Sketches in the Native Land Court.

Waipawa Mail, Volume XVI, Issue 2715, 30 January 1892, Page 2

Sketches in the Native Land Court.

(Catholic Times ') Some time ago, on the East Coast, an old Maori woman famed for her folk lore, was giving evidence in the interests of her family. For three days she had progressed with the recital of her genealogy, the judge giving the old lady full latitude knowing how futile it is to attempt to curtail the evidence of a native whose duty it is to treat of the ancestry of a claimant. At length his Honor said to the interpreter, “ Ask the witness whether these statements refer to her own people.” “People! My people?” ejaculated the old lady, “ why, so far , I have been speaking only of the stones aud lizards from which the Maori race descended.” And still Darwin claimed originality for his ideas of evolution. Though the Court has to listen to these very ancient traditions, it is chiefly concerned with the story of more recent events. Tribal wars, conquests, and even cannibalistic feasts, have an important bearing on the decision of the Land Court. The Judge is simply an arbiter between the various native claimants whose object it is to prove that through descent, conquest, intermarriage, or undisturbed possession they have a right to some part of the land that is being “ put through the Court.” The Maoris of old did not indulge in cannibalism simply to gratify their taste for human flesh. These ghastly feasts generally followed a victory, and were intended as a crowning insult to the vanquished tribe. If a Maori in the good old times wished to be sarcastic with an enemy he would say “ I have eaten your father,” which was almost as bad as one white mao charging another with ignorance of the game of euchre or of being unable to name the winner of the last Melbourne Cup. The insult of canoabilism is forgotten by the natives of the

present day, but as cannibalism followed conquest, and conquest proved right to the soil, the Court has to take cognizance of the bill of fare of many an ancient Maori feast where roast enemy formed a leading attraction. During the hearing of a case at Marton, last year, I heard an old native describing the cooquest by his ancestors of a part of the Upper Rangitikei. He spoke from personal recollections of the tribal war which gave him the right to the land. He deolared that his people had defeated the hapu of a former witness. In fact the ancestor through whom the last witness claimed his heirship had been killed and eaten. Asked whether he could give any circumstance to confirm his statement the old Maori said : '* Yes, after we had eaten him we used his ribs for the snares with which we caught kakas.” I believe the Druids of old kept their fires constantly burning. So, too, did the Vestal Virgins of ancient Rome, and so, also, did the Maoris. To prove that the fires of a tribe had been extinguished is important evidence, for such an event would never have been allowed to occur while that tribe hold sway over its lands. Ah there is well authenticated evidence that some of the stronger tribes held their lands for eight or nine generations—and I might say eighty or ninety generations if I accepted as gospel truth all that the Maori* say on this point—then we can take it as a fact that in some parts of old New Zealand the camp fire had blazed, or smouldered, for hundreds of years. Probably, so much care would not have been taken of those fires had Bell and Black’s wax vestas been known among the natives. The storybooks say that when you want to light a fire and you are without matches you have only to rub two pieces of wood together. Just so, but “ that’s the rub,” as the digger said when trying the experiment.

In important cases, such as the one I referred to at Marton, where some 250,000 acres were being dealt with, there are two European judges, a native assessor, an interpreter, a clerk, and as many native agents as the various claimants think it advisable to employ. To these native agents I would like to dewote a whole letter. Their calling is a difficult one. The knowledge thr y require for successfully conducting u case is of the most intricate character. Moving frequently from place to place, dealing constantly with the seamy side of the native character, breathing an atmosphere of Maoridom, whisky and stale beer, seeking their own relaxation from an arduous life in a doy’e racing or a night’s gambling, the native agents may be described as slightly Bohemian in character. A native agent is generally a Europetn, though half-castes occasionally adopt the calling. The agent always employs one or more clerks, and he is paid according to his skill and his knowledge of Maori lore. Attending the Land Court, or, in other words, melting down their patrimony, is the industry of half the North Island natives. Interinarri ige and tribal changes render it possible for one native to have a claim on the lands of several different districts. Hence the native agent has to keep by him a record of many different cases, and by a comparison of the statements made by a witness in such cases the Court is supplied with a teßt of his accuracy or otherwise—generally otherwise I am afraid. Genealogical trees, some of them ten or twelve feet in length, also form part of an agent’s stock in trade. These trees, or charts, show wonderful patience and ingenuity in construction, displayiog as they do the pedigree of a tribe with its various branches for many generations. In a Native Laud Court the"agent has the status of a lawyer and conducts his case in the orthodox manner. In many oasee a fee of a guinea is charged for the privilege of cross-examiniog a witness. The native assessor is an important factor ia all decisions of the Court, occupying a position almost analogous to that of a marine expert in a nautical enquiry. Aa I have previously said, these courts are often engaged for many months on the one case, and sometimes even then the natives decline to accept the decision, aod the whole thing has to be gone through again. The land is taxed with the cost of the Court’s assessment, and so the longer the natives dispute over a block the less do they have to divide when the decision is finally accepted.