148 THE PASTORAL AGE IN AUSTRALASIA 



some of the advocates of laissez-faire, he was resolute 

 to assert his OAvn rights, but less eager to defend the 

 rights of others. 



Wentworth's political career did not hinder him from 

 eagerly pursuing his own interests. Dr. Lang described 

 him as " one of the largest speculators in land and stock 

 in New South Wales." He was a wealthy land-owner 

 in AustraUa, but land-hunger is not easily sated, and, 

 shortly before the annexation of New Zealand, Went- 

 worth and other members of what we should now call 

 a syndicate concluded, \vith some nine Maori chiefs who 

 had lately visited Sydney for the purpose, a treaty, 

 duly signed and sealed, for the cession of the greater 

 part of the South Island of New Zealand ! According 

 to the veracious Dr. Lang, the syndicate bartered for 

 the twenty million acres thus easily acquired some 

 coarse blankets, some cheap English muskets, some kegs 

 of gunpowder, and other such articles. 



Such is the perverted account of the transaction sup- 

 plied by Dr. Lang's distorting imagination. The true 

 account of it varies considerabty. (1) Instead of 20 

 million acres in the South Island, only ten millions were 

 contracted for, together with 200,000 acres in the North 

 Island. (2) In place of Lang's burlesque purchase- 

 money (blankets, etc.) each of the (nine) Maori chiefs 

 was to be paid £200 and to receive life annuities of £100. 

 It was a bad transaction, but not quite so bad as Dr. 

 Lang misrepresented it. Truthfulness and exactitude 

 were not the fighting doctor's cardinal virtues. 



Happily for itself. New Zealand was then a political 

 dependency of New South Wales, and the government 

 of the Mother-colony was then, still more happily, in 

 the strong hands of Sir George Gipps. When the bill 

 for giving effect to this extraordinary transaction came 

 before the Legislative Council, the Governor-in-Chief 

 did not spare the ' bloated monopolist.' In scathing 

 language he reprobated the shameful bargain. If all 

 the corruption, he asserted, that had defiled England 

 since the expulsion of the Stuarts were gathered into 



