COUSINS REUNITED.

Wairarapa Age, 16 December 1924, Page 4

COUSINS REUNITED.

On Thursday a small blind of Samoan chiefs will visit Masterton and will be accorded a civic welcome and other courtesies and entertainment. The Samoans ate one of the most important branches of the Polynesian race, in fact, the 'most import-ant now surviving after the Maori. They are the nearest kin to the Maori, the latter branch having been derived, it is supposed, from one of the islands of the Samoan group. At any rate, the last stepping stone of the Maori on the way to New Zealand was an island called “Hawaiki,” which is by many believed to be identical with Savaii, in the Samoan group. The Samoans differ little in language from the Maori. It is a mere matter of dialect, which does not prevent the two races understanding each other. In character they are rather more staid and dignified, and decidedly less sophisticated. Indeed, they are in the modern world little more than babes. The missionaries taught them a good deal, but their German-masters had very little patience with their welfare and education when they discovered that , the Samoans were, not available in large number as plantation labour. The visit of the faipulc to New Zealand is an interesting event, especially for them, siuM they are now seeing for the. first* time in their lives the institutions of the modern world in which New Zealand proposes to fit them to play their part.