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A TALE OF THE GOOD OLD TIMES; 
ea 
meio LORY OF THE WAR IN. THE 
NORTH AGAINST THE CHIEF 
HEKE, IN THE YEAR 
1845. 
TOLD BY AN OLD CHIEF OF THE NGAPUHI TRIBE. 


BY A PAKEHA MAORI. 


WITH AN INTRODUCTION 


BY THE EARL OF PEMBROKE. 


LONDON: 
mecHARD BENTLEY AND SON, 
Publishers tn Ordinary to Her Wajestp the Queen, 
NEW BURLINGTON STREET. 
1884. 


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DEC.9 11895 


CONTENTS. 


. ZAYASNTRODUCTION 
Preface to the Crinindl Edition 
“> 


CuapTer I. 

Introductory—First .View of New Zealand—First Sight 
of the Natives, and First Sensations experienced by a mere 
Pakeha—A Maori Chief’s notions of trading in the Old Times 
The 


—A dissertation on “ Courage ”__A few words on Dress 


Chief’s Soliloguy—The Maori Cry of Welcome 


Cuapter II. 


The Market Price of a Pakeha—The value of a Pakeha “ as 
such””—Maori Hospitality in the Good Old Times—A Re- 
spectable Friend—Maori Mermaids—My Notions of the value 
- of Gold—How I got on Shore . : d F : 


CuarptTer III. 


A Wrestling Match—Beef against Melons—The Victor 
gains a loss—‘‘ Our Chief” —His Speech—His status in the 
Tribe—Death of “ Melons ”—Rumours of Peace and War— 
Getting the Pa in fighting order—My Friend the “ Relation 
Eater ”—Expectation and Preparation—Arrival of Doubtful 
Friends—Sham Fight—The “ Taki”—The War Dance— 
Another Example of Maori Hospitality—Crocodile’s Tears— 


£ 


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XNXiil 


14 


vi CONTENTS. 


Loose Notions about Heads—Tears of Blood—Brotherly Love— 
Capital Felony—Peace 


CuapTser IV. 
A Little affair of ‘ Flotsam and Jetsam ’’—Rebellion Crushed 
in the Bud—A Pakeha’s House Sacked—Maori Law—A 
Maori Lawsuit—Affairs thrown into Chancery - : 


CHaptTer V. 


Every Englishman’s House is his Castle—My Estate and 
Castle—How I purchased my Estate—Native Titles to Land, 
of what Nature—Value of Land in New Zealand—Land Com- 
missioners—The Triumphs of Eloquence—Magna Charta ° 


Cuartrer VI. 

How I kept House—Maori Freebooters—An Ugly Cus- 
tomer-——The “ Suaviter in Modo ”—A single Combat to amuse 
the Ladies—The true Maori Gentleman—Character of the 
Maori People ; ‘ ; : : ° 


Cuapter VII. 


Excitement caused by first Contact with Europeans—The 
Two Great Institutions of Maori Land—The Muru—The 
Tapu—Instances of Legal Robbery—Descriptions and Ex- 
amples of the Muru—Profit and Loss—Explanation of some of 
the Workings of the Law of Muru_ : ° : 

7 Cuaprer VIII. 

The Muru falling ito Disuse—Why—Examples of the 
T'apu—The Personal Tapu—Evading the Tapu—The Under- 
taker’s Tapu—How I got Tabooed—Frightful Difficulties— 
How I got out of them—The War Tapu—Maori War Cus- 


toms ° ° ° . . e e e e 


Cuaprer IX. 


The Tapu Tohunga—The Maori Oracle—Responses of the 
Oracle—Priesteraft ; . ; . . ‘ . 


Page 


24 


52 


60 


67 


81 


116 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER X. 


The Priest evokes a Spirit—The Consequences—A Maori 
Tragedy—The “ Tohunga” again 


CHAPTER XI. 


The Local Tapu—The Taniwha—The Battle on Motiti— 
Death of Tiki Whenua—Reflections—Brutus, Marcus Antonius, 
and Tiki Whenua—Suicide J : : : ; 


CuapTer XII. 


The Tapa— Instances of—The Storming of Mokoia — 
Pomare—Hongi Ika—Tareha—Honour amongst Thieves 


CuarTer XIII. 
“ My Rangatira ”—The respective Duties of the Pakeha and 
his Rangatira—Public Opinion—A “ Pakeha Kino’’—Descrip- 
tion of my Rangatira—His Exploits and Misadventures—His 


Moral Principles—Decline in the numbers of the Natives— | 


Proofs of former Large Population—Ancient Forts—Causes of 
Decrease 


CuarTeR XIV 


Trading in the Old Times—The Native Difficulty—Virtue 
its own Reward—Rule Britannia—Death of my Chief—His 
Dying Speech—Rescue—How the World goes Round . 


