NEW ZEALAND.
GENERAL REMARKS.
LOCALITY OF NEW ZEALAND -- GENERAL APPEARANCE OF THE PEOPLE --
THE TWO CASTES, AND THEIR SUPPOSED ORIGIN -- CONTRAST BETWEEN THE
SEXES -- LAXNESS OF MORALS -- NUMBER OF THE POPULATION, AND THE
DIFFERENT TRIBES -- MODE OF GOVERNMENT -- DISTINCTION BETWEEN RANKS
-- FORMATION OF THE CLANS, OR SUB-TRIBES -- THE SLAVES, THEIR VALUE
AND TREATMENT -- THE TENURE OF LAND -- A COMPLEX ARRANGEMENT AND
CONSEQUENT DIFFICULTIES -- ESTABLISHING A CLAIM -- NATIVE LAW -- THE
“LEX TALIONIS” -- SENSITIVENESS TO DISGRACE -- THE PREVALENCE OF
SUICIDE -- STRANGE CONDUCT OF A MAORI CHIEF -- THE SISTER’S VENGEANCE.
Southward and eastward of Australia we come to the group of islands
known collectively as New Zealand. Like Australia, New Zealand
possesses many peculiarities of climate and natural production, and is
inhabited by a number of tribes which are generally hostile to each
other, but which are almost identical in appearance and habits. We
shall therefore be enabled to treat of this important portion of the
globe with much more brevity than could be the case if, as in Africa,
the tribes differed from each other in hue, dress, and customs.
* * * * *
Taken as a whole, the New Zealanders are a singularly fine race of
people--tall, powerful, and well made. Though varying somewhat in
shade, the color is always a brown of some kind, the complexion being
sometimes as light as that of a Spaniard, and sometimes of a dark
umber. It is, however, always of a clear tint and never approaches to
the deep black of the Australian. The nose is straight and well formed,
in many cases being boldly aquiline; and the mouth is rather large, and
the lips moderately full, though not resembling those of the negro. The
cheekbones are rather high, but not much more prominent than those of a
genuine Scotchman; and the eyes are large, dark, and vivacious.
The teeth are remarkably white and even, and the feet and hands small
and well proportioned. The foot is very well developed, the native
never having spoiled its beautiful mechanism with shoes or boots, and
being accustomed to use the toes in many tasks wherein a civilized
European requires his fingers. The toes are, for example, continually
employed in holding one end of a rope, while the fingers are engaged
in twisting or plaiting it; and the consequence is that the natives
are able to ridicule with justice the misshapen feet and toes of the
European.
The men have naturally a full beard; but they always remove every
vestige of hair on the face, in order to show the patterns which are
tattooed upon it. Now and then a very old and powerful chief will dare
to allow his beard to grow; but, as a rule, the face is divested of all
covering: so that the absence of the beard, together with the profuse
tattoo, destroys all evidences of age, and makes the countenance of a
young man of twenty look nearly as old as that of his grandfather aged
sixty.
The hair is plentiful, and mostly straight, being twisted and curled by
art into the various fashionable forms. In some cases it is light, or
even reddish, in color; and in such instances accompanies a complexion
of peculiar fairness. Albinism exists among the New Zealanders, but
is not agreeable in appearance, the eyes being always weak, and the
skin looking as if it had been artificially whitened. In fact, such an
albino looks among his dark fellows like a plant that has been bleached
by growing in the dark.
There seems to be two castes of men among the New Zealanders. The upper
caste is distinguished by the above characteristics; but the lower is
shorter in stature, and has coarse and curly, though not woolly hair,
more prominent cheekbones, and a much blacker skin. This second race,
according to Dr. Dieffenbach, “is mixed in insensible gradations with
the former, and is far less numerous; it does not predominate in any
one part of the island, nor does it occupy any particular station in
a tribe; and there is no difference made between the two races among
themselves.
[Illustration: NEW ZEALANDER FROM CHILDHOOD TO AGE. (See page 795.)]
“But I must observe that I never met any man of consequence belonging
to this tribe, and that, although freemen, they occupied the lower
grades: from this we may, perhaps, infer the relation in which they
stood to the earliest immigrants into the country, although their
traditions and legends are silent on the subject.
