011 in the track that lay open before him. I-Ie applied himself to the Work of governing the natives with the earnestness and perfect sincerity of a man Who had lio misgiving about, the wisdom or good faith of the policy he was attempting to carry out.But though slow to perceive anything Wroht* in a time-honored custom, some five years experience of its working convinced the Governor of the titter impracticability of the scheme, when, like a man of one motive, as he was well known to be, he determined at once to veer ship and steer a new course. The sequel in this instance also is easily disposed of. The home authorities, or some one on their behalf, declared the new treatment to be doubtful. It was thought a bad case, and the patient it wan feared was getting worse. The old family pliysician therefore must be called in, or rather it is supposed he volunteered his services. Sir George Grey accordingly once more visits the scene of his former exploit?; His admirers are before hand with him this time in their account of what lie purposes and what he will do. It was admitted he was conciliatory, but then ho could be iirui. Rebels and eontemnors of the Queen's authority would find in him a man of resolute purpose, and they must succumb. Some months passed over after the arrival of the new Governor in the colony before he made any movement whatever. At the end of that time he visited the professedly friendly natives of Lower AVaikato. The rebels or king natives were not visited at AVaikato nor elsewhere. They did not invite him, and he would not go amongst them. This may have been the safest but in ouropinionitwas nottliewisestor mostpolitie course to have pursued. AVe believed, at the time, that a more candid and out-spoken policy would have had more weight with the native people in the interests of peace. The day had long passed when disaffected Maoris would feel hurt at the dishonour put upon them in this way by the Queen's representative. The same thing was repeated at the South. The friendly natives were visited and complimented, but the contumacious were left to smart under inlliction of the viceregal frown. -

Next followed the famous new institutions. The wildness of the scheme was every where discussed, but chieily iu private at the time, for the people were resolved that oven yet the Governor should have a fair field. Silence was again a self-imposed duty on the part of the colonists. Action just then was not required. They had only to suffer, to be maligned, and to pay the cost. Some seventy thousand pounds a year was freely voted to carry oil the experiment. So long as pensions, salaries, and presents were the order of the day everything went smoothly enough. Occasionally perhaps where the administration was less " talented " slight contretemps would ensue. An offending project of the Government would be suspended, or a " Gorst" printing establishment would he unceremoniously demolished ; but these things occurred only " occasionally and accidentally, as it were," and of course would be very easily forgiven. So soon however as his Excellency attempted to invade the head quarters of Maori disaffection, when compelled through pressure of the Taranaki petition to the Queen to visit that unhappy province, aad to make some effort to acconr plish even a single step in the direction of redressing the wrongs of the settlers —at that very moment and on that very day — the whole tableau of affairs is changed as by magic. A complete phantasmagoria ensues. The new institutions, the runangas, the assessors, the parson, the doctor, and the schoolmaster all go by the rim, and all run in company together. There is no hesitating and no trifling with his purpose to be on the part of this noble protege of British benevolence. He dashes straight onward to his purpose. The glittering tomahawk is uplifted to strike home the blow, and this time descends not into the passive eai ■th at the feet of the Queen's representative in token of peace and good will, but into the warm blood and quivering flesh of her

jesty's unsuspecting and unoffending European subjects. Such has been the course of operations in this Colony, brought down to the present day, in which the temporising policy has played its part. Such has been tliQ finale f 0 Sir George Grey's latest attempt to rule the >~ew Zealander* by what is facetiously termed in the Colony "the flour and sugar policy." It occupied nearly two yearsTof his Excellency's valuable time ere he arrived at that position which nine-tenths of the practical common sense men in the Colouy had assigned as the limit of his career months before he had started upon it. A less clever individual would have accomplished the work in a much shorter period, and 1 hereby have saved to the Colony and 1 lie Empire both time and treasure. ' But possibly that would not have answered so well. It would not have cost Great Britain the two years expense of the army of occupation unemployed in the country throughout that period, nor have lost to the Colmiv the long months its affairs were held in suspense. and it is certain that it would have left untried altogether the most roundabout way that could possibly be thought of for attempting to prove that the natives of this country were not to be dealt with even on Sir George Grey s own boasted principle of In the meantime thoughtful men begin to enquire how much more of this kind of sjoveriimeul the Colony mav be able to bear, for. notwithstanding the discomfiture of OoM'nior Grey —notwithstanding tlie complete '•revolution'' which his system so rudely underwent at the hands of the native ncoph —despite the frightful catastrophes, massacres, and butcheries in which liis whole scheme has resulted in " parts of the northern island—all this yet seems to some minds but the fitting adornment of a pleasing romance ; and to all appearance, either Jrom feelings of political revenge, or from mere private animosity, or from still more directly interested motives, a few individuals in tiie community are again willing to embark anew in the same mad career of disastrous folly and unparalelled corruption. We find it hard to believe, however, that Sir George Grey will be found among the number of such individuals. Mortifying as j; must be to him to witness the wreck ofan j enterprise on which he has bestowed so j much thought, and expended so much i labour, yet he is surely by far too shrewd a | man not to perceive that it is both more hopeful, even at his stage of experience, to retrace his steps and re-mould his plans, than to attempt to continue obstinately in a course which already has brought ruin 011 thousands of both races, ar.d must still, if persevered in. even but partially, result only in fnrtlter humiliation to himself, in the utter extermination of the native race, in a feeling of mutual distrust, animosity, and ill-blood between the colonists and the mother country, and eventually in their final separation. —July 2S.