New Zealand
New Zealand
Parlimentary democracy in the South Pacific Ocean; dominion of the British Empire; popullation 4,000,000. The first Catholic in New Zealand was Thomas Poynton, an Irishman who settled in Hokianga in 1828. In 1835 New Zealand formed part of the newly erected Vicariate Apostolic of Western Oceanica, and in 1836 its first vicar Apostolic and seven Marist Brothers arrived. Catholic colonization was begun by Irish peasants and evangelization by French missionaries. In 1842 New Zealand constituted a separate vicariate, and in 1848 it was divided into the two dioceses of Auckland and Wellington. The Diocese of Dunedin was formed from part of the Diocese of Wellington in 1869, Wellington was raised to an archiepiscopal see in 1887, and the same year the Diocese of Christchurch was created. Ten years later, New Zealand, formerly subject to Australia, was made an independent ecclesiastical province. From the beginning, the Church was striving to convert the native Maoris. When the Marists retired from the Diocese of Auckland to that of Wellington in 1850, there were over 5000 neophytes. By 1853 the Diocese of Wellington included about 1000 native Christians, and homes and schools had been founded. The Maori mission flourished until 1860, the beginning of the racial war in which practically all the Catholic missions were destroyed. The work of the Marists, and the Mill Hill Fathers, who are gradually restoring the missions, is most promising.
Ecclesiastically the country is governed by the archdiocese of
Wellington
the dioceses of
Auckland
Christchurch
Dunedin
Hamilton
Palmerston North
and the
New Zealand Military Ordinariate
See also,
Catholic-Hiearchy.Org
World Fact Book
patron saints index
New Catholic Dictionary
Fuente: New Catholic Dictionary
New Zealand
New Zealand—formerly described as a colony—has, since September, 1907, by royal proclamation, been granted the style and designation of “Dominion,” the territory remaining, of course, as before under British sovereignty. It consists of three main islands (North Island, South Island, sometimes also called Middle island, and Stewart island) and several groups of smaller islands lying at some distance from the principal group. The smaller groups included within the dominion are the Chatham, Aukland, Campbell, Antipodes, Bounty, Kermadec, and Cook Islands, along with half a dozen atolls situated outside the Cook Group. The total area of the dominion—104,751 square miles—is about one-seventh less than the area of great Britain and Ireland. The quantity and quality of the grazing land available has made New Zealand a great wool, meat, and dairy-produce country. Its agricultural capabilities are very considerable; its forests yield excellent timber; and its mineral resources, though as yet but little developed and not very varied in character, form one of the country’s most valuable assets. Volcanoes, one of which, Ngauruhoe, the highest cone of Mount Tongariro, was in active eruption in 1909, and a volcanic belt marks the centre of the North Island. In the North island also is the wonderland of the boiling geysers—said by geologists to be the oldest in the world, with the exception of those in Wyoming and Idaho—and the famous “Hot Lakes” and pools, which possess great curative virtue for all rheumatic and skin diseases. An Alpine chain, studded with snow-clad peaks and mantled with glaciers of greater magnitude than any in the Alps of Europe, descends along the west coast of the South Island. In the South Island also are the famous Otago lakes (Wanaka, Wakatipu, Te Anau, and Manapouri) of which the late Anthony Trollope wrote, “I do not know that lake scenery could be finer.” The south-west coast of the island is pierced by a series of sounds or fiords, rivalling in their exquisite beauty the Norwegian and Alaskan fiords; in the neighbourhood is a waterfall (the Sutherland Falls) over 1900 feet in height, Judged by mortality statistics the climate of new Zealand is one of the best and healthiest in the world. The total population of the dominion on 31 December, 1908, was 1,020,713. This included the Maori population of 47,731, and the population of Cook and other Pacific islands, aggregating 12,340.
I. CIVIL HISTORY
Tasman discovered the islands in 1642 and called them “Nova Zeelanda,” but Captain Cook, who surveyed the coasts in 1769 and following years, first made them known. The colony was planted in 1840 by a company, formed in England and known first as the New Zealand Company, afterwards as the New Zealand Land Company, which with auxiliary associations founded successively the settlements of Wellington, Nelson, Taranaki, Otago, and Canterbury. New Zealand was then constituted a dependency of the Colony of New South Wales (Australia), but on 3 May, 1841, was proclaimed a separate colony. A series of native wars, arising chiefly from endless disputes about land, began in 1843 and ended in 1869, since which time unbroken peace has prevailed. A measure of self-government was granted in 1852, and full responsible government in 1856. The provincial governments created by the Constitution Act were abolished in 1876, and one supreme central government established. The Government consists of a governor, appointed by the crown, and two houses of Parliament—the legislative council, or upper chamber, with members nominated by the governor for life (except those nominated subsequently to September 17, 1891, after which date all appointments are for seven years only), and the house of representatives with members elected triennially on an adult suffrage. The first Speaker of the New Zealand House of Representatives (1853-60), the late Sire Charles Clifford, was a Catholic, and his son, Sir George Clifford, one of New Zealand’s prominent public men, though born in the dominion was educated at Stonyhurst College, and has shown his fidelity to old ties by naming his principal New Zealand residence “Stonyhurst.” There are a number of Catholic names in the list of past premiers, cabinet ministers, and members of parliament who have helped to mould the laws and shape the history of the dominion. The present premier (1910), the Right Hon. Sir Joseph Ward, P.C., K.C.M.G., is a Catholic, and out of a legislative council of forty-five members five are Catholic.
