NATIVE INTELLIGENCE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XII, Issue 4259, 8 July 1875, Page 2

NATIVE INTELLIGENCE.

At a native meeting recently, at Napier, about a new building, the chief Renata Kawepo, in an important speech, said he had been asked to contribute to a fund for redress of native grievances. He had already given .£-100, which had all gone to lawyors, with no result whatever. He would give no more, and advised his people to do the same. He said he had grievances, as all men had, but he found when he went to Government and made proper representation of his grievances that they were willing to afford relief : that they had done much for him and his people in matters of roads and schools. When he was dead he knew that the education of the young would bo cared for by the Government. He know that much money was being collected by a committee for redress of grievances. It was all going the same way as his .t'4oo—to lawyers ; all wasted. This will be a heavy blow and a great discouragement to the repudiation party, llenata is very intluential.

The Otago Time* publishes the translation of a paper, shewing the business transacted at the last Maori meeting at the Heads, from which it appears that it was decided that collections should bo made, to test the validity of the purchase deeds of ISIS, ISIS, and 1553 ; that one or more Maoris, and a lawyer, be sent home to petition the Queen and Parliament for justice ; that £5000 be collected, and when that is spent another £5000 ; that the Maoris who go to England be paid ono guinea a day in New Zealand, and Jt2 2s a day in England ; and that the passages of tho lawyers and tho Maoris be paid by the tribes.

The East Coast natives approve of the confiscated lands being restored to tho Arawas, and are delighted to hear that Sir Donald McLean has made a promise to that effect to them. They think that they havo been deprived of their possessions long enough, and that the time has fully arrived when they should be returned to them. Tho proceedings of public meetings held in the Hay of Plenty and elsewhere during the late visit of the Xalive Minister have been reviewed and commented upon by the leadin" natives of the coast, in such a way as might well surprise some of our most enlightened l>akehas. It is astonishing to find them so well posted up iu political affairs as they are. They have discovered from the native census taken last year that they are inadequately represented in tho Legislature, and begin to perceive that a redistribution of scats is just as necessary for them as it is to the European community, and intend to claim their privilege as a matter of right in due time. Instead of their being represented by four members in the House of Assembly, as at present, they think they are entitled to eight at lest, which would give ono for every 5,000 of the Maori population. It is gratifying to find that tlieso people are taking such a sensible interest in the institutions of the country.

An old I'overty May settler (says a local contemporary) lately became possessed of a Maori curiosity, the history of which is rather interesting. At the time when tho Rev. Mr. Tapsel paid a visit to the inland tribes, acts of cannibalism were by no means of rare occurrence. During his sojourn, a young chief of the Uriweras who had earned the reputation of being a second Ulysses by his deeds of bravery, becaino deeply enamoured of a fair Maori maiden, but the Ilinty-liearted " parients" opposed the match, some difficulty, probably iu the shape of pinmoney, standing in the way, and they continued obdurate to the entreaties of the loving swain. Kvcntually, however, the young chief became desperate at the father's opposition ; seizing a weapon he terminated the old mail's existence without more ado, and obtained the hand ot his beloved one. Having regaled himself with the tender jiortions of Ins late father-in-law, he resolved to preserve some part of the remains as a memento of afl'ection, and extracting several of the vertebra', out of one of them lie manufactured a moric. kuka (circlet for a kaka's leg) with which he tethered a favourite kaka' used by the tribe as a decoy for wild birds of the same species. At the time of tho massacre in ISf.S, the intelligent bird conceived the brilliant idea of following the Uriweras to I'overty Kay, and after sojourning there for some time lie was beguiled by other designing kalcas, and returned to the bush. There he fell a victim to an enterprising adherent of the Arms Act, who shot him in the absence of higher game, and the relic of which we have furnished, tho history, was found 011 his leg. The Alexandra correspondent of tho It'ai kali/ Times asserts that Manuhiri and Itewi are both of them anxious now to put a stop to drunkenness, lest it should lead tliem to trouble.

In referring to the advent of a new minister of tho Gospel to his district, our East Coast correspondent takes occasion to remark as follows :—" As far as tho observations of many of the European inhabitants go, the employment of native missionaries is not attended with that satisfactory result which such agency might be expected to effect. Some way or other the Maoris do not appear to attach so much importance to the ministrations of men of their own race as they do to those of Europeansand it cannot be denied that this apparent disparagement is operating prejudicially to the iuterests of religion among them. In former times when the European element preponderated in the religious instruction of the natives, there was unquestionably more vitality perceptible then in Maoridom than there has been since the dispensation of ordinances has been more extensively committed to Maori ministers. The New Zealanders themselves would, I believe, prefer European to native missionaries, provided the latter could cdifyingly minister to them in their own vernacular. This is a> matter worthy of being looked into by those whose who have tho direction of missionary affairs in the colony."