CHAPTER VII
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CHAPTER VII.
LAWS ON SHIPWRECK. ----CASE OF THE "HARRIET." ----ON THE LETTING OF LANDS. ----HIRING SLAVES. ----ON LAND PURCHASES. ----OR OBTAINED BY CONQUEST. ----POWER OF ALIENATING THEM. ----ON LAND MARKS. ---- CRIMINALITY ATTENDING THEIR REMOVAL. ----CONFISCATION OF THE LAND. ----EJECTION FROM TRIBES. ----SAFETY OF THE TITLES OP EUROPEAN PURCHASERS. ----TENANTS OF NATIVE PROPRIETORS. ----PURCHASES OF LAND BY THE CHURCH MISSIONARY SOCIETY. ----ENORMOUS ESTATE OF A CATECHIST. ----PURCHASES OF THE WRITER. AND VALUE OF LAND IN AUSTRALASIA. ----PRICE PER ACRE. ----NATIVE MAPS. ----MISTAKEN OPINIONS OF THE BRITISH PUBLIC. ----KNOWLEDGE NECESSARY TO BE OBTAINED PREVIOUSLY TO PURCHASING LAND. ----INCREASE OF COLONIZATION. -----ADVICE TO FUTURE COLONISTS PREVIOUSLY TO LEAVING ENGLAND. ----CLIMATE A PRINCIPAL OBJECT TO SETTLERS. ----SEVERITY OF THE CLIME TO THE SOUTH.
WHEN a vessel cuts her chain and drifts from her anchorage to the shore, she is accounted as wrecked, and possession is immediately taken by the natives in her vicinity, who plunder her of every article, and often finish their aggression by setting fire and burning her to the water's edge. Cases have happened that the shipwrecked seamen have been made slaves, murdered and eaten, or some few ransomed. The case of the "Harriet," whale-ship on the coast of Terananaki, lat: 39 deg 24 min S., induced the colonial authorities of New South Wales to despatch H.M.S. "Alligator," Captain Lambert, and the "Isabella," tender, in 1834, to obtain restitution of the wife and children of the master of the wreck, and by the judicious conduct
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of Captain Lambert, the intentions of the British were effected, despite of the several attempts of near-sighted politicians to render it abortive. When boats or canoes are cast adrift, they become the property of the captors, who demand nearly the value of them, previously to restitution. Among the received laws of the country, are included those relating to letting of lands, when a rent is required of a tithe. On hiring slaves, or even freedmen, a fee is paid for the hire. For a loan of seed for planting, the borrower is required to return a percentage in kind, in addition to the principal. The laws of inheritance are well defined. The eldest son attains the patrimony received by his parent, and the priority of title. Lands obtained by purchase or conquest by the parent may be given away or willed to whoever the owner may think fit. Lands are so far hereditary, but no chief is restricted from selling or exchanging the lands or property he may have received from his ancestors, as he is liable to lose the same by war, or, as the case may be, obtain fresh accessions; the same depending on the strength of his tribe and their allies.
Land once disposed of, the alienation is made for ever, and when a purchase has been made with the consent of all parties, a new demand, by the native laws, cannot be entertained. Possession is obtained by planting a portion (however small) of the soil, and reaping the same. The landmarks of
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a property in New Zealand generally consist of a clump of trees, 1 a water boundary, or remarkable appearance in the soil termed a Kotari wero, or red patch (of clay). The abstracting of a landmark has often been the cause of war. After a conquest, the land is divided by lot, agreeably to the laws of more civilized people. 2 If a large tree is found growing at the boundary-line, the chief with an axe cuts deep into the trunk the resemblance of a human face, which is termed tapuing the property.
Confiscation rarely if ever is put in force, the only case we remember in point was that of a chief named Reti, who it was proved had shot at Mr. Busby, the British Consul, with intent to kill, (which he nearly effected) and robbed his European domestics of their property. On an inquiry being prosecuted by the native chiefs, and his guilt being established, he was obliged to make over to the British Government, whose servant he had insulted, a piece of land, but to the delinquent it
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would appear to have made no difference, as he continued to plant on the same land without let or hinderance.
