Читать книгу: «The Treaty of Waitangi; or, how New Zealand became a British Colony», страница 2

My Friends – You will perceive by the letter which I have been honoured with the commands of the King of Great Britain to deliver to you, that it is His Majesty's most anxious wish that the most friendly feeling should subsist between his subjects and yourselves, and how much he regrets that you should have cause to complain of the conduct of any of his subjects. To foster and maintain this friendly feeling, to prevent as much as possible the recurrence of those misunderstandings and quarrels which have unfortunately taken place, and to give a greater assurance of safety and just dealing both to his own subjects and the people of New Zealand in their commercial transactions with each other, these are the purposes for which His Majesty has sent me to reside amongst you, and I hope and trust that when any opportunities of doing a service to the people of this country shall arise I shall be able to prove to you how much it is my own desire to be the friend of those amongst whom I am come to reside. It is the custom of His Majesty the King of Great Britain to send one or more of his servants to reside as his representatives in all those countries in Europe and America with which he is on terms of friendship, and in sending one of his servants to reside amongst the chiefs of New Zealand, they ought to be sensible not only of the advantages which will result to the people of New Zealand by extending their commercial intercourse with the people of England, but of the honour the King of a great and powerful nation like Great Britain has done their country in adopting it into the number of those countries with which he is in friendship and alliance. I am, however, commanded to inform you that in every country to which His Majesty sends his servants to reside as his representatives, their persons and their families, and all that belongs to them are considered sacred. Their duty is the cultivation of peace and friendship and goodwill, and not only the King of Great Britain, but the whole civilised world would resent any violence which his representative might suffer in any of the countries to which they are sent to reside in his name. I have heard that the chiefs and people of New Zealand have proved the faithful friends of those who have come among them to do them good, and I therefore trust myself to their protection and friendship with confidence. All good Englishmen are desirous that the New Zealanders should be a rich and happy people, and it is my wish when I shall have erected my house that all the chiefs will come and visit me and be my friends. We will then consult together by what means they can make their country a flourishing country, and their people a rich and wise people like the people of Great Britain. At one time Great Britain differed but little from what New Zealand is now. The people had no large houses nor good clothing nor good food. They painted their bodies and clothed themselves with the skins of wild beasts; every chief went to war with his neighbour, and the people perished in the wars of their chiefs even as the people of New Zealand do now. But after God sent His Son into the world to teach mankind that all the tribes of the earth are brethren, and that they ought not to hate and destroy, but to love and do good to one another, and when the people of England learned His words of wisdom, they ceased to go to war against each other, and all the tribes became one people. The peaceful inhabitants of the country began to build large houses because there was no enemy to pull them down. They cultivated their land and had abundance of bread, because no hostile tribe entered into their fields to destroy the fruit of their labours. They increased the numbers of their cattle because no one came to drive them away. They also became industrious and rich, and had all good things they desired. Do you then, O chiefs and tribes of New Zealand, desire to become like the people of England? Listen first to the Word of God which He has put into the hearts of His servants the missionaries to come here and teach you. Learn that it is the will of God that you should all love each other as brethren, and when wars shall cease among you then shall your country flourish. Instead of the roots of the fern you shall eat bread, because the land shall be tilled without fear, and its fruits shall be eaten in peace. When there is an abundance of bread we shall labour to preserve flax and timber and provisions for the ships which come to trade, and the ships that come to trade will bring clothing and all other things which you desire. Thus you become rich, for there are no riches without labour, and men will not labour unless there is peace, that they may enjoy the fruits of their labour.

The Resident's address was received with an outburst of wild applause, and soon the smoke of discharging muskets again hung heavy on the morning air. But there was still other diversion for the natives, to whom the proceedings had proved a great novelty. The mental feast which was to provide them with food for discussion for many days was now supplanted by a more material repast, at which fifty settlers were entertained at Mr. Williams's house, while the Maoris were fed with a sumptuousness that made memorable to them the coming and the installation of the first British Resident.

