1840 - Polack, J. S. Manners and Customs of the New Zealanders [Vol. I.] [Capper reprint, 1976] - Chapter XVII

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CHAPTER XVII.

THE opinions of the New Zealanders are highly favourable to European pursuits, whether connected with commerce or agriculture, and give preference to the merchandise of their visitors; their own crude manufactures having dwindled into comparative insignificance and contempt. The articles that now meet with, a ready sale among them are very numerous, including hardware, cutlery, clothes of every description, calico, linens, woollen goods, haberdashery, hosiery, glass, earthenware, tea, spirits, sugars, and the everlasting narcotic, tobacco.

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Within a very few years since, time was not accounted by a native as of any importance; but the impetus already given to his attention and labour by Europeans becoming resident in the country, has greatly changed his former apathy. The most pleasurable devotion of time, is no longer the dance of love or war; but barter, for which the native will now sacrifice any amusement that in times past engrossed all his leisure. This new passion with the New Zealander, may be regarded as the primary cause of his progression, from incivilization to a new moral state of existence. A circulating medium is understood, but its operations have been in use solely in those places where the Europeans abound in greatest number; and the knowledge of our coinage is confined to the few who possess superior mental tact to their duller neighbours. The Spanish dollar is the favorite coin, as in all barbarous countries, where the distinction in coinage is known; 1 but we have

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often been requested to give change out of one farthing British, and some pounds of tobacco to boot, by a simple native, whose credulity had been imposed upon: and when the real value has been made apparent, the coin has been turned to account by a hole being bored through it, and then appended to the ear of its owner as an ornament (waka kai ). But among those persons who are aware of the value of the precious metals, a spirit of amassing has crept in, that has wholly overpowered the cravings that formerly animated them for the serviceable blanket, the destructive fowling-piece, and powder, &c. These persons repudiate barter altogether, selling every thing for money, whether provisions, labour, or land. Of weights and measures, the natives have but an indistinct idea; powder and tobacco are sold by the pound; shot by the bag; potatoes by the basket, varying in weight from 151bs. to 1501bs. Flax is purchased by weight, on which the wily natives remarking that a certain weight was required, formerly inserted some heavy round stones and hard wood inside the package, which were never discovered until opened in Sydney and England; the actors consequently escaped detection. It must also be observed, the natives in turn have been also duped by shipmasters who have traded off the coast, by filling some kegs with sand, a few inches only of gunpowder being placed at the head of the package. Such tricks could not be played off by any resident

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on shore, as any person guilty of such conduct, would in all probability be stripped of every article he possessed, as payment (utu ) for his bad conduct. The value of an article varies exceedingly in price throughout the country: thus a basket of flax of one hundred pounds weight, might formerly have been purchased for the value in barter of three-pence in several stations at the southward, whereas in such places where Europeans resided in numbers, competition consequently took place; the same weight could with difficulty be procured for fifty times that amount; and a ton of flax is probably more expensive in the Bay of Islands, than in Sydney, where it is imported from the south and west coasts of New Zealand. At the same time European goods being also imported in large quantities, it often occurs that such articles are sold as reasonable in the Bay of Islands as in Sydney, where invoices are disposed of (at times) infinitely below the price of the London market, and at less than the manufacturing price, arising from a glut in the market. In the interior villages in New Zealand, the native manufactures and produce are extremely cheap, whereas European goods are altogether as dear. We have seen a native satisfied at receiving half a head of tobacco (the 24th part of a pound) for one hundred pounds of flax, which he had moreover carried over hill and dale, full forty miles; and a flax-house at

