Unpleasant as is the task, it is right that these dark pictures of mistakes and injustice should now and then be shown, if only to induce those whose duty brings them in contact with primitive races to remember that the rights of man belong to the coloured as well as to the white. It is not denied that the Maori treated their prisoners with consideration, and it is pitiful to learn that Mrs. Guard identified the chief who was the first to be slain as one who had behaved with unvarying kindness to her and to her children. Nor is there any doubt that the British disregarded every claim of justice and humanity. Not even common honesty was exhibited; for, although the prisoners were given up, the ransom agreed upon was refused. The one bright spot in the whole affair was the decision of a committee of the House of Commons, condemning the incident, and pointing out that, while the Maori had fulfilled their contract, the British had broken theirs. The committee might with propriety have said a good deal more in the opinion of those whose view was not that of the chief witness, Guard--shipmaster and ex-convict--that "a musket ball for every Maori was the best method of civilising the country." These various happenings, good and bad alike, showed that the wind blew towards Britain and British sovereignty. This was bound to come; and come it did at last through the agency of Kororareka of all places in the world! Things had been going from bad to worse in the "Cyprus of the South Sea," and its orgies, brawls and revellings had become the scandal of a community not easily scandalised. Law-breakers laughed at the law, and Kororareka at last became too bad even for the Kororarekans. The inhabitants of the better sort then drew up a set of rules and banded themselves together under the title of the "Kororarekan Association." The Association approached the Resident, as in duty bound; but when Mr. Busby would have none of them they resolved to act independently of him. The Association went trenchantly to work in quite an American spirit--tarring and feathering, riding obnoxious individuals out of the town on rails, and purging the place of its worst elements. The scared Resident portrayed it in such vivid colours that the Home Government took alarm, and came to the somewhat belated conclusion that it was time for Britain to assert the rights she had possessed by discovery since 1769, and by the recognition of Europe since the Peace of 1814. Another factor had meanwhile arisen which still further demonstrated the necessity for expedition on the part of the British Government.