NEW ZEALANt) 



Almost ihti whole area of good land in tlie middle island 

 was the subject of one proferjsed sale. An Australian 

 politician, Wentworth by name, "bought" ths island at 

 a single stroke from nine wandering Maoris, picked up on 

 the streets of Sydney, who had no right to sell any part of 

 the alleged "purchase." The "Wentworth Syndicate" 

 paid them a little over $i,ooo, or at the rate of about one 

 cent for each 200 acres of the area claimed. 



By 1840 it was estimated that, exclusive of this middle 



island claim and the claim of the New Zealand Company, 



which I shall refer to in a moment, 26,000,000 acres or 



more than a third of New Zealand had been acquired by 



the "land sharks," a large portion of it having been 



bought several tii^ies over from the Maoris by different 



purchasers. Including the Wentworth and New Zealand 



Company claims, the total purchases amounted to 82,000,- 



000 acres, or 16,000,000 more than there were in the whole 



country, including snow-capped mountains, glaciers and 



pumice plains. Some strong authority was clearly needed 



to deal with the conflict of titles, disputes with the natives 



and other evils growing out of this land monopoly. The 



New Zealand Company, under the leadership of Gibbon 



Wakefield and his brother, Col. Wakefield, were determined 



to settle New Zealand whether the British Government 



sanctioned it or not. In September, 1839, the Colonel 



made extensive land purchases for the Company, at least 



he thought he did, and the Company claimed twenty 



millions of acres north and south of Cook Strait in what 



are now the Wellington, Taranaki and Nelson Districts. 



Fifty-eight chiefs signed the deeds of sale, receiving a lot 



of muskets, powder, axes, blankets, pipes, tobacco, looking 



glasses, soap, shaving boxes, handkerchiefs, Jew's harps, 



calico, scissors and other goods amounting to §45,000. 



The Maoris probably knew the sale was a fraud, at any 



rate they had no right under Maori law or custom to 



alienate the heritage of the tribes. Very likely most of the 



