1854 - Cholmondeley, T. Ultima Thule - CHAPTER II. ENGLISH PEOPLING OF NEW ZEALAND.

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CHAPTER II.

THE English population of New Zealand was about 12,000 in 1846; in 1848 it was about 17,000; in 1850 it was 23,000; in 1852 it was reckoned at about 26,000, the rate of increase having been checked by the events in Australia. From this it appears to have more than doubled during Sir George Grey's administration of affairs. Had not an overwhelming attraction drawn away numbers of settlers to a neighbouring country, it is probable, from the rate of increase above given, that the white people in New Zealand would now have numbered considerably more than 30,000. Yet the discovery of gold may ultimately become of very great benefit to New Zealand.

There are some interesting considerations connected with the introduction of this population. Soon after the end of our great war, New Zealand began to be talked of in England. Accounts of Hongi's visit; missionary reports; adventures like Rutherford's, crept by degrees into circulation.

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The imagination of my own boyhood surrounded the tattooed natives with a halo of delightful mystery. Their warlike power was tremendous; their aspect ferocious; their cruelty unutterable: unfortunate white men seldom escaped, and then only half-roasted, from their horrid orgies; their priests were wizards, and they loved the flesh of the missionaries more than any other food.

What principally struck Hongi, when in England, was the magnificence of King George, the multitude and splendour of his men-of-war, and the abundance of his swords and guns. He made up his mind that when he returned home he would become the King George of New Zealand; a determination which he afterwards carried out to the best of his power. A decidedly clever man he must have been. He managed to get supplies of muskets and ammunition by selling at Port Jackson the presents of his English friends. His warlike raids, in one of which he killed about 1500 of his enemies, were so judiciously carried on as never to derange the good understanding between him and the Church Missionary Society. Nor did the work of depopulation, which Hongi's ambition had accelerated, cease with the death of that great savage. The causes lay far deeper than the accident of individual ambition. The native ferocity of a savage race was as yet untamed when they found themselves suddenly in possession of new and extraordinary means of destruction; suddenly

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exposed to overwhelming temptations,--perplexed by strange thoughts, without the safeguard of religion; suddenly enchanted by visions of wealth and power, without the check of knowledge and experience.

The shadow of the white man, yet afar off, fell like a blight upon them. The evil eye from across the ocean hit them.

For twenty years the work of extirpation went on. The north, where the mightiest warriors dwelt, preyed upon the south, which retaliated in its turn. Thousands perished. Thousands were carried away captives.

In the whole of the Middle Island, which is larger than England, there are now not above 3000 Maories.

In short, the intestine warfare of the native New Zealanders so thinned their numbers, and wore away their strength, that they became only a miserable wreck of former greatness. And thus it became comparatively easy for the Europeans, finding them weakened and divided, to gain a firm foothold among them, and ultimately to appropriate their broad lands.

Another cause of their strange decline was the introduction of European vices and habits of life, which brought disease among them. Long before any part of New Zealand was regularly settled, numbers of white men led a roving life there. Many of them were refugees from Australia. There were also large bodies of whalers, some fishing from

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the shore, others coming into the harbours and bays to victual. Some of these, both American and British, became so attached to the country, that they remained there, grouping themselves together, or else dwelling with the Maories.

As the whaling-business declined by degrees, in consequence of the whale being either driven away or exterminated in waters where it formerly abounded, these settlers were obliged to betake themselves to some other occupation.

They are to be found dispersed among the colonists who have since entered the land; some acting as boatmen to carry goods from one part of the coast to another, some as shepherds or cowherds; some have acquired means of their own, generally cattle.

It is true that they are fond of the outskirts of the community, that they shun the town and village, preferring the sheep-station and the society of Maories to the intercourse and habits of civilised life. But it is also true that they are softened and reclaimed by the neighbourhood of their old countrymen, and by degrees recover their former "sense." I have myself seen this influence at work among them, for I lived for some time near the remains of one of their villages. It had once been a favourite haunt; but, when I knew it, only contained six or seven families, of which three were American, and the others from the British Islands. If they were idle and drunken, which unfortunately was the case, they certainly possessed the virtues of hos-

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pitality and honesty, and the desire to become better than they had been.

