The Romance of a Pro-Consul Part 7

Night and morning in the far south were vividly reflected to Sir George Grey in tales of Rauparaha and Rangihaeta, Maori chieftains, and of Siapo, Loyalty Islander.

Before his arrival in New Zealand, the Maoris had been divorced from their cannibal practices. Yet, the horrid traffic was not remote, if he were to accept a lasting rumour of Rauparaha and Rangihaeta. The pair were making their own war stir for him, and must be tackled. It was earlier that, sitting on a hillside in friendly converse, they sent a slave girl for a pail of water. As she tripped off to do their bidding, Rauparaha, the story was, shot her through the back for a meal. No doubt cannibalism among the Maoris had thriven on the absence of animal meat, for New Zealand was peculiar in that respect. Its one large creature of the lower world was the moa, of which Sir George said 'It was akin to the ostrich, but no European, I believe, ever saw it alive.'

Governor Grey and Bishop Selwyn were out together on a walking expedition, and it was Easter Sunday. 'Christ has risen!' Selwyn reverently welcomed the day, and his companion joined, 'Indeed He has.'

They were communing in that spirit when a bundle of letters, sent from Auckland to intercept them, was brought into the tent. One to Selwyn bore the news of the death of Siapo, who had become a Christian under his teaching, and who was being educated with other natives, at his seminary in Auckland.

The Bishop, overcome with grief, burst into tears; then broke some moments of silence with the words, 'Why, you have not shed a single tear!'

'No,' said Sir George, 'I have been so wrapped in thought that I could not weep. I have been thinking of the prophecy that men of every race were to be a.s.sembled in the kingdom of heaven. I have tried to imagine the wonder and joy prevailing there, at the coming of Siapo, the first Christian of his race. He would be glad evidence that another people of the world, had been added to the teaching of Christ.'

'Yes, yes,' Selwyn remarked, drying his tears, 'that is the true idea to entertain, and I shall not cry any more.' What a touching incident! It shows us the depth of feeling which united Governor and Bishop. Only Sir George's version ran, 'It ill.u.s.trated Selwyn's great, good heart.

Stalwart, quite the muscular Christian, he had the simple heart of the child. He was a man entirely devoted to his duty, counting nothing of trouble or reward. We worked hand in hand. During an illness in New Zealand, I drew out a const.i.tution, such as I believed would best suit the Church of England there. Broadly, it came into operation, and in a speech, when he was leaving New Zealand, Selwyn told of its origin.'

You seek life pictures, rather than any chronology of dates, and therefore to a second incident of Sir George and Selwyn on tramp. They were in the Taupo range of mountains, and their supply of food had run very short. By the borders of Lake Taupo they sighted the house of a Maori chief who, being absent, had shut it up. Believing he might find inside a stay to their wants, Sir George forced the door, and after that a cupboard. In it were rice and sugar and other supplies, which he exhibited to Selwyn with the triumphant shout, 'Here, I'll make you a present of all this!'

'I'm afraid,' the Bishop gently remonstrated, 'that there will be trouble about our doings. You see we have really broken into somebody's house.'

'Oh, no,' Sir George rea.s.sured him, 'I know the chief who owns the place, and he would give us part of himself.' On the following day they met the chief, as he was returning home at the head of a string of his men. Sir George informed him of the straits to which he and the Bishop had been put, and of what they had done, and received this approval, 'Well, that was like true friends, and I'm so glad you did it!'

'You can realise,' Sir George drew the inference, 'how easy it was for me to get on with so chivalrous a race as the Maoris!' He and they had arrived at a mutual comprehension of each other. They recognised his parts, the manner in which he could make himself felt where least expected, the difficulty of beating him in expedients, his desire to advance their interests and happiness, his tender care for them as a father, after he had ridden as the Caesar. Towards the full understanding, his bout with Rauparaha and Rangihaeta was, perhaps, an a.s.sistance.

'The name Rauparaha,' he narrated, 'means in Maori a cabbage leaf; a wild cabbage leaf. The tradition was that Rauparaha's father was killed and eaten by some rival chief. While eating him, the other chief mumbled with inward satisfaction, "This man eats like a young cabbage." The son, being told, vowed revenge, and took the name Rauparaha to emphasise the fact.

It was insulting, he felt, to laugh over the eating of his father.'