“From the existence of two races in New Zealand the conclusion might
be drawn that the darker were the original proprietors of the soil,
anterior to the arrival of a stock of true Polynesian origin; that they
were conquered by the latter, and nearly exterminated. This opinion has
been entertained regarding all Polynesian islands; but I must observe
that it is very doubtful whether those differences which we observe
among the natives of New Zealand are really due to such a source. We
find similar varieties in all Polynesian islands, and it is probable
that they are a consequence of the difference of castes so extensively
spread among the inhabitants of the tribes of the great ocean.
“If one part of the population of New Zealand are a distinct
race--a fact which cannot be denied as regards other islands--it is
very curious that there should be no traces of such a blending in
the language, where they would have been most durable, or in the
traditions, which certainly would have mentioned the conquest of one
race by the other, if it had happened. Captain Crozet, a Frenchman, who
early visited New Zealand, says that he found a tribe at the North Cape
darker than the rest. I could observe nothing of the kind there, though
I visited all the natives. Nor are those darker-colored individuals
more common in the interior; I should say, even less so.
“There is undoubtedly a greater variety of color and countenance among
the natives of New Zealand than one would expect--a circumstance
which might prove either an early blending of different races, or a
difference of social conditions, which latter supposition would go far
to explain the fact. All the New Zealanders speak of the Mango-Mango,
or Blacks of New South Wales, as unconnected with and inferior to
themselves; but they never make such a distinction regarding their own
tribes.”
As is often the case with uncivilized people, the women are decidedly
inferior to the men, being much shorter, and not nearly so well
made. They are not treated with the harshness which is the usual
characteristic of married life among savages, and are even taken
into their husbands’ counsels, and have great influence in political
affairs. Still, the heavy work of the household falls upon their
shoulders, and the lot of an ordinary New Zealand wife is rather a
severe one. She has to cultivate the ground, to carry the produce of
the distant fields to the house, and, when the family is travelling,
the women have to carry all the heavy loads. It is no wonder,
therefore, that a life of such drudgery should tell upon the women,
both in preventing the proper development of their frame and in causing
their beauty to decay. Those who preserve their beauty longest are the
daughters of wealthy chiefs, who can afford slaves by whom all the hard
work is done, and who therefore free their mistresses from one of the
causes of deterioration.
There is, however, another cause, which is perhaps equally effective,
but not so palpable. This is the very lax code of morality which
prevails among them, a young girl being permitted the utmost freedom
until she is married, although afterward she is a model of constancy.
This license is exercised at a very early age, and the natural
consequence is that the due development of the frame is checked. This
vicious system is so much a matter of course, that it carries no
reproach with it, and the young girls are remarkable for their modest
and childlike demeanor.
Of course they become aged much earlier than those whose development
takes place at a later period of life; but they compensate for their
deteriorated appearance by their peculiar kindliness of demeanor. The
engraving No. 1, illustrates the countenance and dress of a New Zealand
woman and her boy.
Unlike the men, the women do not disfigure their faces by the tattoo,
which gives to them the stern and fixed expression so characteristic
of a New Zealand warrior; and they thus allow the really flexible and
intelligent features to have full play. The only portions of the face
that are marked with the tattoo are the lips, which are rendered blue
by the process, as it is considered disgraceful for a woman to have red
lips. The tattooing is always performed when the child is allowed to
take her place among women; and, as may be imagined, it gives a livid
and altogether unpleasant appearance to the mouth.
The children are very pleasing and interesting little creatures. They
are full of intelligence, and unusually free and open in their manner.
Unlike the children of most savage nations, they live as much with
the men as with the women, and partake even in the councils of their
parents, thus having their faculties sharpened at a very early age.
The illustration opposite gives typical examples of the New Zealander
from childhood to age, and the reader will notice the contrast between
the soft and rounded outlines of the youth, and the harsh, rigid
countenances of the old man and his consort.
* * * * *
In proportion to the dimensions of New Zealand, the population is very
small; and, even in the earliest days of our acquaintance with it,
the land seems to have been but thinly inhabited. That such should be
the case is very remarkable, as a very thin population is generally
found in those countries where, as in Australia, the inhabitants live
principally by the chase, and therefore require a very large tract
of land to support them. The New Zealanders, however, do not live by
the chase, for the simple reason that there are no animals which are
worth the trouble of hunting; so that a family of twenty or so, even if
they had the entire country as a hunting-ground, would find themselves
in very great straits were they obliged to procure their food by the
chase. The reasons for this thin population will be presently seen.
