From the Fiji Times, November 7, 1900.

Sir.—The unjustifiable attack upon the New Zealand Government made by his Excellency the Governor of Fiji in his speech at the opening of the Wainibokasi Hospital will, I have no doubt, be dealt with officially, but as of necessity many days must elapse before the utterly untrue statements can be contradicted from Wellington, I trust you will allow me to state a few facts in order to place the position fairly before the people of Suva. There are at present in the North Island of New Zealand (the Maoris are practically confined to the North Island) according to the census of 1897 some 40,000 Maoris. In the Hawke's Bay district the Maoris draw over £50,000 per annum in rents alone, besides holding and working several large tracts of land for themselves. In the King Country there are over two million of acres of land held entirely by the natives. In the Tauranga district they hold thousands of acres of land and draw besides large suras in rent. In my own district of Wellington the Maoris, who are very few in number, say some 1000 souls, and this is an out side estimate, hold several thousands of acres of land and besides draw over £20,000 per annum in rents. In the, Wairarapa district the Maoris, who are again few in number hold thousands of acres and draw thousands in rent. As a matter of fact, the 40,000 Maoris in the North Island are, as a tribal community, the biggest landowners in the world, and draw enormous rents for tracts of country that they themselves never saw. It would encroach too much on your space were! to give you the whole history of the Maoris and the way they have been treated by the white people. His Excellency, page 7 however, mast have official handbooks and other sources of information that prove without a shadow of a doubt that the boast of England that its treatment of the natives in New Zealand is an object lesson to the world is a justifiable one. In my own immediate district—the Hutt—there are some 150 Maoris all told, and I know from observation that they are all well off, have plenty of food, good homes and luxuries that very many of the white settlers cannot attain to. The treaty of Waitangi is responsible for all the misery and suffering in the early days, but, mark you, this misery and suffering was not on the part of the natives but was endured by the white people.

The natives have been far too well cared for under the above treaty; thousands of acres of land having been handed over to them by secure titles that they never set foot in. If any injustice was ever done the native race it was done when New Zealand was a Crown Colony. This is an absolute fact, and must be known to his Excellency, and it seems to me it places him in rather an unenviable position. The Governments, from Sir Harry Atkinson's down to the present administration under the Right Hon. Mr. Seddon, have rectified many abuses that crept in under the old Crown Colony days, and at present the large tracts of land held by the Maoris are not allowed under any consideration to be sold to white settlers. To sum up 40,000 Maoris (all told, men, women, and children) hold some five millions of acres of land, and over and above draw rents to an extent of at least £400,000. Let your readers compare the above statements with paragraph 6 m his Excellency's speech, and then they will wonder as I do what his motive was in insulting the colony of New Zealand. I am, etc.,