As an adjunct to his slender authority, Mr. Busby had been informed by Governor Bourke that Sir John Gore, the Vice-Admiral commanding the Indian Squadron of the Navy, would be instructed to permit his ships to call in at New Zealand ports as frequently as possible, and offer him what support they could during these fitful visits. But upon neither naval nor civil power was Mr. Busby to rely overmuch. He was to depend for his authority rather upon his moral influence and his co-operation with the Missionaries, to whom he went specially accredited.

Mr. Busby has frequently been made the butt of the humorist, because his bark was necessarily worse than his bite. The Maori cynic of his day chuckled as he dubbed him "He manuwa pu kore" ("A man-of-war without guns"), and many a playful jest has since been made at his expense, all of which is both unfair and ungenerous to Mr. Busby. The difficulty in the way of investing him with legal power was thus tersely explained by Sir Richard Bourke during the course of his initial instructions to the Resident:

You are aware that you cannot be clothed with any legal power or jurisdiction, by virtue of which you might be enabled to arrest British subjects offending against British or Colonial law in New Zealand. It was proposed to supply this want of power and to provide further enforcement of the criminal law as it exists amongst ourselves, and further to adapt it to the new and peculiar exigencies of the country to which you are going, by means of a Colonial Act of Council grafted on a statute of the Imperial Parliament. Circumstances which I am not at present competent to explain have prevented the enactment of the Statute in question.¹¹ You can therefore rely but little on the force of law, and must lay the foundation of your measures upon the influence which you shall obtain over the Native Chiefs. Something, however, may be effected under the law as it stands at present. By the 9th Geo. IV., cap. 83, sec. A, the Supreme Courts of N. S. Wales and Van Dieman's Land have power to enquire of, hear and determine, all offences committed in N.Z. by the Master and crew of any British ship or vessel, or by any British subject living there, and persons convicted of such offences may be punished as if the offence has been committed in England… If therefore you should at any time have the means of sending to this colony any one or more persons capable of lodging an information before the proper authorities here, of an offence committed in N.Z. you will, if you think the case of sufficient magnitude and importance, send a detailed report of the transaction to the Colonial Secretary by such persons who will be required to depose to the facts sufficient to support an information upon which a bench Warrant may be obtained from the Supreme Court for the apprehension of the offender, and transmitted to you for execution. You will perceive at once that this process, which is at best a prolix and inconvenient operation and may incur some considerable expense, will be totally useless unless you should have some well-founded expectation of securing the offender upon or after the arrival of the warrant, and of being able to effect his conveyance here for trial, and that you have provided the necessary evidence to ensure his conviction.

Shorn of everything which suggested practical power, except the name of British Resident, Mr. Busby soon found himself in no very enviable position. He was ignored by the whites and laughed at by the natives. To add still further to his difficulties he was slow to recognise that the Missionaries in the long years of their labour had naturally acquired more influence with the natives than he could possibly have, and he was reluctant to achieve his object by appearing to play a subordinate part to them. He had been explicitly instructed to seek their hearty co-operation, and take every advantage of the high respect in which they were held by the natives. It was not long, however, before he began to develop ideas of his own and to formulate a policy which he could not enforce, because it was at variance with that of the Missions.

He had also been accredited to the thirteen chiefs who had signed the memorial to the King in the previous year, and had been advised to seek their assistance in arresting those offenders whom he had power to transmit to Sydney for trial. The number of such persons whom he might have apprehended now totalled, we are assured, to several hundreds; but the process was, as Sir Richard Bourke had suggested, so obviously "prolix and inconvenient," that Mr. Busby exercised to the full the measure of discretion given him by the Governor, and left them severely alone.¹²