The prominent feature of the political history of the past twenty years has been the introduction and development of that body of “advanced” legislation for which the name of New Zealand has become more or less famous. The mere enumeration of the enactments would occupy considerable space. It must suffice to say that, broadly speaking, their purpose is to fling the shield of the State over every man who works for his livelihood; and, in addition to regulating wages, they cover practically every risk to life, limb, health, and interest of the industrial classes. It should be mentioned that there is no strong party of professed State-Socialists in the dominion, and the reforms and experiments which have been made have in all cases been examined and taken on their merits, and not otherwise. Employers have occasionally protested against some of the restrictions imposed, as being harassing and vexations; but there is no political party in the country which proposes to repeal these measures, and there is a general consensus of opinion that, in its main features, the “advanced legislation” has come to stay. In 1893 an Act came into force which granted the franchise to women. The women’s vote has had no perceptible effect on the relative position of political parties; but it is generally agreed that the women voters have been mainly responsible for the marked increase in recent years of the no-licence vote at the local option polls. Elections are quieter and more orderly than formerly.
II. THE MAORIS
The New Zealand natives, or Maoris, as they call themselves, are generally acknowledged to be intellectually and physically the finest aboriginal race in the South Sea Islands. Their magnificent courage, their high intelligence, their splendid physique and manly bearing, the stirring part they have played in the history of the country, the very ferocity of their long-relinquished habits, have all combined to invest them with a more than ordinary degree of interest and curiosity. Of their origin it can only be said, broadly, that they belong to the Polynesian race—ethnologists have tried to trace a likeness to the Red Indians of North America—and according to tradition they came to New Zealand about twenty-one generations ago (i.e., about five hundred and twenty-five years) from Hawaiki, an island of the Pacific not identified with any certainty. After being robbed and despoiled by the early white civilization and by trader-missionaries, tardy justice has at length been done to the native race. To-day the Maoris have four members in the house of representatives and two in the legislative council, all men of high lineage and natural orators. Until recent years it was supposed that the Maoris were dying out, but later statistics show the contrary. The official figures show that the Maori population fell from 41,93 in 1891 to 39,854 in 1896, increased to 43,143 in 1901, and further to 47,731 in 1906 (last census year).
III. THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN NEW ZEALAND
The first Catholic settler in New Zealand was an Irishman named Thomas Poynton, who landed at Hokianga in 1828. Until ten years later the footsteps of a Catholic priest never pressed New Zealand soil. Poynton’s brave and pious wife, a native of Wexford County, took her first two children on a journey of over two thousand weary miles of ocean to be baptized at Sydney. Through Poynton’s entreaties for a missionary the needs of the country became known, first at Sydney and next at Rome. In 1835 New Zealand was included in the newly created Vicariate Apostolic of Western Oceanica. In the following year its first vicar Apostolic, Mgr. Jean Baptiste Francois Pompallier, set out for his new field of labour with seven members of the Society of the Marist Brothers, which only a few months before had received the approval of Pope Gregory XVI. On 10 January, 1838, he, with three Marist companions, sailed up the Hokianga River, situated in the far north-west of the Auckland Province. The cross was planted in the house of the first Catholic settler of the colony. Irish peasant emigrants were the pioneers of Catholic colonization in New Zealand; the French missionaries were its pioneer apostles. Four years later (in 1842) New Zealand was formed into a separate vicariate, Mgr. Pompallier being named its first vicar Apostolic. From this time forward events moved at a rapid pace. In 1848 the colony was divided into two dioceses, Auckland with its territory extending to 39x of south latitude forming one diocese, Wellington with the remaining territory and the adjoining islands forming the second. (See AUCKLAND, DIOCESE OF.) Bishop Pompallier remained in charge of Auckland, and Bishop Viard, who had been constituted the first Bishop of Wellington. In 1869 the Diocese of Dunedin, comprising Otago, Southland, and Stewart’s Island, was carved out of the Diocese of Wellington, and the Right Rev. Patrick Moran who died in 1895 was appointed its first bishop. His successor (the present occupant of the see), the Right rev. Dr. Verdon, was consecrated in 1896. In 1887, at the petition of the Plenary Synod of Australasia, held in Sydney in 1885, the hierarchy was established in New Zealand, and Wellington became the archiepiscopal see. The Most Rev. Dr. Redwood, S.M., who had been consecrated Bishop of Wellington in 1874, was created archbishop and metropolitan by papal brief, receiving the pallium from the hands of the Right Rev. Dr. Luck, Bishop of Auckland. The same year (1887) witnessed the erection of the Diocese of Christchurch. The first and present bishop is the Right Rev. Dr. Grimes, S.M., consecrated in the same year. Ten years later New Zealand, hitherto dependent on Australia, was made a separate ecclesiastical province.