Sir George's pledge for peace was the opening up of the country by means of roads, and he drove these hither and thither. The power of resistance which the Maoris manifested in warfare, kept anxiety simmering at Downing Street. 'In that connection,' Sir George said, 'Earl Grey, as Colonial Secretary, consulted the Duke of Wellington on the best policy for securing the durable settlement of the Maoris. The Duke, I learned from Earl Grey himself, advised the making of roads which would knit New Zealand, and employ the natives. Just after Earl Grey had seen the Duke, he had despatches from me, in which I outlined, in almost as many words, what I had been doing.'

The coincidence struck Sir George, and it gratified him to have the Duke in agreement. He was supported by another eminent soldier, when, at a London dinner party, being asked to give his opinion of the conduct of the Crimean War, he answered, 'I should have attacked upon the St.

Petersburg side, where you could really get at Russia, instead of on the Crimean side, with its strong forts, its distance from the centre of the empire, and a food supply confined to that carried by the ships.'

In New Zealand he had no difficulty in getting Maori labour, since it was fairly paid, and excellent trunk roads were the result. Rauparaha took the innovation with a seeming unconcern, meant to hide an adverse feeling, which Rangihaeta, however, frankly expressed. He could look back upon his years, old Rauparaha, and mark in them enough stir and fight to satisfy a score of warriors. Age had crawled on to his shoulders, causing his furtive eyes to rest on the ground. But he was still himself, as Sir George Grey realised, on receiving certain information. It indicated that Rauparaha was in a league of mischief, that he had quietly given a signal, and that large bodies of natives were drawing down the coast to his aid. Farther, it was put to Sir George that an attack on Wellington was the evident object. This would be calamity, for the forces available as a defence, at short notice, were small. Now for the Governor's action, which some criticised as high-handed.

'At first,' he related the exploit, 'I was doubtful whether I could fairly attribute the scheme to Rauparaha. However, I satisfied myself that the information which had reached me was well-founded. It had been brought by a man who was in touch with the Maoris creeping down the coast, and who could speak Maori. These bodies of natives, you understand, had prevented all news travelling. That was how they were able to get so near, without our being aware of it.

'What was I to do? Was I to delay until actually attacked? That would have been to wait for too much proof of the plot; and my information satisfied me. I had a picked force put on board a man-of-war lying at Wellington, and with it, and another small vessel, we set out for Rauparaha's country. Besides myself, only three or four of the officers, I suppose, knew the nature of our mission. We landed, after dark, at a point of the sea coast near Rauparaha's camp, quietly surrounded it, burst in and captured him. The thing was to swoop into the camp before the Maoris could have any warning, or attempt to resist. Thus an encounter, involving slain and wounded, would be avoided. Rauparaha was taken off to the ships in a boat, and we conveyed him to Wellington.

'The results were as I had antic.i.p.ated, for Rauparaha being our prisoner, there was n.o.body to give the word of command to the Maori disaffectants, who melted away. I told Rauparaha there were two courses open to him. He could take his trial, before an open court, for what he had done, or he could remain a prisoner, until I thought the interests of peace would permit me to release him. He elected to continue my prisoner, and other chiefs became bail for him when I did let him go.

'Rauparaha's defence was that he intended no harm, and that he was not in the plot, for he admitted there was a plot. I asked him why, if he meant no harm, he did not tell me that all these men had come so near. To that he had no answer, and besides I submitted to him a letter, which had been sent up the coast, telling the men to march down. He called the letter a forgery, but there was no question, in my judgment, that it was dictated by him and circulated by his desire. The best proof of its genuineness was that its plan was carried out, that the Maoris did collect in response to it. n.o.body could have managed the business but Rauparaha.

'What would have been the outcome of an attack on Wellington? Turmoil! I certainly believe that it would have been attacked. Then, a large force must have been sent to punish the raiders, or Wellington would have had to be abandoned. In either event, the progress of New Zealand would have been thrown back for years.'

Though restored to his tribe, Rauparaha never regained his power, and was a desolate man. It was a characteristic of the Maoris, that when a chief had a tumble he lost his influence. To that detail Sir George added another, namely that Rauparaha was a very good speaker. Indeed, many of the Maoris had the true gift of eloquence. Rauparaha left some Maori ma.n.u.scripts, about himself, to the Governor who had so unceremoniously made him captive. It was a tribute to that Governor's genius for attaching the regard of men, converting even enemies into friends.

Another instance, and another incident, lie in the conversion of Rangihaeta to road-making. He had rushed to the rescue of Rauparaha, on hearing of his capture. It was the chivalrous daring of one chief, towards the brother in distress, but unavailing. Not a hair of anybody's head had been hurt, yet Rauparaha was already beyond his friend's reach.

