the condition of the great body of the
population, except in so far as it affected, or was affected by, that of
the chiefs. Hence the impression they have taken up that theft in New
Zealand is looked upon as one of the worst of crimes, and always
punished with death. It is so, we have no doubt, when committed by one
of the common people upon any of the privileged class. In that case, the
mean and despised condition of the delinquent, as compared with that of
the person whose rights he has dared to invade, converts what might
otherwise have scarcely been deemed a transgression at all into
something little short of sacrilege. The thief is therefore knocked on
the head at once, or strung up on a gallows; for that, too, seems to be
one of the modes of public punishment for this species of crime in New
Zealand. This severity is demanded by the necessity which is felt for
upholding the social edifice in its integrity; and is also altogether in
keeping with the slight regard in which the lives of the lower orders
are universally held, and the love of bloodshed by which this ferocious
people is distinguished.

But when one "cookee," or common man, pilfers from another, it is quite
another matter. In this case, the act entirely wants those aggravations
which, in the estimation of a New Zealander, give it all its
criminality; and the parties, besides, are so insignificant, that the
notion of avenging any injury which the one may have suffered from the
other by the public execution of the offender would probably be deemed
in that country nearly as unreasonable as we should hold a proposal for
the application of such a scheme of government in correction of the
quarrels and other irregularities of the lower animals.

It need not, therefore, surprise us to be told, especially when we
consider also the trivial value of any articles of property they
possess, that thieving among the common people there is regarded, not as
a crime, but as an art, in which, as in other arts, the skilful and
dexterous practitioner deserves reward rather than punishment; nearly as
it was regarded among the Spartans, who punished the detected thief,
indeed, but not so much for his attempt as for his failure; or more
nearly still as it is said to have been among the ancient Egyptians, by
whom such acts were, in all cases, allowed to be perpetrated with
impunity.

This view will go far to explain various incidents which we find noticed
in the different acco