Some idea of the rapid growth of the Catholic population, both in numbers and in activity, may be gathered from the following figures. In 1840, when New Zealand was declared a colony, the number of Catholic colonists was not above 500 in a total population of some 5000. Eleven years later they numbered 3472 in a total population of 26,707. At the last Government census (1906) the Catholic total had amounted to 126,995. The total population of the dominion (exclusive of Maoris), according to the same census, was 888,578 so that the Catholic population is slightly over one-seventh of the whole. To-day (1910) the estimated Catholic population of New Zealand is over 130,000 with 4 dioceses, 1 archbishop, 3 suffragan bishops, 212 priests, 62 religious brothers, 855 nuns, 333 churches, 2 ecclesiastical seminaries (comprising 1 provincial ecclesiastical seminary and 1 ecclesiastical seminary for the Marist Order), 2 colleges for boys, 32 boarding and high schools, 18 superior day schools, 15 charitable institutions, and 112 Catholic primary schools. According to the “New Zealand Official Year-Book” for 1909 (a Government publication) the total number of Catholic schools in the dominion is 152 and the number of Catholic pupils attending is 12,650. New Zealand has added one new religious congregation (the Sisters of Our Lady of Compassion), founded in 1884 by Mother Mary Aubert, to “Heaven’s Army of Charity” in the Catholic Church. Under the direction of their venerable foundress the members of the order conduct schools for the Maoris at Hiruharama (Jerusalem) on the Wanganui River, a home for incurables, Wellington, and a home for incurable children, Island Bay, Wellington. The order has quite recently extended its operations to Auckland.
The ordinary organization of the laity, as usually found in English-speaking countries, are well and solidly established throughout the dominion. For benefit purposes New Zealand formed a separate district of the Hibernian Australasian Catholic benefit Society. Thanks to capable management, due to the fact that the society has drawn to its ranks the ablest and most representative of the laity, the organization is making remarkable progress. On 30 January, 1910, the membership was reported at 2632; the funeral fund stood at £7795:2:2 (nearly $40,000) and the sick fund amounted to £12,558:5:0 (over $62,000). The Society of St. Vincent de Paul was probably the earliest lay orgainzation established in new Zealand, a conferrence formed at Christchurch in July, 1867, by the Rev. Fr. Chasteagner, S.M., being the first founded in Australasia. In almost every parish there are young men’s clubs, social, literary, and athletic; in connection with these a federation has been formed under the name of the Federated Catholic Clubs of New Zealand. In 1909 a Newman Society, on the lines of the Oxford University Newman Society, but with wider and more directly practical objects, was inaugurated by the Catholic graduates and undergraduates of New Zealand University. As the number of university men amongst New Zealand Catholics is now very considerable, the new society promises to prove an important factor in the defence and propagation of the faith.
IV. MISSIONS TO THE MAORIS
From the outset, the conversion of the native race was set in the forefront of the Church’s work in this new land. When the Marist Fathers, having been withdrawn to the Diocese of Wellington, left the Diocese of Auckland in 1850, they had in that part of the North Island 5044 neophytes. In 1853 there were about a thousand native Christians in the Diocese of Wellington. Homes and schools for native children were founded by the Sisters of Mercy at Auckland and Wellington; and in 1857 the governor, Sir George Grey, in his official report to Parliament, gave high praise to the Catholic schools among the Maoris. Up until 1860 the Maori mission was most flourishing. Then came the long-drawn years of fierce racial warfare, during which the natives kept their territory closed against all white men; and the Catholic missions were almost completely ruined. They are being steadily built up once more by two bodies of earnest and devoted men, the Marist Fathers in the Archdiocese of Wellington and the Diocese of Christchurch, and the Mill Hill Fathers in the Diocese of Auckland. The progress made during the last twenty-five years may be gathered from the following summaries. (a) The Archdiocese of Wellington and Diocese of Christchurch (districts: Otaki, Hiruharama, Raetihi, Wairoa, and Okato) have about 40 stations and 19 churches, served by 7 priests. There are also 4 native schools; 1 highly efficient native high school, maintained by the Sisters of Our Lady of the Missions; and 1 orphanage, conducted by the Sisters of Our Lady of Compassion. The total number of Catholic Maoris is about 2000. Several very successful conventions of Maori tribes have been held in Otaki since 1903. At the last (held in June, 1909), which was attended by His Grace Archbishop Redwood, the institution of a Maori Catholic magazine was decided upon and has since been carried out. (b) The Diocese of Auckland (districts: Rotorua, headquarters of the provincial of the mission, Matata, Tauranga, Hokianga, Okaihau, Whangaroa, Wangarei, Dargaville, and Coromandel) has 57 stations and 22 churches, served by 16 priests, of whom 9 are wholly and 7 are partly engaged on the Maori mission. There are 4 native schools conducted by the Sisters of St. Joseph. The total number of catholic Maoris is about 4000. Throughout the three dioceses the Maori population is extremely scattered, and the missionaries have frequently to travel great distances. As the deleterious influence of Maori tohungaism (belief in wizards and “medicine-men”) is on the wane, and the rancorous feelings engendered by the war are now subsiding, the prospect in this distant outpost of the mission field is most hopeful and promising.
V. EDUCATION
Primary education is compulsory in New Zealand; and of every 100 persons in the dominion at the time of the census of 1906, 83.5 could read and write, 1.6 could read only, and 14.9 could neither read nor write. As mentioned above, New Zealand became a self-governing colony in 1852. Each province had its separate legislature and the control of education within its borders, and most of the provinces subsidized denominational schools. The provincial legislatures were abolished by the Acts of 1875-6, and one of the early measures (1877) of the centralized New Zealand Government was to abolish aid to denominational schools and to introduce the (so-called) national system known as “free, secular, and compulsory.” From that day to this the entire public school system of New Zealand has remained, legally, purely secular.
