Read Online Kiwi Wars by Garry Douglas Kilworth - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Garry Douglas Kilworth
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remembered everything about his voyage, from the colour of the waves, to the direction of the swell, to small islands on the way. I am told by your navigators that Raiatea is 2,500 miles away, but Kupe described how to get to the Land-of-the-Long-White-Cloud by sailing to the left of the setting sun in November.’
Potaka paused for effect, then said, ‘So we came. We brought our dogs and pigs, our taro, sweetbreads, sweet potatoes, and other seeds and plants. We did not mean to bring the rats, but they came with us anyway, as rats always do. When we arrived there were only birds. Many, many birds. There was a big one called a moa, twelve feet high, but we killed all the moas before you came here.’
Jack was impressed. ‘That’s quite a story. How many people in each canoe?’
‘Perhaps a hundred or more. They navigated by the star paths and sea and land birds. There were blind navigators, feelers-of-the-sea we called them, who knew which part of the ocean we were in by its temperature. Some were just nature’s tricks. Did you know if you throw a pig into the water it will always swim towards the nearest land, even when that land is out of sight?’
‘Something to do with the scent of the soil on the wind, I expect. I must remember, next time I am lost at sea and have a pig handy.’
Potaka stiffened and stopped poking the fire with a stick. ‘You are making fun of me.’
‘Only a little. Actually, I have a great admiration for a people who travelled thousands of miles over open ocean, while my own nation were still coast-hugging in far more seaworthy ships.’
‘Your navigators are good now though, with their charts and brass instruments. Captain Cook was such a man.’
‘I have heard of one of yours whose ancestor was Speaker for the 7th Canoe.’
‘He is my cousin,’ said Potaka, proudly. He grinned again. ‘But then, most Maori people are my cousins.’
Following this conversation, Jack was allowed to rest. Potaka showed no signs of leaving him to his fate. The Maori made a camp, collected wood for the fire, cooked Jack’s meal and changed his dressing. Their exchanges were not always as pleasant as their talk about migration. At times the festering anger which many Maoris felt regarding the influx of strangers in their land burst through and Jack was subject to a tirade. Why had the white men come here? They had not been invited. Why did they keep coming? When would it stop? When they had taken all the land there was to be had?
On the one hand Jack sympathized with Potaka’s complaints. Had this been Scotland or England, with strangers arriving by the boatload every few months and establishing themselves on the landscape as if they had owned it since Adam, he too would have felt great resentment. On the other he knew the settlers would continue to arrive until they were stopped, either by the government or by a natural law such as a dearth of jobs and land. He felt it would be better for the Maori to integrate themselves and try to assimilate the new culture which had been thrust upon them, than battle against it. As in all other colonizations by Europeans, so far as the natives were concerned the resources of the army they were fighting were infinite in terms of men and equipment. They would keep pouring in until the fight was won – by the British. Jack hesitated to call his people invaders, since they had not stormed the beaches of New Zealand but had simply arrived in batches until there were too many here for the Maori to ignore.
‘Isn’t it better to have established a rule of law here, Potaka, than for your people to have to suffer the dregs of our society?’
Jack was referring to the first settlers, who tended to be escaped convicts, sailors who had jumped whaling ships, and tough, rough traders. Not the cream of British society, to say the least. They had introduced prostitution and grog-shops, sex and drink being their raison d’être, and all the vices and violence that went
Potaka paused for effect, then said, ‘So we came. We brought our dogs and pigs, our taro, sweetbreads, sweet potatoes, and other seeds and plants. We did not mean to bring the rats, but they came with us anyway, as rats always do. When we arrived there were only birds. Many, many birds. There was a big one called a moa, twelve feet high, but we killed all the moas before you came here.’
Jack was impressed. ‘That’s quite a story. How many people in each canoe?’
‘Perhaps a hundred or more. They navigated by the star paths and sea and land birds. There were blind navigators, feelers-of-the-sea we called them, who knew which part of the ocean we were in by its temperature. Some were just nature’s tricks. Did you know if you throw a pig into the water it will always swim towards the nearest land, even when that land is out of sight?’
‘Something to do with the scent of the soil on the wind, I expect. I must remember, next time I am lost at sea and have a pig handy.’
Potaka stiffened and stopped poking the fire with a stick. ‘You are making fun of me.’
‘Only a little. Actually, I have a great admiration for a people who travelled thousands of miles over open ocean, while my own nation were still coast-hugging in far more seaworthy ships.’
‘Your navigators are good now though, with their charts and brass instruments. Captain Cook was such a man.’
‘I have heard of one of yours whose ancestor was Speaker for the 7th Canoe.’
‘He is my cousin,’ said Potaka, proudly. He grinned again. ‘But then, most Maori people are my cousins.’
Following this conversation, Jack was allowed to rest. Potaka showed no signs of leaving him to his fate. The Maori made a camp, collected wood for the fire, cooked Jack’s meal and changed his dressing. Their exchanges were not always as pleasant as their talk about migration. At times the festering anger which many Maoris felt regarding the influx of strangers in their land burst through and Jack was subject to a tirade. Why had the white men come here? They had not been invited. Why did they keep coming? When would it stop? When they had taken all the land there was to be had?
On the one hand Jack sympathized with Potaka’s complaints. Had this been Scotland or England, with strangers arriving by the boatload every few months and establishing themselves on the landscape as if they had owned it since Adam, he too would have felt great resentment. On the other he knew the settlers would continue to arrive until they were stopped, either by the government or by a natural law such as a dearth of jobs and land. He felt it would be better for the Maori to integrate themselves and try to assimilate the new culture which had been thrust upon them, than battle against it. As in all other colonizations by Europeans, so far as the natives were concerned the resources of the army they were fighting were infinite in terms of men and equipment. They would keep pouring in until the fight was won – by the British. Jack hesitated to call his people invaders, since they had not stormed the beaches of New Zealand but had simply arrived in batches until there were too many here for the Maori to ignore.
‘Isn’t it better to have established a rule of law here, Potaka, than for your people to have to suffer the dregs of our society?’
Jack was referring to the first settlers, who tended to be escaped convicts, sailors who had jumped whaling ships, and tough, rough traders. Not the cream of British society, to say the least. They had introduced prostitution and grog-shops, sex and drink being their raison d’être, and all the vices and violence that went
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