According to Dieffenbach’s calculation, the native population of the
entire country may be reckoned rather below one hundred and fifteen
thousand. These are divided into twelve great tribes, which are again
subdivided into sub-tribes, or clans, each of which has its separate
name, and is supposed to belong to a certain district. The fighting
men, or warriors, form about one-fourth of the whole population; the
remaining three-fourths being made up of old men, women, and children.
Since this calculation the numbers of the aborigines have considerably
lessened. The most important of the tribes seems to be the Waikato,
which is divided into eighteen clans, and which occupies a very large
proportion of the country. This tribe alone can bring into the field
six thousand fighting men; so that the entire number of the tribe may
be calculated at twenty-four thousand or so.
The Waikato clans have managed to preserve their individuality better
than the others, and, though brought much in contact with civilization,
and having adopted some of the habits of their white visitors, they
have still retained many of their ancient customs, and, as Dieffenbach
remarks, have preserved much of their ancient vigor and original
virtues.
The tribe that is strongest in mere numbers is the Nga-te-kahuhuna,
which inhabits the east coast, and may be reckoned at thirty-six
thousand strong. In fact, these two tribes alone outnumber the whole of
the others taken collectively. One tribe, the Rangitani, is interesting
from the fact that it was described by Captain Cook. In his days it
was evidently a large and flourishing tribe, but some few years ago
it could scarcely muster three hundred warriors, representing a total
number of twelve hundred. The decadence of this tribe is probably owing
to the destructive wars in which the New Zealanders engage, and which
are often so fierce as to erase a tribe entirely.
The government of the New Zealanders is a curious mixture of
simplicity and complication. Monarchy is unknown, each tribe having
its own great chief, while an inferior chief presides over each clan,
or sub-tribe. The whole of the population may be roughly divided into
three ranks. First come the nobility, then the free men, and lastly the
slaves. The nobility go by the general name of Rangatira--a title which
is always given to officers, missionaries, and other white men who are
placed in command over others.
In each tribe one of the Rangatira is the Ariki, or principal chief;
but, as he is necessarily a Rangatira, he is always addressed by that
title, and, in consequence, a stranger finds some difficulty, even
after a prolonged visit, in ascertaining who is the Ariki. Among the
New Zealanders there is no Salic law, so that the Ariki need not be a
warrior, and may be a woman. The office is hereditary, and the existing
Ariki is always held in the highest veneration in virtue of his
descent. Even the hostile tribes respect an Ariki, and in most cases,
if he should be captured in battle, the victors will spare his life.
One or two of the most powerful chiefs living have been captured and
afterward released, whereas, had they been common men, or even ordinary
Rangatiras, they would have been killed, their bodies eaten, and their
heads dried and fixed as trophies on the houses of their conquerors.
A sort of tax, or tribute, is paid by the different families, though
the tax is entirely a voluntary one, and may be great or small,
or withheld altogether, at pleasure. Mostly the Ariki is a man of
considerable mental powers, and, in such a case, he exercises great
authority over the tribe, either as a priest or a warrior. There is
nothing to prevent the Ariki from assuming the office of priest, and in
many instances he has been able to exercise a far greater influence by
spiritual than by physical means.
The Rangatira are the great men, or nobles, of the land, and with them,
as with the Ariki, the rank is hereditary. The law of succession is
very remarkable, the eldest son being the heir to his father’s rank;
but if the child dies, the youngest, and not the next eldest, becomes
the lawful successor. These two heirs, the eldest and the youngest
sons, are called by a name which signifies the fat of the earth.
Each Rangatira is independent of his fellows, though they collectively
form a sort of body which we may compare with the House of Peers in
England. Any Rangatira who has sufficient influence may gather together
the members of his clan, build a fortified village, or pah, and become
a petty sovereign in his own dominions. It is in this way that the
various clans, or sub-tribes, are formed, each gathering round a noble
of more than usual ability, and adopting a name by which the members
will ever afterward be known.
The free men form the great body of the warriors; some of them being
the sons of Rangatira, and others merely having the privilege of free
birth; which carries with it the right of tattooing the face. Sometimes
a free man who is remarkable for his generalship and courage will take
the command of an expedition, even though men of higher rank than
himself should be engaged in it.
Last come the slaves. These are always procured from two sources:
they are either captives taken in battle, or are the children of such
captives. The value of such slaves is very great. All savages are
idle, but the New Zealander is one of the laziest of mortals in time
of peace. In war he is all fire and spirit; but in peace he lounges
listlessly about, and will not do a stroke of work that can possibly be
avoided.
