After having made so fine an exhibition of the choice spots of Zelania, Oseba commented upon the peculiar notions of the Outeroos regarding their visits to other lands. He said by the Outeroos’ measure, he himself had been the world’s greatest “discoverer,” for he had found and charted the whole outer surface. He had “discovered” China, Japan, Russia, and other countries; he had discovered Africa, America, Australia, and finally the “Paradise of Oliffa”—Zelania.
Many people on Oliffa did not care to be “discovered”—in fact, would rather not have been, and, among these, were not improbably, those fading Maoris of Zelania. The “discoverer” had been the bane of many a people—remember the color-line!
Oseba told his people that “Zelania was once discovered by Tasman in 1642, and that it was not discovered again for more than a hundred years, when Cook found it in 1769. Later, to the temporary joy and final regret of the Maoris, the French also ‘discovered’ the country, and soon some gentlemen from Sydney called, and in 1814 the ‘parsons’ found it, since which time the collections have been regular. I,” said he, “am Zelania’s last ‘discoverer,’ and my report shall be a modest one.
“In 1840 the Union Jack was permanently nailed up in queenly Auckland, Zelania being made a province of New South Wales, and the next year the country was erected into a colony, with a good billet for the favorite of a British Premier.
“In 1865 the capital was removed to Wellington, a very breezy city, with fine ‘sloping’ hills at no great distance from the water-front.
“As in other British colonies, government here meant liberty, and, as in all habitable countries liberty means progress, Zelania has had a full measure of prosperity, practically from the beginning.
“If,” proceeded Oseba, “the Outeroos ever evolve a generation of thinking men, the mystery of mysteries to them will be how a people as educated and business-like as the generation, who discovered and developed steam and electricity, and the modern commercial systems could be stupid enough to give away or sell to a few of the people the land upon—and from—which all the people must necessarily live. Further, it will be interesting to inquire by what course of reasoning the temporary custodians of the public domain arrived at a conclusion that they could rightfully alienate it, ignoring the will and the right of all who might come by the next train.
“As broad, as almost limitless, as is the meaning of supreme authority among the Outeroos, by no compromise with expediency, by no stretch of the imagination, can any human power consign the future generation to a madhouse, or to homelessness, or to a condition of serfdom under the heirs of the more fortunate few; but to grant the lands to a small number of persons is to pawn the cage in which the animals are eternally locked.