CHAPTER XV, 


Mana—Young New Zealand—The Law of England—“ Pop 
goes the weasel”—Right if we have Might—God save the 
Queen—Good Advice : 


History oF THE WAR IN THE Nortu or New ZEALAND 
AGAINST THE CureF HEKE : . A F 


129 


140 


165 


181 


INTRODUCTION. 


De ARAN the good old times of Conquest and 
3 Colonization (I like to be particular 
y}) about my dates and places), the civi- 
KSSH lized nations of the day followed a 
simple policy in regard to the savage races with 
whom they came in contact, which may be roughly 
described as going their own way, and punishing the 
natives if they didn’t conform to it, without troubling 
themselves much about what the aforesaid natives 
thought or felt on the subject. If they understood 
the meaning of it so much the better for them, if 
they did not it could not be helped. Holding them- 
selves to be morally and intellectually far superior 
to the savages, they maintained that it was the 
savage’s business to understand and conform to their 
notions, and not their business to regard the savage’s. 
As for giving savages the rights of civilized men it 
was seldom thought of; savages were to be treated 


as such. 
I do not exactly know when this sort of native 
policy was first practised, but I know that it has 
b 


x INTRODUCTION. 


lasted, with modifications, even to our day, and is to 
be seen in full working order in more than one part 
of the globe. 

And let me remark (pace the Philanthropists) that 
it is not always the unwisest or cruellest policy that 
can be followed, for this reason, that it is simple, 
consistent, and easily understood. The man or the 
nation that consistently follows its own path, turning 
aside for no consideration, soon becomes at least 
thoroughly known if not intelligently understood. 
And misconceptions and misunderstandings are the 
most fruitful of all causes of bloodshed between civi- 
lized and savage races. 

Let me confess, moreover, that there have been 
moments when I have felt certain carnal hankerings 
after that same old native policy. When, for instance, 
I had just left the French colony of New Caledonia, 
where amicable relations with the natives were pre- 
served, and the country made as safe as Italy from 
end to end by the simple expedient of regularly 
and invariably executing a certain number of natives 
for every white man that they disposed of, without 
much inquiry into the motives of the murderers; and 
had returned to New Zealand to hear of a most 
lively massacre at Poverty Bay, perpetrated by three 
hundred Maori gentlemen, very well up in their Old 
Testaments and extremely practical in the use of the 
New,’ who having satisfied the more pressing de- 


1 They made cartridges of them. These were the Hau Haus, 
a sect of Maories who, when the prestige of Christianity first 


? 


iv 


INTRODUCTION. xi 


mands of their appetite upon the field of their exploit, 
had shown the sacred light of civilization that was 
burning within them by potting the remainder of the 
corpses in tins snd sending them as presents to their 
friends in the country, and had then departed to the 
mountains, filled with the comfortable conviction that 
nothing worse than imprisonment would follow the 
improbable event of their capture, that after a year 
or two of most enjoyable skirmishing the matter 
would be allowed to drop, and that they would most 
of them go to their graves well-honoured and un- 
hung.’ 


began to wane in the native mind, abolished the New Testament, 
retained the Old, which was more to their taste, and by mixing 
with it a large quantity of their old heathenism, produced a 
religion entirely devoted theoretically and practically to plunder 
and blood. 

1 TI regret to say that the strict propriety (according to the 
received code of that day) with which the Poverty-Bay mas- 
sacre, and the fighting which followed it, were prosecuted on 
both sides, was marred by the scandalous behaviour of a settler 
whose name I forget; this man’s wife and child were mutilated, 
killed, &c., at the massacre; it was done in a most correct way, 
but somehow made him most unaccountably and unreasonably 
angry. He joined the expedition that was sent in pursuit of 
the murderers, and in one of the first engagements some dozen 
of them were made prisoners. At night he approached them, 
and, taking treacherous advantage of their guileless confidence, 
asked them if they had participated in the massacre, feast, &c. ; 
and they, never dreaming that they had anything to fear from 
the admission, innocently answered in the affirmative, whereon 
this monster, knowing well that the poor fellows would escape 
capital, or even very serious, punishment, on the grounds that 
they were prisoners of war, or had brown skins, or excellent 


xi INTRODUCTION. 


At moments like these I have had ideas on native 
policy that I dare not utter in the latitude of Exeter 
Hall, and the era of the nineteenth century. 