He may, perhaps, condescend to carve the posts of his house into some
fantastical semblance of the human form, or he may, perchance, employ
himself in slowly rubbing a stone club into shape, or in polishing or
adorning his weapons. Whatever real work is to be done is left to the
women or the slaves, and a man who values his wife or daughter will
endeavor to procure slaves who will relieve her of the drudgery.
There are slaves of both sexes, to whom the appropriate work is
allotted. They are considered the absolute property of their owner,
who may treat them as he pleases, and, if he prefers to kill them, may
do so without attracting any attention. Of course he would not do so
except for very good reasons, as he would deprive himself of a valuable
article of property. There have been cases, as we shall presently see,
when the owner of slaves has deliberately murdered them for the sake of
selling their heads.
Once a slave, always a slave. Should one of these unfortunates manage
to escape and get back to his own tribe, his owner would apply for
him, and he would be given up, the right of the master to his slave
being universally recognized. Still, as a rule, the slaves are treated
well, and some of them, who have attained excellence in certain arts,
often become richer men than their owners. So great is the value of
slaves, that many a war has been undertaken for the mere purpose of
slave hunting, and some of the most disastrous and obstinate feuds have
originated in the slave hunt.
Connected with the government of the New Zealanders is the land
question. This is a strangely complicated business, as every inch of
ground has an actual owner, while there are usually several claimants
who allow their rights, real or imagined, to lie in abeyance as long
as the land is owned by one who can hold his own, while they will all
prefer their claims at his death, or even during a lengthened absence.
So it has often happened that the white men, while desiring to act
according to law and honor, have involved themselves in a very net of
difficulties. A chief, for example, may agree to sell a portion of
territory, will receive the price, and will sign a deed, which will be
witnessed by natives as well as by Europeans. No sooner has he done so,
than a claimant comes forward, declaring that the chief in question had
no real right to the land, and therefore had no right to sell it.
His claim will be inquired into, and, if it seems to be tolerably
consistent with likelihood, the man will be paid an additional sum for
his consent to the sale. The matter, however, is not at an end, for
such is the jealousy with which the natives regard land, that, as long
as a foreigner holds an inch of ground, so long will there be a native
who prefers a claim to it. Strange as it may seem, the white man would
incur less odium by taking the land by force, and seizing it by right
of conquest, than by trying to act according to justice and equity.
War is a fertile source of misunderstanding about land. A tribe may
be driven out of a district, and their land given to others, who hold
it as long as they can keep it, the original possessors being sure to
reconquer it if possible. It has sometimes happened that a chief to
whom such lands have been presented has transferred them to another
chief, and he, in his turn, has sold them to European settlers, the
bargain being ratified by his own followers, who are considered as
having a share in such property.
The colonists take the land, clear it, cultivate it, and when the crops
are fairly in the ground, the dispossessed tribe will come forward
and prefer their claim to it. Those to whom it was sold have already
received their price, and do not trouble themselves to oppose the
claim; and the consequence is, that the colonists are obliged either to
make a second payment or to run the risk of war.
As to the claims themselves, they are of the most curious and
unexpected character, such as no European would be likely to
anticipate. According to Dieffenbach, “There exists a very distinct
notion of the rights of landed property among the natives, and every
inch of land in New Zealand has its proprietor. Sometimes land is
given to a strange tribe, either as pay, or from other considerations,
but the proprietor reserves certain rights, some of which are what we
should term manorial.
“It was formerly very common that the fat of the native rats (Kiore)
killed on such lands should be given to the principal proprietor, and
in many cases a title to land seems to have been derived from the fact
of having killed rats on it. Thus a chief will say, ‘This or that piece
of land is mine; I have killed rats on it.’ Generally, however, land
descends, as with us, by inheritance.”
Such being the complicated tenure on which land is held--a tenure which
is often puzzling to the natives themselves--it is no matter of wonder
that English settlers should have found themselves in difficulties. It
is said that the colonists tried to make themselves masters of the land
by unfair means, _i. e._ either by forcibly taking possession of it, or
by inveigling the ignorant natives into signing documents which they
did not understand, and thus selling their paternal estates for rum,
tobacco, and a few blankets.
