Early Rope-Works—a Row with the Natives.

In the year 1856 I decided to start a rope-factory at Waikawa, where I leased a run from the Maoris, and there I established my rope-works and carried on sheep-farming as well. I was soon enabled to develop a large trade with the Maoris, from whom I bought hundreds of tons of flax fibre. It was splendidly dressed, and well adapted for the manufacture of the finer class of I exhibited at Dunedin, Melbourne, Sydney, Adelaide, and Vienna, and was awarded prizes at all these places. Things went satisfactorily between the Maoris and myself till the year 1858, when the t tribe began to dispute with their chief Paora concerning the rent of my run. One day the whole tribe waited on me and instructed me not to pay any money to Paora, but to pay it to them instead. Failing this they threatened to drive away all my sheep to the sea-beach. I saw Paora regarding the matter. He said Potatau had been made king, and that one of his edicts was that no more land was to be leased or sold to any European, and no public roads were to be made through Native lands. Potatau had guaranteed them immunity from the action of European laws, and the Maoris believed him. Paora insisted on my paying him the rent as formerly. I was in a quandary, hardly knowing which course to pursue, when the whole of the tribe again waited on me within a few days' time and demanded payment of the rent of the run. I told them I would not recognise them in the matter. Immediately the whole wild spirit was aroused within them, and about 100 men and women went, and having mustered my sheep, placed them in a small paddock near my house. I informed Paora of what had happened. He told me to let the sheep go. I did so, and Paora came and stayed at my house. The next day the Natives sent me word that they intended fetching in the sheep again. Paora, finding that the whole of the tribe had turned against him, went to Otaki and obtained the assistance of a number of his nearest relatives in order to keep the sheep on the run. His daughter, my wife, and several others came from Otaki, and when the tribe mustered the sheep, and were about to turn them into the small paddock, our party rushed savagely at them in an attempt to frustrate their purpose. Then followed a scene of the wildest confusion and uproar, as each party contended with the other in an attempt to obtain possession of the sheep. The trouble continued for half a day, at the end of which time both combatants and sheep, of which several were killed during the affray, were exhausted. However, our party was page 28 victorious, and it was only by extraordinary luck that [unclear: bloodshed] was avoided. Another meeting between Paora and the tribe [unclear: was] held, but the chief would not agree to their terms. [unclear: Finding] themselves baffled in their attempts either to obtain, payment [unclear: o] the rent, or possession of the sheep, they unanimously decided [unclear: t] obtain revenge by turning loose all their dogs to worry my [unclear: shee] I had no redress, and was eventually compelled to send them [unclear: t] Mr. Cook's, in the Manawatu, in order to save the flock [unclear: fr] annihilation. And so ended the trouble.

A Maori tangi in the "good old days" was a sight to be remembered, and I have often felt indignant at the manner [unclear: in] which tangis are conducted now-a-days. In the old days the death of a chief was signalled by thousands of voices being raised in the lament for the dead, and at such times I have seen the old women cutting themselves with shells, while to the accompaniment of freely flowing blood they sang their weird songs of humiliation. I have seen an old woman hold a piece of flint or glass as keen as a razor in her right hand, and this, she would deliberately place against the left side of her waist. Then it would be slowly drawn upwards to the left shoulder, and a stream of spurting blood would follow the deep incision. Then, in the same deliberate manner, the gash would be continued downwards across the breast to the short ribs on the right side. The glass or flint would then be taken in the left hand, and the same process of gashing would be gone through, making a cross of blood on the breast. Some of the sights witnessed by me in 1848 were horrible in the extreme. I have seen numbers of women standing, in rows before the dead body of their chief, screaming and wailing, their bodies and hands quivering in an extraordinary manner, while they gashed themselves till they were covered in blood from head to foot. This custom has gradually-become extinct, and often of late years I have felt indignant at the sight of some degenerate hussy at tangi flourishing a piece of flint with which she was very careful to avoid making so much as the least scratch on her dusky skin. To my mind this departure from an ancient custom betrays a want of deep natural affection which was possessed by the old type of Maori. Some of them even refuse to shed either tears or blood at the loss of their relatives or friends. They are a degenerate lot, and not nearly such noble characters as they were in the good old days. During the progress of the tangi speeches of welcome to the departed spirit would be made. One ran as follows : "Come here my father, come to look on us. I have deserted from elder brother and your father." (Meaning their buried bodies).

The Maori race is quickly disappearing, and where the so-called blessings of our civilisation have taken a firm hold of them the process of decay is materially hastened. The Maoris say there page 29 have been no remarkable magical signs vouchsafed to them since the arrival of the Rangi Pai (Gospel). There has been nothing seen in this island like the happenings when men were tapu, and the karakia had full power to work their mystical wonders. One of the signs alleged to have been given in this island was the Ra Kutia (the closed or hidden sun) at mid-day, when darkness overspread the land and the stars could be seen twinkling for two hours before the return of daylight. Our fathers (they say) saw this sign, but there are now no signs given us like those of former days before the pakeha came with his Rangi Pai (gospel), his strange habits, and still stranger diseases. They have banished the tapu, and we are no longer immune from diseases which kill us continually—diseases of which our men in the old days knew nothing, but died only when bent beneath the weight of many years—the natural end of life.

I have no confidence in our being able to civilise the Maori. We have forced upon them our religion and civilisation, often with the Bible in one hand and the rum bottle in the other, and then we have flattered ourselves that we have made Christians of them. The idea—noble thought it was—of being able to civilise the Maori until he stood on the same plane as ourselves, is now exploded, and their numbers are diminishing year by year.

The makutu is still the weapon of the weak, of him who has no other means of endeavouring to obtain redress for his wrongs, There can be do doubt that this belief exercised a strong restraining influence in their old state of society, where the law of force generally prevailed, and it exercised a potent influence in checking thieving and unjust dealing among themselves, for there is among the Maoris a firm belief in and dread of its power.