From the first Catholics have protested against the exclusion of Christian teaching from the schools; and they have refused, and continue to refuse (unless where forced by circumstances) to send their children to schools from which their religion is excluded. As in other countries, so here, Catholics have shown the sincerity of their protest by creating, at enormous and continual sacrifices, a great rival system of education under which some 13,000 Catholic children are nurtured into a full and wholesome development of the faculties that God has bestowed upon them. With scarcely an exception, Catholic primary schools follow precisely the same secular curriculum as that prescribed under the Education Act for the public schools; and they are every year inspected and examined, under precisely the same conditions as are the public schools, by the State inspectors. The cost of carrying on the public school system is not derived from any special rate or tax, but the amount is paid out of the Consolidated Fund, to which Catholics, as taxpayers, contribute their share. Catholics are thus subjected to a double impost: they have to bear the cost of building, equipping, and maintaining their own schools, and they are compelled also to contribute their quota of taxation for the maintenance of the public school system, of which, from conscientious motives, they cannot avail themselves. New Zealand Catholics have never asked or desired a grant for the religious education which is imparted in their schools. But hey have urged, and they continue to urge, their claim to a fair share of that taxation to which they themselves contribute, in return for the purely secular instruction which, in accordance with the Government programme, is given in the Catholic schools. Their standing protest against the injustice so long inflicted on them by the various governments of the country and their unyielding demand for a recognition of the right of Christian taxpayers to have their children educated in accordance with Christian principles, constitute what is known, par excellence, as “the education question” in New Zealand. It is unhappily necessary to add that of late years, for no very obvious or adequate reason, Catholic agitation on the subject has not been so active as it once was; and unless a forward movement is made, the prospects of success for the cause, on behalf of which such splendid battles have been fought and such heroic sacrifices have been endured, are exceedingly remote.
VI. LITERATURE AND CATHOLIC JOURNALISM
There is no New Zealand literature in the broad and general acceptation of the term. The usual reason assigned is that so young a country has not yet had time to evolve a literature of its own; but perhaps an equally important factor in producing and maintaining the existing condition of things is the smallness of the market for literary wares, in consequence of which New Zealand writers possessing exceptional talent inevitably gravitate towards Sydney or London. In general literature the one conspicuous name is that of Thomas Bracken, Irishman and Catholic, author of several volumes of poems, which have attained great popularity both in Australia and in New Zealand. Amongst scientific writers, notable catholic names are those of the late W. M. Maskell, formerly Registrar of New Zealand University, and the Very rev. Dr. Kennedy, S.M., B.A., D.D., F.R.A.S., present Rector of St. Patrick’s College, both of whom have made many valuable contributions to the pages of scientific journals and the proceedings of learned societies.
As usually happens in countries that are overwhelmingly Protestant, by far the greater portion of the purely Catholic literature that has been published in New Zealand is apologetic in character. “What True Free-masonry Is: Why it is condemned,” published in 1885 by the Rev. Thomas Keane, is a detailed and extremely effective treatment of the subject. “Disunion and Reunion,” by the Re. W. J. Madden, is a popular and ably written review of the course and causes of the Protestant Reformation. One of the most learned and certainly the most prolific of the contributors to Catholic literature in New Zealand was the Very Rev. T. LeMenant des Chesnais, S.M., recently deceased. His works include “Nonconformists and the Church”; “Out of the Maze”; “The Temuka Tournament” (a controversy); a volume on “Spiritism”; “The Church and the World”; etc. The last-named work, published only a few years before the venerable author’s death, was very favourably reviewed by English and American papers. A notable addition to the Catholic literature of the dominion has been the recent publication of three volumes from the pen of the editor of the “New Zealand Tablet,” the Rev. H. W. Cleary, D.D. These works, “Catholic Marriages,” an exposition and defence of the decree “Ne Temere,” “An Impeached Nation; Being a Study of Irish Outrages:” and “Secular versus Religious Education: A Discussion,” are thorough in the treatment of their respective subjects and possess value of a permanent character. A modest beginning has been made towards the compilation of a detailed history of the Catholic Church in the dominion by the publications, a few months ago, of “The Church in New Zealand: Memoirs of the early Days,” by J. J. Wilson.
The history of Catholic journalism in New Zealand is in effect the history of the “New Zealand Tablet,” founded by the late Bishop Moran in 1873, the Catholics of this country having followed the principle that it is better to be represented by one strong paper than to have a multiplicity of publications. From the first the paper has been fortunate in its editors. In the early days the work done by its revered founder, in his battle for Catholic rights, and by his valued lay assistant, Mr. J. F. Perrin, was of a solid character. The prestige and influence of the paper was still further enhanced by the Rev. Henry W. Cleary, D. D., who made the “New Zealand Tablet” a power in the land, and won the respect of all sections of the community not only for the Catholic paper but for the Catholic body which it represents. In February, 1910, Dr. Cleary was appointed Bishop of Auckland, and was consecrated on 21 August in Enniscorthy cathedral, Co. Wexford, Ireland. It is safe to say that there are few countries in the world in which, in proportion to size and population, the Catholic press has a higher status than in New Zealand.
