CHAP. VI - THE TWO FLIES
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 July 2011
Summary
“As the Pakéha fly has driven out the Maori fly;
As the Pakéha grass has killed the Maori grass;
As the Pakéha rat has slain the Maori rat;
As the Pakéha clover has starved the Maori fern,
So will the Pakéha destroy the Maori.”
These are the mournful words of a well-known Maori song.
That the English daisy, the white clover, the common thistle, the camomile, the oat, should make their way rapidly in New Zealand, and put down the native plants, is in no way strange. If the Maori grasses that have till lately held undisturbed possession of the New Zealand soil, require for their nourishment the substances A, B, and C, while the English clover needs A, B, and D; from the nature of f things A and B will be the coarser earths or salts, existing in larger quantities, not easily losing vigour and nourishing force, and recruiting their energies from the decay of the very plant that feeds on them; but C and D will be the more ethereal, the more easily destroyed or wasted substances. The Maori grass, having sucked nearly the whole of C from the soil, is in a weakly state, when in conies the English plant, and, finding an abundant store of untouched D, thrives accordingly, and crushes down the Maori.
The positions of flies and grasses, of plants and insects, are, however, not the same.
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- Information
- Greater Britain , pp. 390 - 397Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2009First published in: 1868