According to Captain Fitzroy, who visited the Bay of Islands during the cruise of H.M.S. Beagle in 1835, he preferred to fold his hands and allow events to shape their own course. "He chose to tell every one who went to him that he had no authority; that he was not even allowed to act as a Magistrate, and that he could do nothing. The consequence was that whenever anything did occur, those who were aggrieved went to the Missionaries. Mr. Busby might have very considerable power, because the Missionaries have such influence over the whole body of natives they could support him. If Mr. Busby wanted a person taken up he had only to express his wish to the Missionaries, and the natives would have done it for them, but he was slow to act in that way. He was sent there in a high character, and was accredited to the Missionaries, and had he communicated with them freely and allowed them to be cognisant of, if not the agents in all that took place, while he remained as the head, and the understanding had been that all that the Missionaries did was done in concert with Mr. Busby, and all that eventuated was from him as the head, his influence would have been far too great for any individuals in that part of the Islands to resist. By dividing the two influences Mr. Busby lost his power of preventing mischief. He remained on tolerably good terms with them, but separated himself in an unnecessary degree from them, and thought he might differ from them sometimes, even to taking a precisely opposite course of conduct to that which they recommended. The consequences were that while the natives retained their opinion of the Missionaries, they found that the Resident was a nonentity, and that he was there to look on and nothing more."

As illustrating the class of difference which sometimes arose between the Resident and the Missionaries, and which must have appreciably hampered the activities of both, Captain Fitzroy stated to the Committee of the House of Lords that when he was at the Bay of Islands in 1835 there was then a serious difference between the real and the nominal head of the community, with respect to the stopping or discouraging the sale of ardent spirits. The Missionaries wanted to carry into effect a regulation similar to one established in the Society Islands, namely, that no spirits should be imported into the country. Mr. Busby would not be a party to such a rule, contending that it was an unnecessary measure; while the Missionaries, on the other hand, were unanimous in declaring it was one of the most useful precautions they could take, but no amount of argument could induce Mr. Busby to co-operate with them.¹³

Mr. Busby at all times expressed the most profound respect for the Missionaries and veneration for their labours. He also cheerfully acknowledged that if the British Government expected them to accord their influence to its Representative they must be given a specified share in the government of the country. But when it came to a point of difference, he plainly let it be known that he considered himself possessed of a sounder judgment than they. After detailing to Governor Bourke a discussion in which he claimed to have got the better of the Missionaries, he wrote: "I thought they would naturally conclude in future that it was possible for the conclusions of a single mind, when directed to one object, to be more correct than the collective opinions of many persons whose minds are altogether engrossed with the multitude of details which fill up the attention of men, occupied as they are, leaving neither leisure nor capacity for more enlarged and comprehensive views."

Mr. Busby might have said more in fewer words, but he could scarcely have depreciated the mental powers of the Missionaries in a more delightfully prolix sentence. Skilfully, however, as the sting was sheathed within a cloud of words, the barb came through, with the not unnatural result that he had to confess the Missionaries afterwards neither respected his opinions nor appeared anxious to co-operate with him in what he described as "the furtherance of matters connected with the King's service in this country."

Though severely handicapped by his inability to coordinate his ideas with those of the Missionaries, or to sink his individuality before theirs, it does not follow that Mr. Busby was entirely idle. He lent himself with considerable industry to the task of placing the shipping of the country upon a basis more satisfactory than it had up to that time been. At the date of his arrival there were a number of New Zealand owned craft trading on our coasts, and several vessels were building on the Hokianga River. Sailing as these vessels were under no recognised register, and without the protection of the British ensign, which they were prohibited from hoisting, they were liable to seizure at any time by any enterprising pirate.¹⁴ Equally impossible was it for these owners to register their craft in New Zealand, for there was as yet no acknowledged flag of the nation.

These facts were made the subject of representation by Mr. Busby to the Governor of New South Wales, who accorded a hearty approval to his suggestion that the commerce of the country warranted some protection of this nature. Flags of three separate designs were accordingly entrusted to Captain Lambert of H.M.S. Alligator, who brought them from Sydney and submitted them to the chiefs for approval.

This event took place at Waitangi, on March 20, 1834, the natives having been gathered from all the surrounding pas into a large marquee erected in front of the British Residency, and gaily decorated with flags from the Alligator. Wisely or unwisely the proceedings were not conducted upon the democratic basis of our present-day politics; for upon some principle which has not been made clear the tent was divided by a barrier into two areas, into one of which only the rangatiras were admitted, and to them the right of selection was confined. No debate was permitted, but Mr. Busby read to the chiefs a speech in which he dwelt upon the advantages to be anticipated from the adoption of a national flag, and then invited them to take a vote for the choice of design.