This may to some extent have been the case when the colonists first
came to settle in the country. But the natives are far too intelligent
to remain long ignorant of the power of pen, ink, and paper, and
there is no doubt that in many cases they intentionally outwitted the
purchaser, either by putting forward a sham owner of the ground, who
had no right to sell it, and who vanished with his share of the prize
as soon as the bargain was concluded, or by asserting ignorance of the
meaning of the document which had been signed, and refusing to carry
out its conditions. That the white men succeeded too often in cheating
the natives is unfortunately true, but it is no less true that the
natives as often cheated the colonists.
Law among the New Zealanders seems to be of the simplest kind, and, as
far as we know, is not so well developed as among some of the tribes of
Southern Africa. The three offences of which the law takes cognizance
are murder, theft, and adultery. For the first of these offences a sort
of _lex talionis_ holds good, the relatives of the slain man being
sure, sooner or later, to kill the murderer, unless he manages to
compromise with them. Even theft is punished in a similar fashion, the
thief being robbed in his turn.
As to the third offence, it is punishable in various ways; but both the
offending parties are supposed to have forfeited their lives to the
husband. If, therefore, the fact be discovered, and the culprit be a
person of low rank, he seeks safety in flight, while, if he be a man
of rank, he expects that the offended husband will make war upon him.
Sometimes, if a wife discovers that her husband has been unfaithful to
her, she will kill his paramour, or, at all events, disgrace her after
the native custom, by stripping off all her clothes, and exposing her
in public. Even the husband is sometimes subjected to this punishment
by the wife’s relations; and so much dreaded is this disgrace that
men have been known to commit suicide when their offence has been
discovered.
Suicide, by the way, is not at all uncommon among the New Zealanders,
who always think that death is better than disgrace, and sometimes
destroy themselves under the most trivial provocation. One such
case is mentioned by Mr. Angas. “On arriving at the village or
kainga of Ko Nghahokowitu, we found all the natives in a state of
extraordinary excitement. We had observed numbers of people running
in that direction, along the margin of the river, from the different
plantations, and, on inquiry, we learned that an hour previously to
our arrival the son of an influential chief had committed suicide by
shooting himself with a musket.
“Our fellow-travellers, with Wisihona their chief, were all assembled,
and we followed them to the shed where the act had been perpetrated,
and where the body still lay as it fell, but covered with a blanket.
The mourners were gathered round, and the women commenced crying most
dolefully, wringing their hands, and bending their bodies to the earth.
We approached the body, and were permitted to remove the blanket
from the face and breast. The countenance was perfectly placid, and
the yellow tint of the skin, combined with the tattooing, gave the
corpse almost the appearance of a wax model. The deceased was a fine
and well-made young man. He had placed the musket to his breast, and
deliberately pushed the trigger with his toes, the bullet passing right
through his lungs. Blood was still oozing from the orifice made by the
bullet, and also from the mouth, and the body was still warm.”
The cause of this suicide was that which has already been mentioned.
The young man had been detected in an illicit correspondence with the
wife of another man in the same village. The woman had been sent away
to a distant settlement, a proceeding which had already made her lover
sullen and gloomy; and, on the day when Mr. Angas visited the place,
he had become so angry at the reproaches which were levelled at him by
some of his relations, that he stepped aside and shot himself.
The determined manner in which the New Zealanders will sometimes commit
suicide was exemplified by the conduct of another man, who deliberately
wrapped himself up in his blanket, and strangled himself with his own
hands. The crime was perpetrated in the common sleeping-house, and was
achieved with so much boldness that it was not discovered until the man
had been dead for some time.
A remarkable instance of this phase of New Zealand law took place when
Mr. Dieffenbach visited the Waipa district. He was accompanied by a
chief, who called a girl to him, and handed her over to the police
magistrate as a murderess. The fact was, that her brother, a married
man, had formed an intimacy with a slave girl, and, fearing the
vengeance of his wife’s relatives, had killed himself. His sister, in
order to avenge the death of her brother, found out the slave girl in
the bush, and killed her. The strangest part of the business was, that
the accused girl was the daughter of the chief who denounced her.
The girl pleaded her own cause well, saying, what was perfectly true,
that she had acted according to the law of the land in avenging the
death of her brother, and was not amenable to the laws of the white
man, which had not yet been introduced into her country. As might be
imagined, her plea was received, and the girl was set at liberty;
but her father was so earnest in his wish to check the system of
retaliatory murder, that he actually offered himself in the place of
his daughter, as being her nearest relation.