But when New Zealand was colonized the feeling 
of the English public was distinctly philanthropical 
towards native races (especially at a distance), and 
the old policy was thoroughly discarded, for one, in 
its general theory and intention at least, more en- 
lightened and more humane. Speaking broadly, I 
think one can see all through the chequered course 
of our Maori policy an earnest desire to treat the 
native as a man and a brother; to give him the 
status of a civilized man whenever it was possible to 


motives, or a deficient moral sense, or a defective education, 
deliberately shot the whole lot with his revolver, I need hardly 
mention that had this act been performed by a Maori upon 
white men by way of “utu” (revenge, payment) for some of 
his tribe that had been killed, it would have been quite ‘tiku” 
(correct, proper); but for a white man so to behave was scan- 
dalous. I forget what punishment was awarded him: let us 
hope he got what he deserved ; and may this story be a warn- 
ing to those who let their angry passions rise. 

The leader of the Hau Hau expedition was a ruffian called 
Te Kooti. The chief of the native contingent that joined in 
their pursuit was a Maori, of the old-fashioned sort, named 
Ropata. A friend of mine asked him one day what he thought 
would be done with Te Kooti if he were taken. ‘Oh, you'll 
make him a judge,” answered Ropata, coolly. ‘ What do you 
mean?” asked my friend. ‘ Well,” said Ropata, “the last 
two rebels you caught you made native assessors, and Te Kooti’s 
a much greater man than either of them; so I don’t see how 
you can do less than make him a judge. But you won't if I 
catch him,” he added, with a grin. : 


het a i lee 


INTRODUCTION. xiii 


do so; and when not possible to consider and make 
due allowance for the fact of his being uncivilized, 
and to guide and lead him towards civilization by 
just and generous treatment, and appeals to his moral 
and intellectual faculties. 

I do not wish to dwell upon the dangerous extra- 
vagances into which such a policy might and did 
occasionally run—such as letting off one native cut- 
throat by treating him as a civilized prisoner of war, 
and reprieving the next on the ground that he wasa 
poor untutored savage who knew no better, to the 
utter destruction and confusion of all sense of power, 
justice, and security—great as was the amount of 
mischief that they did, but will confine myself to 
what I believe was the main cause of the almost total 
failure of this noble and, in the main, plausible 
policy. . 

It is quite evident that to give it a chance of suc- 
cess it must have been founded on a _ thorough 
understanding of the native character. It is no use 
making signs to 2a man who cannot understand them, 
it is no use uttering the most lovely moral precepts 
in language that is sure to mislead him. It was in 
this first necessary step that I hold that we failed, 
with brilliant individual exceptions no doubt, who, 
however, only served to make the confusion worse 
with their gleams of light. 

Narrow-minded Enthusiasm, Ignorance, and Care- 
lessness all contributed their quota to the mischief, 
and their favourite blunder consisted in jumping at 
conclusions concerning native character from certain 


xiv INTRODUCTION. 


analogies with our own. It did not occur to many 
of us that actions. which marked the presence of 
certain qualities in the English character, might 
mark the presence of very different ones in the 
Maori, and vice versd, or that qualities which marked 
the presence of certain other qualities in the English- 
man might be very differently accompanied in the 
native; we did not realize the fact that the Maori 
reflected, argued, and acted in a way that was often 
as incomprehensible to us as our way was to him. 
When we observed a band of native converts sing- 
ing a hymn before advancing to battle we were filled 
with admiration at their piety, without perceiving 
that those deeper religious feelings which alone could 
have produced such a manifestation amongst Eng- 
lishmen were entirely absent... When Christianity 


1 The Maori notion of prayer reaches no higher than the 
thing we call an incantation. One day I was talking to the 
old Pakeha Maori (7.e. a white man who lives amongst the 
Maories) on the subject of missionary labour. At last he said, 
“ T’ll tell you a story that will establish your name for ever at 
Exeter Hall, only you musn’t tell it quite the same way that I 
do. I was here at the time when both the Protestant and 
Roman Catholic missionaries were first beginning to make their 
way in the country; and the Maories of my tribe used to come 
to me and ask me which had the greatest ‘mana’ (i.e. fortune, 
_ prestige, power, strength)—the Protestant God or the Romanist 
one. I was always a good Churchman, and used to tell them 
that the Protestant God could lick the other into fits. There 
was an old Irish sailor about five miles from me who used to 
back up the Roman Catholic God, but I had along start of him, 
and moreover was the best fighting man of the two, which went 


INTRODUCTION. XV 


spread through the tribes with amazing rapidity, we 
rejoiced over their capability for accepting the doc- 
trines of high and pure religion, never perceiving 


along way. Inashort time I had about two hundred of the 
most muscular, blood-thirsty, hard-fighting Protestants you 
could wish to see. 

