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fact that those men had been well treated there, and that they had considered the Austrians the
most generous people they had encountered. Archduke Maximilian’s gift of the Hokioi press was
also remembered and appreciated, and it had seemed to put Austria in the category of a Maori ally
(however unwitting) during the Waikato war. 208
The first point of interest is Te Rerehau’s journal, in which he emphasises the “great hospitality”
of the Austrian people, especially when it comes to dinner parties: “In this respect I would say
they are a very generous people; I thought they would be like the English who are not generous.
The warm-heartedness of this people is so very, very great.” 209 He continues:
They are a very fine people, the best we have encountered in European countries. How excellent
are their houses, their food and drink. There were many kindnesses in invitations to go to their
houses and have meals prepared for us. There is no rum-taking; we have not seen a single drunk
person on the roads, even though we have been living here a full nine months. Nor have we seen
any badly behaved person in this country. Indeed, Germany [German Confederation] is the finest
country in the world. 210
No doubt upon their return, these same messages of generosity and orderliness were spread
among the people of the Waikato at the same time as the British engaged in military actions with
the Taranaki tribes and the King Movement. 211
Furthermore, due to the newly acquired skills of Toetoe and Te Rerehau, who had worked
as apprentices in the State Printing House in Vienna under the mentorship of Herr Zimmerl, they
were gifted a printing press to bring back to New Zealand. This printing press was used to publish
Te Hokioi (e Rere Atu Na), a propagandist Kingite newspaper based in Ngaruawahia between
1861 and 1863 designed to spread Tawhiao’s word to his loyal subjects, which incorporated much
anti-British sentiment during the Waikato War and whose early issues appeared with the
statement “printed with the loving gift of the Emperor of Austria to the Maori people”. 212
208
King, Collector, 79; cf. Kolig, Umstrittene Würde, 82-85.
209
“Te Rerehau’s Journal”, in: Hogan, Bravo, Neu Zeeland, 21.
210
Ibid., 33.
211
According to King, Toetoe was said to have even organised a “royal guard” for King Tawhiao in imitation of the
Austrian Imperial Guard (King, Collector, 28). However, the “very smart young fellow” that John Elsdon Gorst
comes across serving as the general of the King’s guardroom at Hangatiki in 1862 is most certainly Te Rerehau
(Gorst, Maori King, 153f.; Hogan, Bravo, Neu Zeeland, 96).
212
King, Collector, 28n. So great was its anti-British standpoint that a rival press called Te Pihoihoi (Mokemoke) was
set up in February 1863 at Te Awamutu in order to spread the Governor’s views through the editorship of John Gorst,
the resident magistrate and civil commissioner to the Waikato (M. P. K. Sorrenson, “Gorst, John Eldon 1835 – 1916:
Lawyer, teacher, magistrate, civil commissioner, politician, writer”, in: DNZB 1, 154f.). Scherzer, meanwhile, was
dismayed to find the Austrian gift was being used in the King Country to encourage violence against the British:
“Den neuesten Nachrichten (Jänner 1864) aus Neuseeland zu Folge, sind die beiden Maori’s seit ihrer Rückkehr die
entschiedensten Gegner der Engländer und benützen die, ihnen zur Gründung eines friedlichen Erwerbes zum
Geschenk gemachten typographischen Utensilien, um fulminante Proklamationen zu drucken und zur Rache und
Vernichtung ihrer Feinde, der Engländer, aufzufordern!” (Scherzer, Reise (1864-66), II:371n). The last issue of Te
Hokioi was in fact printed in March 1863. No comment is made in the first German edition, but, interestingly, in the
271