COLONIAL TRADUCERS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume I, Issue 253, 3 September 1864, Page 6

COLONIAL TRADUCERS.

(From tho Syitneij Murtiinii Jfnu/i/, August 20.) The angry references of the. leading Knglish I'resslo the cost of tho New Zealand war is the explanation of the despatch of Mr. Ourdwell, and shows how difficult the position of a Minister. We mav well despair of removing prejudices which arc founded upon misconceptions so gross and absurd that it is hardly possible to read them with patience. The reiterated statements that tho colonists have made the war, in spite of evidence now in the hands of the British Government, and, indeed, accessible to everybody, proves how little! can bo gained by the establishment of an unwelcome truth. It is evidently useless to repeat that the colonists never had power to make thy war ; that it was the act of the British Government by its own agents; that the i[uarr< 1, whatever its cause, cannot he traced to any popular interference. All was done under a system which placed the native a flairs in the absolute discretion of the Crown, and which prohibited oven the most trifling land bargain as between the settlers and the natives. Whatever, therefore, be the merits of the New Zealand war, it was made by .Kngland through her own agents, and independently • *1' the will or voice of the colonists, on whom tin? British Government. never conform! any suhrdantial power in

" native affairs" until this war was in its full career.

Is it really eonsistent with tin: intere-dx of 1 li;it ii eharge should lie reiterated against such notorious fnctfi The war, we believe, wan justiliable aiul inevitable. Wo know that the stairmeets of aggression upon native rights sire false. There has never been any attempt to give precise (lata in support of those charges. The worst we have ever heard is that low white men have sometimes treated respectable blaclc men with insnlt and contempt—a great social wrong, but surely not to lie charged upon a people. The most monstrous illusion of (lie English J'ross seems, however, to be this— that the colonies of Australia, with New Zealand, are, as u whole, concerned in the Maori war! We believe that the common Kngli.-.h fceliiiL', and the delermination to stand by our own kindred iu danger, iia.s animated the population of this hemisphere, and to this is to be attributed much that has been done in support of the Government- of New Zealand. Hut were Auckland and all the present, seat of war submerged, the greater part of even New Zealand would still remain unhurt. No interest beyond that, of social life would be greatly a fleeted- Kngland has had this example afforded by the Colonists of New Zealand—-that divided as they aro in several provinces—many having no connection in trade—they have, nevertheless, undertaken jointly the responsibilities of a public debt, t.he first loan of which is seized, one half, by the I'.ritish Government lo pay for war made by her own agents when the colonists had no power whatsoever, ff th" people of Kngland may cry out because they have no interest in these wars, we may ask what, interest has Kyttleton r What concern has Dunedin r What, has Otago to do with this contest ? What, that large section, passing under the name of New Zealand, which forms a separate Island, and where there is scarcely a iWaori trilio fo lie found What liav New youth Wales and Victoria to do more, than nnv other part of the British Kmpire with (he fate ill' New Zealand 'i \\ e have no exclusive trailing privileges ;we have no political influence or power. All that can be said is that, in this colony in particular, the requests of the representative of the Crown were promptly complied with—that when volunteer* were" called lor, the Tress, and particularly this journal, appealed to the .English feeling .and fraternal sv'mpath v of the population, and'thus drew togethc-r a considerable number of men trained to bush life, who rushed to the assistance of their countrymen. Had we eonsuited our own interests, we should, perhaps, have objected to the loss of such valuable population, brought here in part by our own revenue. We should have told the British Government that New Zealand "was the concern of Kngland. We should have told Now Zealand that we had no interest, in the Maori war. But these considerations never aroM> iu this country. Whatever was iu our power we did promptly, in furtherance of the views and at the bidding of tho representative of the Crown. It is lather hard, therefore, that the colonists should be reproached, we may say, from the style of expression insulted—by the language of the British Press.

Tho London Times proposes thnt tho colonists of Auckland should bo left to iio:i 1 with " the savages" ill their own way—tli:it tho JJritish troops should be withdrawn, mid that tho colony should settle its own (Juan-els. Wo do not ask vholher such a principle has over been adopted in British colonisation, or wheUier that groat portion of tho resources of Kngland which come from the colonics would ever have been hers had she actcd upon this narrow principle'. But what we now bay is this— if the Jintibh Govein-

ment will leave tho colonists of New Zealand to sottie this affair they will do it. Of their success we have not the smallest doubt. They will have a long long and sanguinary struggle, but they will Biiccrcd. They will find means to crush the power of tho race whoso pro vocat ions will not be wai ting to.justify in their own eyes the severest measures, l'ut when the colonists suppress rebellion which thieatens their families and property we know by history in what form the work is done. We are not prepared to recommend such a policy to Great Britain. It is true she has thrown off her control of native allairs in name, while the despatch of Mr. Card well shows that it is rather a relinquishment of responsibility than tin abandonment of power. But such a renunciation, if absolute, as now proposed, will be equivalent to abdication. Tho colonists, like tho Boers of Natal, will then deal with tho natives under the exasperation of wrongs inflicted and suH'ered, and 111 memory of tho liani bondage with whicli they have been made to servo tho Philo-Maori interest,, whoso interference and ignorance of the course of human affairs has been a fatal snaro to the Maori nice, and would insure its ultimate extinction. For our part., we dread this surrender as likely to issue within a very few years in a policy of which our colonial empire has too many precedenls, and which must cover both England and her colony with dis-

grace. The representation of the colonial Government of Now Zealand as a tyrannical combination against native rights is ono of tho most pernicious and unfortunate phases of the controversy. Tho Maories are sufficiently educated to translate and circulate these various opinions. They find grievances invented and inflamed by men of high station, echoed in tho British Parliament —almost adopted by the British Minister. What is this but to tell them that tho colonists are rebels, and not tho Maories, and that, however far they may push their resistance to the authority of the Crown, they will find among its most eminent servants persons who will shield them from all the consequences of rebellion, and represent them only as persecuted patriots, who have defended their country against robbers and murdereis. When we consider how utterly unsustainrd by facts these allegations are, and yet how they are taken for grunted, we may well despair of obtaining a hearing in Great Britain, or a fair and .just estimate of those difficulties which the incompetence of her Administration lias brought upon the people of New Zealand. The Maories have not been oppressed. Their land has not been taken fr.im them. They have not been provoked by European cruelty to war, but they have been led into it by the absurd notion that a Maori monarchy could bo established under tho shadow of the British flag. The success of our arms might have taught the natives that it is impossible to succeed in their projects had it not been for the encouragement they derive from those who pretend to be their protectors, but who are assuredly luring them onward to destruction.