The story of this knot of men is a key to the habits and fate of the scattered white population generally. They always maintained friendly relations with the Maories, who had a large and beautiful settlement on the other side of the harbour. Indeed, the New Englander and the Irishman had Maori wives, to whom they were greatly attached. They succeeded no less with the Scotch settlers, respectable farmers, who were scattered up and down the neighbourhood of Banks' Peninsula. But when the Canterbury Colony made its appearance, the land, containing their houses and gardens, was chosen by a settler, who came armed with his title among them. At one time it appeared likely that the newcomer would have been expelled; but, in the end, he managed to make good his position against them. They then pulled down their houses, sold the materials as well as they could to the farmers and labourers who were settling about them, and dispersed.

The New Englander came to live near my farm at the head of the harbour. Here he took a section of land on lease, set up his cottage, having floated up the woodwork from the other place, and went to work stoutly, clearing the ground and carrying loads of firewood to Lyttelton. Firewood was then worth twenty-two shillings a cord in the town.

The Irishman went off to Ahuriri, where he

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had a cousin, leaving his wife behind him among her friends the Maories.

The Scotchman and the two British Americans (boat-builders) settled in Lyttelton. What became of the others I know not.

Hence it appears the settling of a large body of new-comers may break up and destroy smaller groups which were in the process of formation.

Such as these was the scattered white population which existed in New Zealand before it became a British colony, and such exists still in many places not yet regularly occupied. The sojourn of such people was and is more or less accidental. The manners they introduced have been tending for the last thirty years to wear away the remnant of the Maori race. This intercourse corrupted what little was sound and healthy among the natives, and enfeebled their savage vigour. Such strangers were like the irregulars who precede the advance of a disciplined army. They may be charged with the sin of aiding directly and indirectly in the work of destruction and decay: but they may plead in reply that they have produced a race of half-castes from the Maori women, which may become some day far greater than the Maories ever were.

Creation and destruction went on together. The claims for satisfaction, and the penalty of wrong-doing, centre in the same children of the next generation. Surely the various entries in the book of mankind are strangely jumbled.

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Even as one man must suffer for another, and one man reap another's reward, so, too, it is with races. It is only on the whole account that the world pays its way.

But since the year 1839 we have seen a Migration conducted upon calculation and plan. In 1839--1840, Wellington was founded, the position of which seems to mark it out as the capital of New Zealand. The plan upon which the New Zealand Company and their branch societies went, was eminently artificial; being, in this respect, entirely different from the great democratical movement which since the year 1825 has poured above 2,000,000 from this United Kingdom into the United States alone. It is evident that the originators of the New Zealand Company well understood that the country with which they had to do was too distant, and too much out of the ordinary route and westward tendency of Migration, to attract settlers, unless extraordinary inducements were held forth. But they knew that under skilful management the very distance of those islands,--their isolation, the ferocity of their inhabitants, and the wildness of their scenery, might be made to constitute an attraction.

It was to be an adventure like a romance; the colony was to boast of unexampled institutions; and pledges were to be obtained from the British Government, against any imperial interference which might impede the free growth of

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the new Anglo-Saxon community. They were to be protected, but not governed; patronised, but never scolded, or set right. In short, everything was done to enlist in favour of the new colony the longing desire which really exists among the English--to have a child in their old age after their own image. And it was considered that to effect a work of this arduous kind, requiring so much careful attention, so much influence, and so much capital, the strong cement of interest was required. The Society became a Joint Stock Company.

Every class existing in the old country was to find itself represented in the new colony; there were to be various settlements for various tastes; but all resembling each other in this, that they presented some ingenious combination of advantages. It is gratifying to observe how provisions for steam communication and religious education went hand in hand in the Nelson variety. Again, national and congregational sympathies were enlisted in the adventure. New Plymouth was for the west of England: Otago for the Scotch, with a Free-Church front to it. There was at one time (I understand) a plan for a great Irish Roman Catholic province with its full complement of priests; while Protestant opposition, judiciously roused, might have been induced, it was thought, to plant a rival Methodist settlement by its side. This project, however, although it rested upon a shrewd appreciation of the advantages to be obtained by a proper management

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of sectarian rivalry, died in its cradle. The last and greatest invention was the Canterbury scheme; for it will be found upon inquiry that both Otago and Canterbury were offshoots of the New Zealand Company. They were branch concerns, carried on under a judicious change of name and management.