This mode of procedure created considerable dissatisfaction amongst the plutocracy of the tribes, who resented the doubtful privilege of being permitted to look on without the consequential right to exercise their voice. The stifling of discussion also tended to breed distrust in the minds of some of the chiefs, to whom the settlement of so important a matter without a korero¹⁵ was a suspicious innovation. Two of the head men declined to record their votes, believing that under a ceremony conducted in such a manner there must be concealed some sinister motive. Despite these protests, the British Resident and Captain Lambert had their way, and at the conclusion of Mr. Busby's address, the flags were displayed and the electors invited to vote. The great warrior chief Hongi, acting as poll-clerk, took down in writing the preference of each chief. Twelve votes were recorded for the most popular ensign, ten for the next in favour, and six only for the third. It was then found that the choice of the majority had fallen upon the flag with a white ground divided by St. George's Cross, the upper quarter of which was again divided by St. George's cross, a white star on a blue field appearing in each of the smaller squares.¹⁶

The election over, the rejected flags were close furled, and the selected ensign flung out to the breeze beside the Union Jack of Old England.

In the name of the chiefs Mr. Busby declared the ensign to be the national flag of New Zealand. As the symbol of the new-born nation was run up upon the halyards, it was received with a salute of twenty-one guns from the warship Alligator, and by cheers from her officers and the goodly crowd of sailors, settlers, and Missionaries who had assembled to participate in the ceremony.

As is usual with most such functions where Britons are concerned, the event was celebrated by a feast. The Europeans were regaled at a cold luncheon at Mr. Busby's house, while the Maoris had pork, potatoes, and kororirori¹⁷ served upon the lawn in front of the Residency, which delicacies they devoured sans knives sans forks.

These proceedings subsequently received on behalf of the British Government the entire approbation of Lord Aberdeen;¹⁸ and the countenance thus lent to what at the time was regarded as no more than a protection to the commerce of the country was discovered to have a most important bearing upon the question of Britain's sovereignty over these islands.

Though Mr. Busby found himself destitute of legal power or military force to make good his authority, and equally lacking in the tact necessary to secure by policy what he could not achieve by any other means, he was sincerely and even enthusiastically loyal to the main principle underlying his office – the preservation of British interests. Thus when the tidings came that Baron de Thierry intended to set up his kingdom at Hokianga, he took immediate and, as far as lay in his power, effective steps to defeat what he regarded as a wanton piece of French aggression.

Baron de Thierry was not a Frenchman in the narrow sense of the term, and his foreign associations were more imaginary than real. He was the son of a French noble refugee who had fled his country and had resided in England for many years. The Baron had been educated at Cambridge, had acquired English sympathies, and had been an officer in the 23rd Lancers, so that he was in sentiment if not by birth a subject of the King. When Hongi, the great Nga-Puhi chief, visited Cambridge in company with his compatriot Waikato and Mr. Kendall, to assist Professor Lee in the compilation of the Maori vocabulary, the Baron met the warrior chief, and became fired with the romance of the Pacific. There was much that was quixotic in his scheme of becoming a potentate amongst the savages of the South Seas, and it is possible it was not altogether devoid of benevolence.¹⁹ There is at least reason to believe that Baron de Thierry had persuaded himself that he also had a mission for the uplifting of the benighted, and that when he arranged with Mr. Kendall to purchase him an area of land at Hokianga whereon he proposed to set up his "kingdom," he did so more in the spirit of philanthropy than of mercenary adventure. The area alleged to be purchased by Mr. Kendall on behalf of the Baron was the considerable one of 40,000 acres, and the price paid was the inconsiderable one of 36 axes. The transaction was accompanied by the usual misunderstanding as to the real nature of the deal, the Baron declaring that the axes were payment in full, the natives contending they were but a deposit, or at the best payment for a much smaller area.

