Departure of the Maories for the Sydney Exhibition.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume VI, Issue 899, 19 September 1879, Page 2

Departure of the Maories for the Sydney Exhibition.

This evening, wind and weather permitting, the schooner Telegraph will put to sea with its living freight of Maories, bound for Sydney. The shores of Port Jackson will have received, during the last few months, many very wonderful and extraordinary things to be exhibited at the great New South Wales magnificent and costly Show ; but we doubt whether there will be found anything which is likely to draw so large an amount of attention and create so great an interest as will be felt in these twenty-five Maories, seven of whom are females. These are all of an ancient tribe ; warriors themselves when needs be, andjthe descendants of a long line of fighting men led by .the bravest and most astute chiefs of all the New Zealand native tribes. They are men and women of hi^h caste ; and will represent a true but splendid type of the New Zealand aboriginal, whose fathers trace their descent through many generations. The contrast between these and the natives of New Holland will, in itself among men of philosophic and reflecting minds, beasubject for study to all the civilized peoples that will be gathered together during the great Exhibition. New Zealand, like to the Northern portions of New Holland, when first discovered, was almost barren of natural food, and the earlier war weapons of the indigenous tribes are not very dissimilar. The natives of New Holland are almost to-day as they were when first discovered ; but our Maories, proud of their ancestors and religiously preserving the weapons and emblems of dignity which have descended from sire to son, will be found as superior to the aboriginals of the Great Australian Colony as a nobleborn Englishman descended in a direct line from the Plantagenets is to the lowest type of humanity to be found in the Black counties of England. Those who will flock to see these twenty-five Maories will easily discern why it is that we have* never been able to completely conquer or subdue them. They will be told by Europeans who have been ong dwellers among the Maori tribes, the fine men and women which have come from the strain of the two bloods, as seen in our half-castes. There is not one of the Maoris who will land in Sydney but can use the rifle with the practised skill of the European marksman, and who, being friendly to us, are ready at instant notice to help us in our battles against the hostile tribes. The language of the Maoris, although unintelligble, will be found as soft as the Italian, every word and every syllable, of Maori ending with a vowel. These are not mere dregs of a Maori tribe, picked out to make a show. Most of them own land and cultivations of their own, and they have been Bent over by the consent of the Colonial Government that they may Bee the wonderful sights which will be shown them, and so come back and tell the tribes how people have come together across many seas to meet and display their inventions. Last night a haka was given in McFarlane'a Hall ; and although it was nothing new to the people of Poverty Bay, yet was the place thronged to the doors. The war dances, the modes of Maori warfare, and other curious incidents of Maori life were all very curious, and while there was much to surprise and interest, there was nothing which could give the smallest offence to the most sensitive of females.