Chiefs of minor grade, when they have acted very criminally, have been ejected from their tribes, but their property in land has never been attached. When one tribe has conquered another, the lands of the vanquished belong to the victors, but if any of that land has been previously purchased by a European, his rights are not invaded, as he is not included in the war. If the victors have not wholly subdued the enemy, and the latter have sheltered themselves in the adjacent forests, the conquerors in the battle do not attempt possession; a war is therefore always undertaken with a determination to exterminate the adverse people, that (among other causes) no after-disputations shall arise in the conveyance of the land. If a portion of the conquerors should, at a future period, cut ship-timber in the newly-acquired districts, or shoot pigeons in the woods, a portion of the payment obtained for the first, and an equivalent for the last, is expected by the absent proprietors. If provisions are planted on those lands without permission first had and obtained of the owners, the crops are forfeited, and any one of the latter may justly seize on the same, but if the planter (belonging to another tribe) is allowed to do so, a small pepper-corn rent or gift is expected on the crop being removed.
The divisions and subdivisions of landed pro-
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perty are not only as well known, as in any country in civilized Europe, but as tenaciously adhered to; and probably few circumstances in life would tend sooner to raise the ire of a native, than openly doubting the real boundary-lines of his property. 3 Foreigners are allowed to purchase land, and the extensive purchases of the missionaries have been calculated by Chevalier Dillon, as amounting, some time back, to 1,200,000 acres; one Catechist alone, a Mr. Fairburn, has been stated by Mr. Flatt, also a Catechist of the same society, of unimpeachable veracity, to have purchased a tract of between thirty and forty miles in length. What this person could want with such an estate, pro-
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bably, he alone can divine--unless to prevent less fortunate Europeans purchasing in the same vicinity. We made five separate purchases of land in the country, but the whole quantity did not amount to, and was certainly less than, 1100 acres; and when it is taken into consideration, that land proprietors in New South Wales, Port Philip, South and Western Australia, (in the latter Mr. Peel's grant comprised six hundred and fifty square miles, and was yet further allowed to extend his moderate desires to 1,000,000 acres!) The United States, and South America, the Canadas, possess not only 1100 acres, but nearly 1,100,000 acres! our purchases sink into absolute insignificance, and we do incline to think, that the persons who have insisted on "the princely estates" we possess, (see Appendix,) will admit (within themselves) that there was nothing extremely criminal in our making those purchases, which, in three instances out of five, we were absolutely obliged to accede to the wishes of the chiefs, with whom we had been for some time on terms of continual intercourse and friendship.
The said purchases will be further conceded to us, we are inclined to think, from the fact, that for some acres of the said land, we paid to the natives chiefs, proprietors of the soil, in barter, at cash prices, the rate of [pounds]6. 10s. per acre, and at a period (1833) when land was obtainable at 1000 per cent, less than at the present day. The natives
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possess much ability and tact in making maps of their country, and the vicinage of their journies; their untaught outlines, for correctness, would put to the blush many scholastic tyros in Europe.
Half the soil of the country, averaging the uninhabited, unoccupied, and unnamed waste lands, will fall to the British government, on the actual colonization of New Zealand. At the present moment, the British public are apt to imagine that an intending settler is only to take his passage to New Zealand, and he can purchase lands when and where he pleases. To those persons who have already attempted the experiment, they will quickly discover their mistake; when once the natives are supplied with the few articles they may want, their desires are ended; and those implements and goods they set the greatest store by, and in defence of which they would have risked their lives; when once satisfied, their desires fall at least five hundred per cent., and intending purchasers will find this to be the case. It also requires a thorough personal knowledge of the tribes from whom the land is to be purchased, that care be taken every claimant is satisfied, and this discovery is not easily or quickly made, as no native chief present, in his anxiety to procure his payments, will notify to the purchaser the absence of a fellow proprietor, and as a chief without jealousy will be found a lusus naturae, so a less likelihood will arise of all the claimants partaking of the purchase goods or money.
