| pp.1-2 | Editorial prescribing the dress, living, cultivating and working standards and habits for Maori. Distinguishes between good and bad Pakeha, and between a Maori of bearing and one wearing ragged, worn blankets, with dirty hands and cheeks, singing ditties, distorting the countenance, and being insubordinate, rather than going to church and listening to a mentor. |
| Debates the practices of compelling Pakeha to buy land and transacting another group's land, of begging at the township's entrance, of theft, drunkenness, and insubordination. | |
| Reports on the archetype of the Pakeha farmer at Remuira [Remuera] who received more return from his crop than he would have from the sale of land, with an emphasis on the monetary return from harvesting wheat to buy cattle, sheep, or clothes for children, rather than from land sales to buy guns and powder. Requests the retention of some settlements for the benefit of future generations. | |
| pp.2-3 | Criticism of the burial of a Bible with a deceased person in a Maori burial ground. Argues that the Bible is for the living because the deceased who are with Jesus Christ do not need the words of the Bible, unless they had not adhered to the words of Christ. Explains the practice of the Pakeha to leave the Bible to the deceased's family as a keepsake, and cites the analogy of bequeathing a greenstone club. |
| Criticises burying the deceased's clothing and advises retaining the clothes to keep those who are alive warm, rather than begging the Pakeha for more clothes; blames the lack of appropriate clothing for the amount of sickness and death amongst Maori; describes the rituals for the dead as compassionate yet ignorant; prescribes concentrating on being compassionate to the living and the maintenance of clothing and fences; quotes Matthew 25:30-40, James 2:15,16. Refers to the Maori deceased travelling to Te Reinga and staying there to live in the traditional manner of eating, drinking, quarrelling, and fighting. Concludes that the attire that is worn by the living is not required by the spirit of the departed. | |
| p.4 | To the leaders of Tokerau and Hokianga |
| From [Governor] Robert Fitzroy. An address to the leaders of the North regarding the resistance at Pēwhairangi [Bay of Islands], as notification of a planned visit to present a flag to peaceful Maori, but questions the merit in this if dissidents still persist. Debates the effectiveness of some leaders in subduing the resistance of Pōmare, Kawiti and Tāmati Pukututu of Te Kawakawa or Mohi Tāwhai of Hokianga; refers to other uprisings in Pōneke [Wellington] and Taranaki; pledges not to retaliate against peaceful groups who remain sympathetic to the Governor. | |
| Requests the Kororāreka [Russell] District Court Judge to inform him of the names of the accused who stole Raihara's horses and destroyed the jail; indicates retribution if leaders do not aid in submitting these names. |