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Uwoua, eighty feet long by twenty-four broad and forty feet high to the ridge-pole, was built by a chief and a large company of natives for a small keg of powder 251bs. in weight. The house was extremely water-tight and warm, and several streams and marshes had been denuded of their rushes (raupo ) to cover the roof and sides; a similar house could not have been procured at the northward under one hundred sovereigns. The value of the powder was originally about twelve shillings. Articles of European manufacture are now in continual request. If a musket is bought, powder is also required, together with lead, shot, balls, bullet-moulds, &c, A shirt requires the nether part of its wearer to be decently encased in trousers; the thighs thus safe from exposure, kindle an affection on the part of the legs for a pair of stockings, whose soles would soon depart from the body unless remedied by boots or shoes. A piece of flax will remedy any gentleman whose braces are left in the minority; but a waistcoat is required to hide the unseemly shift, and shirt-sleeves minus a coat or jacket is wholly at variance with ton . While the body is thus recovering something of a complexion from the former ravages of the sun, the face also requires a similar countenance and support from its owner; a hat is therefore purchased, which forms almost a final equipment. But as in civilized countries, with the advocate for fashion, cleanliness

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cannot exist versus soap, and the handy-work of a cooper is called into request to furnish a tub. To proceed no further, we would show that however simple the wants of the people may be, yet no sooner are they possessed of one article of European manufacture, the possession of it begets additional requisites; thus slowly, but nevertheless eventually, progresses their civilization. As European articles bear equal repute on the coast and in the interior of the country, many of the natives, similar to pedlars in Europe, carry an assortment of goods, with which they are intrusted by Europeans, to exchange for pigs, potatoes, Indian corn, of their friends inland, and generally perform such commissions in a satisfactory manner.

The New Zealanders have hitherto been taxed as an extremely lazy people; but let us review the scale of prices given to remunerate labour, and we shall find the incentive so small, as scarcely to rouse the people from the early inactive habits of their ancestors. Many servants are well satisfied if they can obtain a sufficiency of food, with now and then a cast-off garment, that we would assure the reader is not too hastily rejected by the original wearers. Some servants work for a month for a pair of duck trousers or a canvass jacket; some are paid at the rate of half an ounce of tobacco per week. Works on a large scale, such as building large houses, palisades, embankments, excavations,

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are performed by contract, and generally in some article whereby the chief obtains the sole payment, such for example as a double-barreled piece, consequently, where no incitement has existed, it is unfair to state that the natives are naturally inactive, simply because they are usually so, and have no incentive presented to them to become otherwise. Where an opportunity has been afforded to them to show a contrary inclination, they have taken advantage of it. That the effeminacy of the South Sea Islanders cannot reign in New Zealand is assured from the fact, that the indigenous productions of the country are too scanty to afford human sustenance, and consequently the natives have been obliged to work, to preserve life.

From the restricted nature of missionary exertions, the natives have only been able to obtain employment, mentally or physically, in a very limited degree, whereas the lay residents, from their superior numbers, and the nature of their commercial pursuits, have given ample employment to both. Nor have the natives been mean proficients in the imitation of the arts of European labour, as many very fair specimens of carpenters, joiners, blacksmiths, coopers, wheelwrights, &c., are to be found among them; but the national taste would appear to delight principally in seamanship and agriculture. in both of which they have made great progress. In a former work we mentioned instances

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the New Zealander by the force of merit had raised himself to the situation of chief officer, 2 but many other similar examples can be adduced verifying the same fact. Some hundreds of natives are at the present moment manning ships sailing under the British, French, and American flags, and are regarded by unbiassed persons, equal in their duties to European seamen, and as effective in ability and strength while dieting on similar provisions. The New Zealand seamen may now be found in every part of the globe, under the frozen zones of the north and south, and the torrid latitudes east and west, steering at night and alone on deck the full-freighted ship, amid the pathless waters, joining the hilarity of his brother seamen, and equally watchful aloft when danger may approach, and may be said to present the nearest approach to a British tar, beyond any other nation we know of.

But the most congenial employment to the bulk of the people is farming and domestic service. To the British colonist they will be found invaluable. The native plantations have ever been cultivated with a degree of neatness far surpassing the generality of European farms, and greatly superior to

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many of the agriculturalists in British America and the United States. Their principal defect has arisen from want of invention and materials to diminish manual labour, but certainly does not deteriorate from the extreme cleanliness in weeding and general neatness of their plantations.