The chiefs treated his "sovereign rights and powers" with undisguised derision. They disavowed his territorial claims because they were made regardless of the fundamental principle underlying the Maori law of property – that all the people who have an interest in the land must consent to its sale. Subsequently the matter was compromised by Tamati Waaka Nēne conceding him a small area,²⁰ to which he retired destitute of retainers, and surrounded only by the members of his own family.

The story of the Baron's landing in 1837, with much pomp and circumstance, under a salute of twenty-one guns, his dispute regarding Kendall's purchase, his final disappearance into obscurity, are, however, of secondary importance to our purpose. What is of vital interest is that the announcement in 1835 of his approaching advent galvanised the British Resident and the native chiefs into a state of anxious activity. Living as they were on the confines of civilisation, their information concerning events outside their own little world was necessarily of the scantiest. Their fears were thus often greater than their knowledge of the facts, and so in this emergency they had no difficulty in persuading themselves that an invasion by the French was at hand.

As a counterblast, Mr. Busby counselled that the chiefs should immediately crystallise the position taken up by Britain – that New Zealand was not a British possession – by unequivocally declaring their own independence. His policy was approved, and for the purpose of giving effect to it, thirty-five chiefs assembled at Mr. Busby's house at Waitangi, where in the presence of the resident Missionaries and merchants they evolved the following declaration,²¹ which brought into existence the much-questioned and questionable authority known as The Confederated Tribes of New Zealand.

It is not difficult to trace the Roman hand of the Resident throughout the document, especially as the Maori had no word in their language to express the idea of sovereignty; but it is only just to remark that in a subsequent despatch Mr. Busby drew the attention of Governor Bourke to the fact that the concluding paragraph, both in language and sentiment, originated with the chiefs:

DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE OF NEW ZEALAND

(1) We, the hereditary chiefs and head of the tribes of the Northern parts of New Zealand, being assembled at "Waitangi" in the Bay of Islands on this 28th day of October 1835, declare the independence of our country, which is hereby constituted and declared to be an independent state, under the designation of the United tribes of New Zealand.

(2) All Sovereign powers and authority within the territories of the United tribes of New Zealand is hereby declared to reside entirely and exclusively in the hereditary chiefs and heads of the tribes in their collective capacity, who also declare that they will not permit any legislative authority separate from themselves in their collective capacity to exist, nor any function of Government to be exercised within the said territories unless by persons appointed by them and acting under the authority of laws regularly enacted by them in Congress assembled.

(3) The hereditary chiefs and heads of the tribes agree to meet in Congress at Waitangi, in the autumn of each year, for the purpose of framing laws for the dispensation of justice, the preservation of peace and good order, and the regulation of trade, and they cordially invite the Southern tribes to lay aside their private animosities, and to consult the safety and welfare of our common country by joining the confederation of the United tribes.

(4) They also agree to send a copy of this declaration to His Majesty the King of England, to thank him for his acknowledgment of their flag, and in return for the friendship and protection they have shown and are prepared to show to such of his subjects as have settled in their country, or resorted to its shores for the purpose of trade, they entreat that he will continue to be the parent of their infant State, and that he will become its protector from all attempts upon its independence.

Agreed unanimously on this 28th day of October 1835 in the presence of His Britannic Majesty's Resident.

English Witnesses:

(Translated by the Missionaries and certified to by James Busby, British Resident.)

Names of Chiefs signing Declaration of Independence, October 28, 1835

Awaroa.

Hare Hongi.

Hemi Kepa Tupe.

Ware Poaka.

Waikato.

Titore.

Moka.

Wharerahi.

Kewa.

Wai.

Reweti Atuahaere.

Awa.

Wiremu Te Ti Taunui.

Te Nana.

Pi.

Kaua.

Tareha.

Kawiti.

Pumuka.

Ke Keae.

Te Kamara.

Pomare.

Wiwia.

Te Tao.

Marupo.

Kopiu.

Warau.

Ngere.

Moetara.

Hiamoe.

Pukututu.

