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A U'S TRA LA SI A ILL US TRA TED. 



them these causes alone, if there were no others, would be sufficient to account for 

 their decay. Add to all these the irregular warfare which has always been washed 

 along the outer fringe of our advancing settlement, and we need seek no further for 

 an explanation of the rapid extinction of the native race. The Colonial Governments 



and the various churches have 

 clone something for the mis- 

 erable remnants near our 

 centres of population, by the 

 establishment of stations 

 where they are housed, fed, 

 clothed and instructed. But 

 the natives do not flourish 





under these conditions, and their final 

 disappearance from the scene seems to 

 be only a question of time. 



Something has already been said, 

 about the Maori tribes, in dealing with 

 New Zealand. The people comprising 

 this fine race of men are deservedly 

 regarded as the most remarkable yet met 

 with, and they are acknowledged to pos- 

 sess in a singular degree some of the noblest traits of character that are to be found 

 among the native races of an)- part of the world. The Maoris are not aboriginal to New 

 Zealand, and some doubt still exists as to the actual cradle of the race. Many theories 

 have been ventilated on the subject, and perhaps the favourite is that which traces them 

 from the Samoan Group or, as their own traditions name the place of their origin, 



AIHIKIGINAL METHODS OK DISl'OSINC OK TI1K DK.AD. 



