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New Zealand Herald, Volume XVI, Issue 5497, 30 June 1879, Page 5

The following letter, addressed to the editor of the Daily News, appeared in a recent issue of that journal:—" My attention has been called to a letter in your issue o£ April 21, headed, ' The English Agricultural Labourer in New Zealand.' The description which the writer gives of that prosperous colony., and the prospect it offers to men of bone and sinew, is not at all overdrawn. But when, at the close of his well-written letter, he refers to the ' native population,' he falls into the illogical error of drawing a general conclusion from a particular case, Jt seems that at Wellington he saw some of the worst specimens of the Maori people—who, by the way, are by no means c the large proportion'— and then jumps to the verdict that they are a ' dirty, squalid, unimprovable, and intolerably ugly generation.' lam sure that a better acquaintance with them would qualify his opinion. It is that unfair and contemptuous way in speaking of and dealing with a sensitive race which provokes their resentment, and has mnch to account for in, producing that; state'of alienation which more than anything else doth ' bar the way to improvement.' If the present generation of the Net? Zealanders be compared with that of half a century ago, the most ample proof will be found of their wonderful improvement, while many of them suffer little or nothing in comparison with the average character of their Anglo-Saxon neighbours. They.' are certainly capable of rising to a high standard of civilisation, and both as and consumers, they form no mean element in the general community.—l am, yours, &c, Jambs Buixer, author, of 'Forty Years ih'New Zealand.'' New Zealand Villa, Lower .Norwood, London, March 24." ■■." ..J- ---... The • inhabitants of Normanby were-.con-siderably alarmed the other day by hearing .firing in? the bush, close to the township"; but ft was 30'0'n allayed, on its being ascertained that it was, only" the natives firing-a j&jduta over..tue,'bbdy of one of their, chiefs, whom they werejmrsjng._ The quarter-day of theCnurch of England Grammar' School, -Par Hell, begins o»; She sth 'July.. ' : School-"duties : ' are' to be-resumed on >* ednesv3ay first, : at the usual h»ur,;'" • -.'- 1