WHALERS BRING TRADE BUT INFLUENCE ON THE MAORIS IS CONDEMNED

Korero (AEWS), Volume 2, Issue 15, 31 July 1944, Page 16

WHALERS BRING TRADE BUT INFLUENCE ON THE MAORIS IS CONDEMNED

Started in 1791 and firmly established in 1802, the whaling trade round New Zealand coasts, with the more important depots at the Bay of Islands, is steadily growing, both in the number of ships and the quality of equipment. In 1810 there were seven ships to call for crews and food for those crews, this year there have been more than four times that number. And so great is the demand in markets overseas for the whale-bone and the whale-oil, the two most important products of the trade, that there is likely to be even greater numbers of ships arriving in New Zealand waters before many more years.

To be seen to-day is the start of a -- 1 " e Y 1 at ’ wlt “ timber and flax, will be the most profitable to New Zealand until an organized scheme of land-settlement is put into practice. But whaling is profitable only as a trade; in every other way its influence on this country, and the Bay of Islands in particular, cannot but be condemned. Whaling crews of runaway convicts, of blackguards of the lowest types, of adventurers from New South. Wales of the most abandoned descriptionashore they often forget they are sailors, having forgotten long ago (if they ever knew) they were men. the They are the great enemies to the missions and our cause,” says the Rev. Samuel Marsden. At first axes and agricultural implements were traded by the

whalers for food and supplies from the Maoris; to-day muskets and powder are the prices asked for and given. The missionaries do not like the whalers, but the feeling is not mutual— whalers approve of the missions and their work. Well they might, for they have all the benefits of the peaceful and cooperative feelings introduced between white man and Maori by the missionaries. The demand for European firearms and goods is so great that it has led among the Maoris to underhand methods to obtain the trade f s om ships. It has led to £ om visiting ships. It has led to preserved head trade, it has led to bickerings and jealousies, it has led even to wars and bloodshed, These are bad times.