Rangihaeta sulked into his own fastnesses--a rumble of discontent and vengeance. Sir George did not wish him to remain in a state holding so little happiness. Moreover, the all-important high roads must invade even Rangihaeta's territory. Diplomatic overtures were not wasted; they blossomed quietly, and then bloomed on an inspiration.

'When the old fellow had begun to get frail and ill,' said Sir George, 'I sent him a pretty pony and trap. The sea sh.o.r.e, at his part of New Zealand, offered a splendid stretch of firm sand, one of the finest drives in the world. Delighted with his carriage, he would use it; only a breadth of rough land intervened between his pa and the beach. He could not drive across it, so what does he do but turn out his men to make a roadway.

'There was merriment in Maoriland at the idea that Rangihaeta, hitherto sternly opposed to our roads, should himself be constructing one. That was as I had hoped, and he made no more difficulties for us. How could he? There he was, almost every afternoon, driving on the sands in all the pride of peac.o.c.k feathers. Not merely that, but he aired his sister Topera, a woman of first-rate abilities, and of wide influence among the Maoris.'

Meanwhile, an outbreak at w.a.n.ganui furnished Sir George with material for his administrative wits. He was strolling up and down, deep in meditation, on a sort of terrace at his residence in Auckland. Turning, he noticed a Maori running towards him, and the next moment the Maori was rubbing his nose against the Governor's, the native fashion of salute.

Sir George, himself, had raced one of the fleetest members of a Maori tribe, throwing off his coat to do it, and proving the victor. 'I was somewhere on the coast, with several of my officers and a number of Maori chiefs, and there was a debate as to running. I ventured the statement that I could, perhaps, beat the Maoris at a distance contest. They selected their best man, a young chief, and I fancy it took me more than half a mile to get away from him.'

Those civilities were very well in their place, but the Governor would have dispensed with the nose rubbing of the native at his doorstep, so anxious was he to learn the reason. There was news in the man's face, and when he gathered words, it proved to be that of the w.a.n.ganui outbreak.

A spark there, had been the going off, by mishap, of a midshipmite's pistol. The lad was toying with it, amusing himself and a Maori chief.

'Look here, old fellow!' he had exclaimed, and to his own amazement the pistol went bang, hurting the chief in the face.

Extracting from his Maori mercury, every point of information he could furnish, Sir George ordained silence upon him, lest uneasiness might be caused among the people of Auckland. Then, on the plea of making a rapid tour of the outposts of the Colony, he organised a move on w.a.n.ganui. He went thither by sea, with a contingent of troops and a body-guard of leading Maori chiefs.

'These,' Sir George smiled, 'had been vowing all sorts of handsome things to me, and I took them at their word. I said to them that no better opportunity could arise, enabling them to fulfil their promises. They would be beside me, ready to send orders to their several tribes, should the a.s.sistance of these be needed. I need hardly add, that nothing untoward could happen in the localities which the chiefs denoted, while they were absent with me. Generally, I went about with a group of them in my train, as I preferred to have the possibilities of trouble with me.

They took kindly to travel, and they always behaved most admirably towards me.'

As his vessel touched the w.a.n.ganui sh.o.r.e, a Maori was seen scouring along it, in desperate haste. Behind, there raced a thread of enemies, Maoris on the war-path, but the man plunged into the surf before they could overtake him. Sir George imagined that here was another messenger, with information from the little w.a.n.ganui garrison of British soldiers. It was necessary he should hear tidings without a moment's delay, and he jumped into the ship's boat, which had been lowered to pick up the swimmer. The latter was pulled into it dripping wet, and in a rare state of excitement.

He seized Sir George, to salute him in Maori fashion, and the roll of the boat sent them both sprawling among the thwarts. Not minding that, the Maori kept vigorously rubbing the nose of his Excellency, who made the plaintive comment, 'I could not help myself. Besides, I had no grievance, unless that the Maori was using up, with his nose, precious minutes, to which he might better have given his tongue. That's an unusual compliment to pay the latter human member.'

The w.a.n.ganui crisis was settled by a show of strength, and a shrewd ukase, for Sir George set himself against more fighting. The recalcitrant Maoris had been accustomed to come down the river to trade, getting in return, sugar, tobacco, and other dainty necessaries.

'I shut them off from all that, until such time as they should submit, and undertake to live in peace. Neither could they meet their friends, and tiring of these laws, they gave in.' It was the boycott, employed by a Queen's servant, long before the word itself entered our language.

