The chief had
grown old and sick, and he sat every day for two years on a fallen
puriri near the white man's pah, but he never entered it. His spear
was always sticking up beside him. He had a gun, but was never known
to use it. He was often humming some ditty about old times before
the white man brought guns and powder, but he spoke to no one. He
was pondering over the future of his tribe, but the problem was too
much for him. The white men were strong and were overrunning his
land. His last injunction to his warriors was, that they should
listen to the words of his Pakeha, and that they should be brave that
they might live.
When the British Government took possession of New Zealand without
paying for it, they established a Land Court to investigate the
titles to lands formerly bought from the natives, and it was decided
in most cases that a few axes and hoes were an insufficient price to
pay for the pick of the country; the purchases were swindles. Laming
had possession of three or four hundred acres, and to the surprise of
the Court it was found that he had paid a fair price for them, and
his title was allowed. Moreover, his knowledge of the language and
customs of the Maoris was found to be so useful that he was appointed
a Judge of the Land Court.
The men who laid the foundations of empire in the Great South Land
were men of action.
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