NEW ZEALAND FLAX

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21769, 7 April 1934, Page 1 (Supplement)

NEW ZEALAND FLAX

ITS RISE AND FALL

BV KOTAItB

The coming of the trader inevitably dislocated the long-established Maori conceptions of value. The harakeke, Phormium tenax, New Zealand flax, call it what you will, had played an important part in the old economy, but not as an item of trade. It was used for clothing, for cordage, for nets; but these things were for the use of the individual or the group, not a medium of exchange. The trader wanted prepared flax fibre; the Maori wanted more than anything else the firearms that had become under the new conditions as essential not merely for conquest but even for survival. The devotion of so much intense labour to the production of flax fibre upset the whole balance of the well-ordered tribal life. Where the trader came, the labour formerly spent on collecting adequate food supplies was diverted to the production of material lie would accept in exchange for the coveted guns and powder. The Maori did not look far 'ahead. The immediate possibility of possessing a gun blinded his eyes to the remoter certainty that if he neglected his food supplies he would find.himself on short rations before the winter was ovei. The flax grew in the swamps. For many reasons he had found it best to live on the high ground. He could arrange defence better there, and that was a matter that had always to enter into his calculations. Besides, a village on the heights had natural drainage and in every way was far healthier than one placed close to the swamp land. Changed Conditions

In his eagerness to get his supplies of flax tho Maori abandoned all the wisdom his fathers had beaten out in the stern school of experience, and shifted his quarters to tho unhygienic environment of the flax swamps. Dr. Raymond Firth considers that the malnutrition duo to inadequate food, and the strenuous labour in unhealthy areas, had a disastrous effect on the Maori physique. The one weakened his power of resistance to disease and the other placed him where disease was bound to grip him. Lung troubles became common and carried off a considerable proportion of the race during the early years of the nineteenth century. " Not only through war did the musket claim its victims" is Dr. Firth's summing up of the situation.

Many attempts were made to acclimatise the Now Zealand flax abroad. If it were as valuable as everybody agreed in affirming it would simplify matters if the raw material were grown where it would ultimately be manufactured for the uses of men. E. Luttrell, a surgeon stationed at Sydney, who was also a farmer on a considerable scale, wrote in 1807 that " the plant called the New Zealand flax thrives remarkably well; and if we knew how to manufacture the fibre it would be superior either to cotton or to common flax, as it is exceedingly strong and has a rich glossy silk-like feel and look." But an evil fato always seemed to dog every attempted development. Floods had swept away much of the local food supply before it could be reaped, and in the frantic efforts to cope with the consequent famine the flax cultivation seems to have dropped out of sight. Growing Abroad

In 1825 the Sydney Gazette expresses its surprise that " some of our agriculturalists do not enter with spirit into the cultivation of so essential an article as the New Zealand flax, which would infinitely repay the expense and trouble of cultivation." Hobart in 18_26 reports that " a small plantation of the valuable plant is thriving luxuriantly in the Government gardens," and suggests that Van Diemon's Land should be every whit as suitable as New Zealand for its cultivation on a large scale. It is mentioned that the flax has attracted much attention in Europe and that it is being cultivated to a certain extent in France.

Japan's recent resolve to grow the 11 ax on her own account, which has caused some perturbation in the hearts of a few patriotic New Zealanders, is only a revival of a policy initiated well over a hundred years ago. We cannot keep our flora to ourselves, even if we were foolish enough to try. New Zealand's plants and trees have long gone round the world. A Scottish paper a few years ago published a picture of a lone sentinel palm in the furthest Hebrides. There it stood fronting the Atlantic, an incredible waif from the tropics, as they conceived it, defiantly challenging the western storms in a bleak, uncongenial environment. A New Zealander at once greeted a friend from home, half the world away. It was a cabbage tree, and not a bad specimen either. A couple of months ago the London Sunday Times published a large picture of tropical palms in Falmouth. A magnificent picture it is—a group of graceful trees massed with a maximum of decorative effect. Again the tropical palms are our old friend the New Zealand cabbage tree. Decline The Maoris abated their enthusiasm for the flax trade in the twenties of last century. It seems that the fibre needed the Maori touch upon it. Nothing the ingenuity of man devised could adequately replace the slow skilled labour of the Maori workers, and when the Maoris abandoned the craft on a large scale the flax fell into disrepute. Captain Harris, a naval officer of standing and a member of the House of Commons, made in 1831 a valiant effort to save the situation. Captain Harris had invented a method of treating New Zealand flax ropes that eliminated the use of tar, and as most of the tar and hemp supplies came from Russia, and Russia was always a potential enemy, his proposals were thought to have a national significance. The King, William IV., graciously gave his patronage. An exacting test was arranged by the navy. Captain Harris cast a wide net. He had by his process made from the flax fibre cables of a strength and pliability never achieved before. He had also made a fine shirting. He insisted on Maori-prepared fibre; European treatment always entailed the loss of some essential quality. The test was carried out 011 H.M.S. Rainbow. A fourteen and a-half inch cable had been prepared from the flax and was to bo tried out in mooring operations on the Rainbow. Two lengths of cable of the same dimensions, one made of the New Zealand flax and the other of the customary hemp, were to be subjected to parallel tests in the dockyards. Nothing helpful to Harris and New Zealand flax seems to have been proved at the trials. In spite of " the benignity with which His Majesty has been pleased to encourage the speculation," Harris and his scheme fall out of sight and within a few years flax had ceased to be an important item of New Zealand trade.