Te Peka.

Hone Wiremu Heke.

Paerara.

Erera Pare (te kai-tuhituhi).

Subsequent Signatures to the Declaration Of Independence

Nēne (Tamati Waaka).

Huhu.

Patuone.

Parore, June 25, 1837.

Towa.

Panakareao (Nopera).

Kiwi Kiwi, Jan. 13, 1836.

Tirarau, Feb. 9, 1836.

Hamurea Pita, March 29, 1836.

Tawhai.

Mate.

Kaha, June 25, 1837.

Te Morenga, July 12, 1837.

Mahia.

Taonui, Jan. 16, 1838.

Papahia, Sept. 24, 1838.

Hapuku, Sept. 25, 1838.

Te Wherowhero, July 22, 1839.²²

A few days prior to this meeting at Waitangi and the proclamation of their independence by the chiefs, Mr. Busby issued (on October 10, 1835) a stirring appeal to his scattered countrymen, in which he announced that he had received from "a person who styles himself Charles Baron de Thierry, Sovereign chief of New Zealand, and King of Nukuheva, one of the Marquesas Islands, a formal declaration of his intention to establish in his own person an independent sovereignty in this country, which intention he states he has declared to their Majesties the Kings of Great Britain and France, and to the President of the United States, and that he is now waiting at Otaheite the arrival of an armed ship from Panama to enable him to proceed to the Bay of Islands with strength to maintain his assumed authority. His intention is founded on an alleged invitation given to him in England by Shunghee (Hongi) and other chiefs, none of whom as individuals had any right to the sovereignty of the country, and consequently possessed no authority to convey a right of sovereignty to another; also upon an alleged purchase made for him in 1822 by a Mr. Kendall of three districts on the Hokianga River from three chiefs who had only a partial property in these districts, parts of which are now settled by British subjects by virtue of purchase from the rightful proprietors. The British Resident has also seen an elaborate exposition of his views which this person has addressed to the Missionaries of the C.M.S., in which he makes the most ample promises to all persons, whether whites or natives, who will accept his invitation to live under his Government, and in which he offers a stipulated salary to each individual in order to induce him to act as his Magistrate. It is also supposed he may have made similar communications to other persons or classes of His Majesty's subjects, who are hereby invited to make such communications, or any information on this subject they may possess, known to the British Resident or to Lieutenant MacDonnell. The British Resident has too much confidence in the loyalty and good sense of his countrymen to think it necessary to caution them against turning a favourable ear to such insidious promises. He firmly believes that the paternal protection of the British Government which has never failed any of His Majesty's subjects, however remote, will not be withheld from them, should it be necessary to prevent their lives, liberties, or property from being subjected to the caprice of any adventurer who may choose to make this country, in which British subjects have now by the most lawful means acquired so large a stake, the theatre of his ambitious projects; nor in the British Resident's opinion will His Majesty, after acknowledging the sovereignty of the New Zealand chiefs in their collective capacity, by the recognition of their flag, permit his humble and confiding allies to be deprived of their independence upon such pretensions. But although the British Resident is of opinion that such an attempt as is now announced must ultimately fail, he nevertheless conceives that if such a person were once allowed to obtain a footing in the country, he might acquire such an influence over the simple-minded natives as would produce effects which could not be too much deprecated, or too anxiously provided against, and he has therefore considered it his duty to request the British settlers of all classes to use all the influence they possess with the natives of every rank in order to counteract the efforts of any emissaries who may have arrived or may arrive amongst them, and to inspire both chiefs and people with a spirit of the most determined resistance to the landing of a person on their shores who comes with the avowed intention of usurping a sovereignty over them. The British Resident will take immediate steps for calling together the native chiefs in order to inform them of this attempt upon their independence, and to advise them of what is due to themselves and to their country, and of the protection which British subjects are entitled to at their hands, and he has no doubt that such a manifestation will be exhibited of the characteristic spirit, courage, and independence of the New Zealanders, as will stop at the outset such an attempt upon their liberties, by demonstrating its utter hopelessness."