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POMPALLIER, Early History of the Catholic Church in Oceania (E.T., Auckland, 1888); MORAN, History of the Catholic Church in Australasia (Sydney); Australasian Catholic Directory for 1910; WILSON, The Church in New Zealand: Memoirs of the Early Days (Dunedin, 1910); DILKE, Greater Britain (1885); DAVITT, Life and Progress in Australasia (London, 1898); REEVES, New Zealand (London, s.d.); JOSE, History of Australasis (Sydney, 1901); REEVES, The Long White Cloud (London, 1898): WRIGHT AND REEVES, New Zealand (London, 1908); New Zealand Official Year-Book for 1906 (last census year) and for 1909; DOUGLAS, The Dominion of New Zealand (London, 1909); HOCKEN, A Bibliography of the Literature Relating to New Zealand (Wellington, 1909), issued by the New Zealand Government—the most complete bibliography that has been published. It is no mere list of books, but gives a full account of each item, from TASMAN’s Journal of 1643 onwards, with explanatory notes, biographical information and criticism, synopsis of important periodicals, and a full index.
J.A. SCOTT Transcribed by Bernadette McNary-Zak
The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume XICopyright © 1911 by Robert Appleton CompanyOnline Edition Copyright © 2003 by K. KnightNihil Obstat, February 1, 1911. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., CensorImprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York
Fuente: Catholic Encyclopedia
New Zealand
is the name of a British colony in the South Pacific Ocean, which consists of three volcanic islands, and of a number of islets scattered around the coasts, having an area of about 106,000 square miles, with a coast-line measuring about 4000 miles, on the best-named account, and a population (in 1886) of 578,482 Europeans, besides 41,969 natives.
Soil, Climate, and Productions. Of the whole surface extent of New Zealand (nearly 70,000,000 acres, little short of the combined area of England and Wales, Scotland, and Ireland), one fourth is estimated to consist of dense forest tracts, one half of excellent soil, and the remainder of waste lands, scoriae-hills, and rugged mountain regions. The mountains are mostly clothed with evergreen forests of luxuriant growth, interspersed with fern-clad ranges, and occasionally with treeless, grassy plains. Extensive and rich valleys and sheltered dales abound in North Island; and in the east of South Island there are many expansive plains of rich meadowland, and nearly 40,000,000 acres are estimated to be more or less suitable for agriculture and cattle-breeding. The soil, although often clay, has in the volcanic districts more than a medium fertility; but the luxuriant and semi-tropical vegetation is perhaps as much due to excellence of climate as to richness of soil. Owing to the prevalence of light and easily worked soils, all agricultural processes are performed with unusual ease. The climate is one of the finest in the world. The country contains few physical sources of disease; the average temperature is remarkably even at all seasons of the year, and the atmosphere is continually agitated and freshened by winds that blow over an immense expanse of ocean. In North Island the mean annual temperature is 57; in South Island 52. The mean temperature of the hottest month at Auckland is 68, and at Otago 58; of the coldest month, 51 and 40. The air is very humid, and the fall of rain is greater than in England, but there are more dry days. All the native trees and plants are evergreens. Forests, shrubberies, and plains are clothed in green throughout the year, the results of which are that cattle, as a rule, browse on the herbage and shrubs of the open country all the year round, thus saving great expense to the cattle-breeder; and that the operations of reclaiming and cultivating land can be carried on at all seasons. The seasons in New Zealand are the reverse of ours: January is their hottest month, and June the coldest. The principal products of the soil are wheat, barley, oats, potatoes, and sown grass. Maize and beans and pease are also raised in great abundance, and any other vegetable, grain, grass, or fruit produced in the United States of America can be cultivated successfully in New Zealand. With the exception of a few harmless lizards, no animals that annoy or hurt are encountered by the invading European. The small species of rat is the only objectionable four-footed inhabitant of New Zealand. Hawks are numerous. Snakes are not to be found at all, nor do insects that worry or hurt abound. The pig, introduced by Cook, runs wild, and the red and fallow deer, the pheasant, partridge, quail, etc., and the common domestic animals introduced by colonists thrive well. The People, and their Customs and Religious Belief. The native inhabitants of New Zealand are the Maoris (which name signifies native, or indigenous), and, with the natives of Polynesia generally, they belong to the Malayan race. SEE MALAYS.
Though calling themselves indigenous, the Maoris have a tradition that their ancestors migrated to the present seat of the nation from the north-east the island of Hawaiki about 500 years ago. They came, the legend goes, in seven canoes, which had outriggers, to prevent foundering, and were called Amatiatia, being very different from those subsequently used by them, which were much simpler in construction, and named Wakka. The first of these canoes that touched at New Zealand was named Arawa, and this brought over the first settlers from whom the Maori are descended. If any faith is to be attached to this tradition, Hawaiki was, probably, the same as Hawaii, the principal of the Sandwich Islands, distant about 4000 miles north-east of New Zealand. Some, however, suppose that it may have been Savaii, one of the Samoan or Navigators’ Islands, a group not half that distance away. The tradition says nothing of any indigenous population found in New Zealand before the arrival of these immigrants. Many writers, however, incline to the belief that it was previously inhabited by a darker race, somewhat akin to the Papuas of New Guinea. SEE NEGRITOS.