During the disturbances, a Maori leader, in sincere quest for tobacco, found something more deadly. He was rummaging a provision chest, not his own, when a wandering bullet plunged through the roof of the wooden cottage. It entered his head and put out his pipe for ever. The occurrence gave the Maoris an eerie shiver, for it was as if death had fallen straight from Heaven. They were learning to look up there, though a chief, the story went, once rebuked a missionary: 'You tell me to turn my gaze to Heaven, not to care for earthly things, and all the time you are grabbing my land.'

XI THE THRILL OF GOVERNING

Nothing is small in the making of an empire. It is the seeming trifles that often shape the way, fair or foul. This was a clear article of faith in Sir George Grey, and he would give it picturesque sittings. It had been with him wherever he carried the flag; it dotted Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa with milestones of policy. These might not be visible to others, but he knew, having planted them. They told of what had been done, by means of the little things; a bulwark against the undoing of the great things. Ever, the handling of personal elements was the master touch, the vast secret.

Take Sir George's entrance into the circle of Knights Commanders of the Bath, with Waka Nene and Te Puni for Esquires. He was one of the youngest K.C.B.'s ever nominated, being only thirty-six, and he just preceded his old friend Sir James Stephen. 'It struck me as a great shame,' his feeling had been, 'that one to whom I was so much attached, whose services to the State were so much longer than mine, should be made to follow me in the "Gazette." I could have cried over it.'

The notion of Esquires belongs, no doubt, to the truculent age when a brace of henchmen were useful beside the stirrup of a knight. Sir George did not revive them, in New Zealand, as a body-guard in any warlike meaning. Herein, there possibly lay a certain disappointment for his friends Waka Nene and Te Puni, both Maori chiefs of martial qualities.

The purpose was to identify the Maori people with a reward, which the Queen of England had conferred upon her representative in New Zealand.

'It is not for me alone,' Sir George Grey put the honour, 'but for all of us in this distant part of the realm. Therefore you, Waka Nene and Te Puni, shall join in the acceptance, in proof that the Queen forgets none of her subjects, no matter who they may be, or where they may dwell.'

This was a sprig of the policy which he felt must be pursued by an Empire called to boundless limits. Did it rest its control of the nations, successively adopted into it, upon their fears, upon a compelled obedience? Why, it would but grow the weaker as it spread, until eventually a time must arrive when, from its very vastness, it would fall into fragments. On the other hand, if, as it spread its dominion, it also spread equal laws, the Christian faith, Christian knowledge, and Christian virtues, it would link firmly to itself, by the ties of love and grat.i.tude, each nation it adopted. Thus, it would grow in strength as it grew in area, its dominion being an object sought for, rather than submitted to impatiently.

Go into the engine-room of administration, and listen to the clatter of yon modest pinion in a corner! That is, follow the avoidance of a peril in New Zealand, which might easily have sown more seeds of race warfare.

There had been a mysterious, deadly tragedy on the outskirts of Auckland, a retired naval lieutenant and his family the victims. The affair profoundly moved the young community, having regard to the unrest which had been rife in the land. Several natives were arrested as suspects, and Europeans put it to the Governor, 'We shall certainly all be murdered, unless you deal sharply with them.'

A leading Maori chief of the district went away, to be out of the serious trouble which, he feared, might arise at any moment. The Governor sent after him the message: 'The manner in which to meet difficulty is not to flee from it, and you must come back. I relied upon you to behave with sense and courage, and I'm confident you will still bear me out in that view.' The chief did return, but said Sir George, 'He upbraided me as being, to all appearance, a Governor quite unable to deal with such a problem as confronted me.' This was an exquisite turning of the tables.

'Why,' argued the old Maori, 'could you not at once have hanged the natives who were arrested? If you had done that, everybody's mind would have been at rest, but, as things are, n.o.body feels safe. We imagine that we may be blamed for the crime, while the English can have no confidence so long as no person has been punished. You see at what we have arrived.'

Any spark might now fire the bracken, and it was the task of Sir George to prevent that. His despatches and blue-books, fodder for the browse of Downing Street, had to wait upon this other business, which would not even go into them. Not unless there was a crash, during a moment's want of vigilance, or by lack of perfectly deft management. The greater empire making, it is evident, was not to have to write any blue-books. None were written, for the tension between European and Maori healed in the hands of the patient doctor. It turned out that a Van Diemen's Land convict was the villain of that remote New Zealand drama.