Correspondence.

New Zealand Herald, Volume I, Issue 268, 21 September 1864, Page 6

Correspondence.

To (lie Kditor of the J* ew-Zealand Pie. —I have read with alarm and indignation that ilie escape of tlie JCative prisoneis from Hie Kawau lias home ils first fruits in the slaughter cf settlers' cattle. How long may tlie settlers themselves hepe to fro unharmed, since " Imperial concern" and the protection to the colonists' life and property, mean two diflercnt things. wc may hold ourselves in readiness for something to happen. Whatever it may be tlie enemies of tlie colonist will be patted upon the head, fed and clothcd- at his expense —benevolence, ivliic-li means blankets and tobacco to the aboriginal, means risk, uncertainty, and ultimate loss to the unfortunate Englishman. The desired result will be accelerated, the capital already invested here will be jeopardised, if not lost ; the capital about to come liere.will be diveited. and so Imperial policy, the same policy which lost .America, whiih caused rebellion in Canada, which disaffected Australia, which promises, abandons and betrays, and which lias been in the ascendant since the c!n\s of Lord Livcipool— holding "no concern" in the lives of those who «o forth to found and consolidate a co'onial empire, will linve lcwardtd the ignorance of experimental statesmen, and the inane conceit of philosophic sentimentalists. The ground of compromise will be narrowed to the utmost, the settler must look behind him with contempt, and go forward with stern resolution. If he fail, lie may, no doubt, regard with feelings of mingled hatred and distrust, the incapacity of which he is the victim, bur if he succeed, and succeed he will, Governor Sir George Grey will have done more to ruin the native race, than all the rumor tobacco that ever claimed Jamaica for its birth place. Ihe reason of this is obvious. The antagonism which Imperial unconcern shall have begotten and fostered, will fill up those corners of the mind which would otherwise have been left free to assert the common instincts of hi man nature. The man who is obliged to sleep with pistols under his head, will not he apt to teach the TVcalogne to the objects of his fears. There is no other end to a policy which holds the people of a rising colony of 110 concern, but the extoi mination either of the settlers, or of the native obstructions.

It should be known to Fir George Grey, and tho?e whom it mar concern, that if the Englishman in New Zealand is to be made a mere contributory to what Carlylo would < all the " whimwhums" ofofiieml flunkeybm, and smiled into insecurity by the meekness of c-fiifial hypocrisy, he will button his pocket against the one resort, and "will smite the other rathoi unceremoniously. The manner will only be a question of time. The colonist lias found a home in these southern regions which his own people denied him ; for one of the secrets of English emigration is the sycophancy with which pride treats the dangerous classes in Eng'h.nd. .It is well known that the industry of England is with its pauperism and vagabondism. Possibly some such policy might iir.d adherents in England as that against which Australia and the Cape of Good Hope protest, and the "Imperial concern' 5 which sits enthroned in the Colonial Oliice, may congratulate Parliament at some future day, when the colony shall have been experimentally ruined, that it affords a capital field for convict labor. One thing, however, is certain, if colonial possession be worth having, the jnoplc who invest their lives and their means in it are worthy of protection; if thev are not it would he humanity to tell them *o at once, for when an Imperial satrap coquets with aboriginal barbarism, and looks like a well-combed .Jupiter superciliously upon the struggle of industry with primeval mud, obstructive weed, and impervious "<>i\ st, ho is as much out of place as would be a dandy ol Burlington -Arcade in the mocassins of a Choctaw Indian. 1 am. Sir, Your obedient servant, P.ISQft.V pEKIGKEE.