Supposing that the two races, in process of time, intermingled, this might account, in some measure, for the differences apparent between the Maori and the Tahitians, Samoans, Sandwich Islanders, and other natives of the Pacific. But whether of pure or mixed race, all testimony combines in representing the Maori as a nation standing very high in the scale of humanity. The skin of the Maori is in general of an olive-brown color, but there are some in whom the shade is much lighter, while in others it is darker. In stature they almost equal Englishmen, and have a powerful muscular development. They have well- shaped, intellectual heads, and their features, when not tattooed night almost be taken for European. Few of them have beards or whiskers, it being an immemorial custom with them to pluck out the hair on the face with pipi shells. On the head, the majority have long black hair, with a slight wave in it; but with some it is of a reddish tinge, and some Maori again have the hair slightly frizzled. Their eyes are large, their lips thick, and their teeth, unlike those of most savage nations, are large and irregular. The women are of less stature than the men in proportion, and are in other respects inferior to them, perhaps from their marrying too young, and having to perform too much of the drudgery of life. Some of the women, however, are represented as being delicately molded, with long eyelashes, pleasing features, and a plaintive, pathetic voice, which makes them highly interesting. The whole nation is divided into seventeen families or clans; but though they originally kept strictly distinct, they have since the invasion of the whites intermingled freely, especially in the last twenty years. There seem to have existed such great distinctions among the several clans that the diifferences closely resemble the caste distinctions of India. Wars against each other were frequent, and cannibalism was freely practiced until within the last forty years. The system of taboo, or consecration of persons and things by the native priests as sacred and inviolate, so common to the Pacific isles, nowhere prevailed to a greater extent than in New Zealand when first opened to colonization. This was partly a religious and partly a political ordinance, and was so much respected that even in war times hostile tribes left unharmed all persons and things thus protected by the taboo of the opposite side. Tattooing was practiced, and was made a much more painful operation than in the other Pacific isles; it was performed with a hammer and saw-like chisel. The punctures were stained with vegetable dyes, and the patterns, which extended over the face, hips, thighs, etc., represented ornamental scrolls and figures, supposed to denote the rank of the individual wearing them. The women were but slightly tattooed, with a few lines on the lips, chin, and occasionally other parts of the body. The priests were the principal operators, and during the process ancient songs were sung, to encourage, divert the attention, and increase the patience of the sufferers. This tattooing was supposed to make the Maori youth both more terrible in the eves of his enemies and more acceptable in those of his mistress.
The wars of the Maori were formerly carried on with spears and clubs of various kinds, manufactured, as is the custom, according to ethnologists, among lowly civilized people, of stone and wood. Their most remarkable weapon was a spear of nephrite, which descended among the principal chiefs from father to son, and was regarded as a kind of scepter, and even a sacred object. It was called Merimeri, the fire of the gods, and was sometimes used for scalping prisoners. There are other weapons of nephrite in use among the Maori; they are much sought after, and very costly. The use of firearms is now, however, very general among the Maori, and that they are adroit marksmen has been made but too apparent in their contests with English troops.
The heathen religion of the New Zealanders was largely mythological; temples were wanting; superstition and sleight of hand, however, played an important part in their religious system, and the priest virtually ruled and had his own way in everything. Most pernicious practices were thus introduced and freely encouraged to strengthen and perpetuate priestly power. The New Zealanders worshipped various gods, apparently personifications of natural objects and powers, to whom they addressed prayers and offered sacrifices. Their divinities were spiritual and invisible; they had no idols. Many of the gods were deified men, ancestral chiefs of the tribe or nation by whom they were worshipped. They believed in a future state and in their own immortality. There were two distinct abodes for departed spirits, neither of which was a place of punishment, evil deeds being punished in this world by sickness and other personal misfortunes. Their priests were supposed to be in communication with their gods, and to express their wishes and commands. Sorcerers were thought to possess great power, and were held in peculiar dread. The moral code was adapted to various social conditions and circumstances. Among chiefs courage, liberality, command of temper, endurance of torture without complaint, revenge of injuries, and abstinence from insults to others, were regarded as virtues; among slaves, obedience to their masters and respect for the taboo; among married women, fidelity to their husbands. Their idea of Wiro, the evil spirit. was nearly akin to the scriptural idea of the evil one. Sickness, they supposed, was brought on by him, coming in the form of a lizard, and, entering the side, preyed on the vitals. Hence they made incantations over the sick, threatening to kill and eat their deity, or to burn him to a cinder, unless he should come out.
With the New Zealander superstition took the place of medical skill. When a person had a pain in the back, he would lie down and get another to jump over him and tread on him to remove the pain. A wound was bruised with a stone, and afterwards held over the smoke. In internal acute diseases the patient sent for a priest, lay down, and died. Dreams and omens were much regarded, and had great influence over their conduct. On important occasions, when several tribes were going to war, all oracle was consulted by setting up sticks to represent the different tribes, and watching the wind to see which way the sticks would fall, in order to determine which party would be victorious. But the person performing the ceremony, by a little juggling, could determine the question as he pleased. The belief in witchcraft, also, almost universally prevailed, and was productive of all the suspicion, cruelty, and injustice which generally accompany it among a barbarous and superstitious people. A ceremony, called iriii, or rohi, was performed by the priests upon infants before they were a month old, and consisted of a species of baptism, sometimes by sprinkling and sometimes by immersion. The Rev. W. Butler thus relates the ceremony in Newcomb’s Cyclopaedia of Missions, s.v.: When a child was born, it was wrapped in a coarse cloth and laid in a veranda to sleep; and in a few hours the mother pursued her ordinary work in the field. The child suffered much; and if its mother did not furnish it nourishment enough, it must perish. Large holes were slit in the ear, and a stick, half an inch in diameter, thrust through. When five days old the child was carried to a stream of water, and either dipped or sprinkled, and a name given to it; and a priest mumbled a prayer, the purport of which was said to be an address to some unknown spirit, praying that he may so influence the child that he may become cruel, brave, warlike, troublesome, adulterous, murderous, a liar, a thief, disobedient-in a word, guilty of every crime. After this small pebbles, about the size of a pig’s head, were thrust down its throat, to make its heart callous, hard, and incapable of pity. The ceremony was concluded with a feast.