All this was the work of many years; during which the Company, through its agents, bought land from the natives, which was sold to settlers, and then claimed back, and so litigated and re-divided and arbitrated upon, that all parties, from the original vendors to the latest purchasers, became involved in a meshwork of insecurity and distrust, from which even Sir George Grey's ability has not sufficed entirely to clear them. Nevertheless, the Company did make settlements, and conducted an emigration from England, and in doing so (among other things) incurred heavy debts and liabilities. In short, New Zealand has been hitherto peopled by a series of laborious artifices, which have been at every step attended by a certain amount of sacrifice, danger, and failure.

"Such work it cost to found the Roman State!"

Having unreservedly said thus much, it is my duty to say more.

Nothing is more unjust than to aggravate the shortcomings of well-meaning and patriotic men into charges against their honour; nothing is viler than to cast ridi-

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cule upon great efforts, because they have not exactly resulted in the proposed success.

If adulation is a base fault, it is meaner still to decry; and, finally, it is a huge mistake to estimate the result of a struggle by its immediate consequences. This is too individual a test. We must not anticipate the conclusions of time. The result may yet explain away many an over-hasty and correct many an unfair construction. To have established flourishing colonies in New Zealand is in itself a great success. That they are at length flourishing, is a fact. That the English race has struck roots into the soil of a new and noble country, is surely a matter of high national congratulation. The planting of New Zealand may contain features disagreeable enough. There we meet, in truth, with reasonable hopes disappointed,--engagements unfulfilled,--public and private means wasted. But let the whole case be judged in its integrity. Let it be remembered that difficulties arose which it was impossible to have foreseen; that the management of men can never, under any circumstances, be a matter of nice calculation; that the very mistakes and losses of all kinds incurred in the course of planting the English in New Zealand have taught us lessons in the practice, and guided us to a knowledge of the principles, of what is called colonisation, which otherwise we could never have obtained. We now see that emigration, indeed, may be reduced to a system in the mother country, but

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that colonisation in its proper sense is a work for and in the colony itself.

The Canterbury Association, which was an offshoot of the New Zealand Company, has of late been the special object both of violent open attack and of covert enmity. It appears to me, with the greatest deference to the opinion of its originators, that its great fault lay in attempting to do too much at once. To place the burden of so many contributions upon the land at all is to exaggerate the nominal, and therefore diminish the real, value of land, and thereby confine its sale greatly, except among fancy purchasers, encouraging a market which cannot be relied upon for twenty-four hours together.

Besides, to force a large money payment at the outset is to weaken the settler at the time when he most requires all his strength. To this it may be answered, that the scheme involved a very large outlay--an outlay which could only be met by levying a large contribution; that it was necessary to fix the amount of this contribution in some definite manner, so as to be as far as possible independent of individual caprice; that land was the only article upon which it could be fixed; that it was easily collected in this way, and levied with the greatest possible fairness and impartiality, inasmuch as the amount paid was determined simply by the amount of land taken at one and the same rate per acre for all purchasers; that to purchase at all was a

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matter of free choice; and, lastly, that the purchasers of land-orders were placed at once in possession of their lands, on arriving in New Zealand, without the smallest delay, and with the best possible title.

This answer carries no little weight along with it. I shall return to it again when I come to inquire "what constitutes the worth of land in a new country."

Meanwhile it is plain that the circumstances of the case are such as to render a condemnation of that great attempt, to say the very least, premature.

The Association is peculiarly unfortunate in this; that while their operations have terminated as far as they are themselves concerned, and one at least of their engagements remains unfulfilled, it is not as yet clear whether the colony is prepared to step into their place, or whether, indeed, the colony can do so.

Again, the colony is at present in its transition state. It is like a child learning to walk. In a year or two we shall see what it is like, and what it can do; meanwhile its friends have every reason to think well of it.

The mistakes and shortcomings are on the surface. The success has not yet had time to show itself. Such are the convictions of one who is personally interested in the question. I spent both time and money at Canterbury, and, should it eventually appear that our expectations were unfounded, I should certainly feel greatly injured as well as grieved.

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It may now be safely asserted of New Zealand that its population is sufficiently great, and its resources sufficiently developed, to render any further nursing, whether by companies or by associations, utterly unnecessary. They had their day and did their work--the work of preparation; whether it was done well or ill, is a matter for private opinion, but done, it was, and the country is now sufficiently advanced to carry on its own business itself. That business is one not only of extension and increase, but of civilisation.

Of the civil development of a colony, I shall presently treat in itself.

Mere extension is of two kinds: first, fresh supplies of men; second, fresh settlements. These may be easily obtained without any more artificial assistance. The country has reached the second stage of its progress. The long toil of planting is over.