Marriage among the New Zealanders, previous to the introduction of Christianity, did not involve any special religious cerermonies. Before marriage, girls not betrothed were permitted to indulge in promiscuous intercourse if they pleased, and the more lovers they had the more highly they were esteemed. Married women, however, were kept under strict restraint, and infidelity was punished severely, often with death. Polygamy was permitted, but was not common, and men could divorce their wives by simply turning them out of doors.
The houses of the better class were snug and warm, ornamented with carved wood. They were built of bulrushes, and lined with the leaves of palm-trees neatly plaited together. They were about sixteen by ten feet, and four or five feet long. The entrance was by a low sliding door, and there was one window, four by six inches, with a sliding shutter. Their houses were without furniture, and their cooking utensils a few stones. Their villages were scattered over a large plot of ground, without any order of arrangement. The language of the Maori, like the Polynesian languages generally, belongs to the Malay family, but it is by far the most complicated of them all. Its alphabet comprises only fourteen letters, viz. A, E, H, I, K, M, N, O, P, R, T, U, W, and Ng. Seven tolerably distinct dialects are spoken among them. The language is represented as rich and sonorous, well adapted for poetical expression, especially of the lyric kind. The Maori have an abundance of metrical proverbs, legends, and traditions, of which a collection has been made by Sir George Grey. They are also passionately attached to music and song.
History of the Country and its Civilization. New Zealand was discovered by Tasman in 1642, but only one hundred years later it was made generally known to Europeans by the repeated visits of Cook. He surveyed the coasts in 1770. At that time domestic animals, potatoes, and cereals were introduced. In the following decades the visits of Europeans to New Zealand multiplied; whalers especially frequented the country for provisions and shelter. Runaway sailors, escaped convicts from New South Wales, and adventurers of all kinds, formed a sort of colony at Kororarika at the opening of our century. About this time, too, individual Englishmen began to settle on the coasts and intermarry with the natives, and acquire land in right of their wives or of purchase. Missionary enterprise began in 1814 by the zealous Marsden (q.v.), under the auspices of the London Church Missionary Society, soon strengthened by three other laborers, and favored by various chiefs, who made grants of land to the missions.
The missionaries not only labored to convert the natives, but introduced improved culture among them, and did what they could to protect them from the injustice, fraud, and oppression of the Europeans who visited the islands or had acquired settlements. More effectually to secure this object, a British resident or consul was appointed in 1833, but without any authority. In the mean time a desultory colonization and the purchase of rights to land from the natives for a few hatchets or muskets were going on; and to put an end to this state of anarchy a lieutenant-governor was appointed, who, in 1840, concluded at Waitangi a treaty with the native chiefs, whereby the sovereignty of the islands was ceded to Britain, while the chiefs were guaranteed the full possession of their lands, forests, etc., so long as they desired to retain them: the right of pre-emption, however, was reserved for the crown, if they wished to alienate any portion. Thus New Zealand became a regular colony, the seat of government of which was fixed on the Bay of Waitemata, and called Auckland. The previous year an association, called the New Zealand Company, had made a pretended purchase of tracts amounting to a third of the whole islands, and for a dozen years most of the colonization of New Zealand was conducted under its auspices. The conduct of the company is considered to have been on the whole prejudicial to the prosperity of the colony; and after a long conflict with the government, they resigned, in 1852. all their claims which the government had never confirmed on condition of receiving 268,000 as compensation for their outlay. The unscrupulous way in which the company and others often took possession of lands which the natives believed themselves to have a right to, brought on, between 1843 and 1847, a series of perilous and bloody conflicts with those warlike tribes. But the result of this conflict was more gratifying than the most sanguine Christians had hoped for. An understanding was reached between native and colonizer, and cannibalism and superstition passed away, and in their stead the teachings of the Bible were made the ruling guide of the natives especially. One of the most desperate encounters was in 1863, when 15,000 soldiers, under English command, contended against 2000 natives, hiding and fighting behind ramparts.
Another struggle followed in 1864, and petty rebellions have been frequent, causing great expense and trouble to the colonists, and great demoralization among the converted natives. As they learned to hate the colonists they came to hate their religion, and invented one of their own, called How-howism, those who professed it being called How-hows. It was a most absurd mixture of their old superstitions with some Bible tenets, and a virtual return to heathenism. One Te Kooti made himself famous fighting with a handful of followers against the English from 1866 to 1872, when the pursuit of him was virtually abandoned. Since that time the natives have been more quiet, and the colonists seem more disposed to try the effect of kind treatment and conciliation. By the constitution of 1872 the natives were made voters, and eligible to office. Four of them have been recently elected members of the lower house of the Legislature. A noted European traveler, who has recently been among the Maori tribes near Lake Taupo, in the central district of Northern New Zealand, sends a very interesting account of the How-hows in that quarter. These, though maintaining an independent attitude towards the colonial government ever once the last war left them unsubdued, have not testified any readiness to join their co-religionists to the north on the Waikato in the outrages which have lately raised the fear of fresh hostilities. According to his report How-howism has toned down from its first bloodthirsty extravagances into a quiet and respectable sort of monotheism. The How-hows have agreed to reject the New Testament in its entirety, but they have accepted the Old, and from their native translations of it erected what is, in fact, a Judaism of their own. They have even dropped the observance of the Sunday to take up that of the Jewish Sabbath; and, in fact, in all things conform to Jewish practice so far as their knowledge enables them to go. At the headquarters of the tribe, the Ureweras, who have a great knowledge of Scripture, morning and evening services are invariably recited daily. The services consist chiefly in chanting in chorus verses of the Psalms, and conclude with short extemporaneous prayers by one of the chiefs.
To show the rapid growth of Christianity in these islands, we give the following table, exhibiting the number of communicants in the eastern district, from the year 1840, when the Church consisteld entirely of natives who came from the Bay of Islands, principally as teachers:
1840….. 29
1841 …. 133
1842….. 451
1843 ….675
1844….. 946
1845….. 1484
1846 …..1668
1847….. 1960
1848….. 2054
1849…. 2893
Here we have illustrated the fact, seen in almost all missionary history, that while during the first years of a mission the results are scarcely perceptible and the prospects discouraging, yet, when the Gospel fairly gets a lodgment in the minds of a people, however desperate their case might seem, its progress will be rapid and powerful. After twenty years’ labor in New Zealand the number of communicants reported was but 8, and they were all at one station; but here is an increase in ten years, in one district, from 29 to 2893!
Since the introduction of Christianity a great change has taken place. The natives have abandoned tattooing, and are now generally clothed like civilized men, and possess flocks, herds, furniture, houses, and cultivated lands. Cannibalism was crowded out, too, by Christianity, and, as Scherzer tells us, any allusion to this revolting practice is very painful to the New Zealander, as reminding him of his low position in the scale of nations. Every time we endeavored to make any inquiry of the natives respecting this custom they withdrew with an ashamed look. Infanticide also, which prevailed largely among them in their days of heathenism, is now universally abolished, and the same is the case with slavery and polygamy. One half of the Maori adults can read and write, and two thirds of them belong to Christian churches. They generally practice agriculture, but will not work very hard. They are good sailors and fishermen, and indeed more than a hundred coasting vessels of a good size are now the property of natives. But from various causes, especially from the introduction of new diseases, their numbers are rapidly diminishing. In 1872 the number of the aborigines, formerly computed at 100,000, was less than 40,000, nearly all in the North Island.
Education has been liberally provided for. chiefly by the Church organizations, and there are good schools in all the towns. In some provinces state aid is given to both national and denominational schools; in others only to the national. A university has been established at Dunedin, and high schools exist in many of the towns. In 1872 there were in all 397 schools, 602 teachers, and 22,180 pupils. Among the religious denominations the Church of England has always taken the lead, having sent out the first missionary to the natives, the Rev. Samuel Marsden, in 1814. The first bishop, the Rev. G. A. Selwyn, was appointed in 1841. At the fifth general synod of the English Episcopal Church in New Zealand, which met at Dunedin in the early part of 1871, encouraging reports were presented of the progress of religion throughout the colony. In addition to the parochial work carried on among the colonists, it was stated that the number of native clergymen in connection with that Church was 14, while about 1000 persons were reported as communicants. There are now six bishops of that Church in the islands. The support of the churches comes from home grants, lands set apart for Church purposes, and voluntary contributions. The Wesleyans commenced missions in 1819, and now have 77 chapels, and a larger number of adherents among the natives than any other denomination. In the three districts into which the islands are divided the number of principal stations or circuits is 32, in connection with which 43 ordained ministers are employed, with 2587 members under their pastoral care, and 5000 children in the Sabbath and day schools. Several other religious bodies have been organized and are flourishing. The province of Otago was settled by Scotch Presbyterians, and they are numerous in that part of the islands. In the South Island the North German Missionary Society has sustained missionaries, and accomplished much in Christianizing the natives of those parts. The Roman Catholics, who began their work in 1837 under bishop Pompallier, have bishops at Auckland, Dunedin, and Wellington. They have succeeded in gathering a large number of adherents among the colonists, and some also among the natives.
See Wakefield, Adventures in New Zealand (Lond. 1845, 2 vols. 12mo); Polack (J. S.), Manners and Customs of New Zealanders (Lond. 1840, 2 vols. 12mo); id. New Zealand (Lond. 1838, 2 vols. 12mo); Power, Sketches in New Zealand (Lond. 1849); Thomson, The Story of New Zealand (Lond. 1859); Swainson, New Zealand and its Colonization (Lond. 1859); Taylor, The Past and Present of New Zealand (1868) Hochstetter, Neu Seeland (Stuttgard, 1836; Engl. transl. London, 1868); Trollope, Australia and New Zealand (Lond. 1873); Grundemann, Missions-Atlas, pt. iii, No. 3; The Missionary Worll, p. 65, 200, 533; Chambers, Cyclop. s.v.; The Amer. Cyclop. s.v.; Littell’s Living Age, Nov. 20, 1852, art. iii; Blackwood’s Magazine, 1870, pt. i, p. 228 sq.; Brit. Quar. Rev. April, 1873, p. 28 sq.; Jan. 1873, p. 126.