“Well; it so happened that one day we had a little difference 
with some of our neighbours, and were drawn up on one side of 
a gully all ready to charge. I liked the fun of fighting in those 
days, and was rigged out in nothing but a cartridge-box and 
belt, with a2 plume of feathers in my hair, and a young woman 
to carry my ammunition for me; moreover, I had been put in 
command of the desperate young bloods of the tribe, and burned 
to distinguish myself, feeling the commander of the Old Guard 
_ at Waterloo quite an insignificant person in regard to myself in 
point of responsibility and honour. 

*‘ Lying down in the fern, we waited impatiently for the 
signal to charge ; had not we, on the last occasion worth speak- 
ing of, outrun our elders, and been nearly decimated in conse- 
quence? Shall it not be different now? See! there is the 
great war-chief, the commander of the ‘Taua,’ coming this way 
(he was a real ‘ toa’ of the old stamp, too seldom found among 
the degenerate Maories of the present day). Little cared he 
for the new faith that had sprung up in the last generation; 
his skill with the spear, and the incantations of his ‘ Tohungas’ 
(i.e. priests or magicians), had kept him safe through many a 
bitter tussle; his ‘mana’ was great. Straight to me he came 
and addressed me thus :—‘ Look here, young fellow! I’ve done 
the incantations and made it all square with my God; but you 
say that you’ve got a God stronger than mine, and a lot of our 
young fellows go with you; there’s nothing like having two 
Gods on our side, so you fellows do the proper business with 
him, and then we'll fight.” Could anything have been more 
practical and business-like than this? But I was quite stuck 
up; for though I could have repeated a prayer from the liturgy 


xvi INTRODUCTION. 


that they accepted it simply because they thought 
from our superiority in ships, arms, tools, and ma- 
terial prosperity in general, that the ‘‘ Mana” (ze., 
luck, power, prestige) of Christianity must be greater 
than that of their old superstition, and would be 
quite ready to leave it again when they found out 
this was a mistake, their minds being as void of the 
higher religious elements as those of many savages 
far below them in intellectual powers. When we 
heard of a native chief supplying his enemy with 
food or ammunition to enable him to carry on the 
war we were charmed with his generous chivalry, 
and immediately endowed him with all the virtues 
that usually accompany such behaviour in an Eng- 
lishman, blind to the fact that the chief simply liked 
fichting as we might like eating or sleeping, and 


myself, my worthy converts, who philosophically and rightly 
looked upon religion merely as a means to an end (¢.e. killing 
the greatest possible quantity of enemies), were unable to pro- 
duce a line of scripture amongst them. 

‘«¢ There was an awkward pause; our commander was furious. 
Suddenly one discovers that he has a hymn-book in his pocket. 
General exultation! ‘Now!’ cries the old chief, foaming at the 
mouth with excitement, ‘go down upon your knees (I know 
that’s the custom with your God) and repeat the charm after 
him. Mind you don’t make a mistake, now, for if one word is 
wrong, the whole thing will be turned topsy-turvy, and we 
shall be thrashed.’ 

« And then, having repeated one hymn word for word on our 
knees, I and my converts charged, and walked into the Amorites 
no end; but whether it was the hymn or the fighting that did 
it is of course an open question to this day.” 


INTRODUCTION. xvii 


furnished his enemy with arms and ammunition just 

as we might furnish one’s cook with money to buy 

meat with.* | 
By radical misconceptions, such as these, we 


1 Of the Maori’s passion for fighting for its own sake, with 
the chivalrous appearance that it somewhat misleadingly bore, I 
will give an instance. A certain chief had a missionary whom 
he desired to get rid of. Whether he was tired of his sermons, 
disliked his ritual, or what, I cannot say. However, he for- 
warded him on to another chief, with his compliments, as a 
present. Chief number two not being in need of a chaplain, having 
no living vacant, and having perhaps, too, a suspicion that the 
missionary was unsound in some respect from the careless way 
he was disposed of, declined him, and returned him uniried. 
Chief number one was insulted, and declared that if chief 
number two had not known his superiority in arms and ammuni- 
tion, he would not have dared to behave in such manner, When 
this came to the ears of number two, he divided his arms, &c., 
into two halves, and sent one to the enemy, with an invitation 
to war. 

A distinguished friend of mine in New Zealand once asked a 
Maori chief who had fought against us on the Waikato, why, 
when he had command of a certain road, he did not attack the 
ammunition and provision trains? ‘“ Why, you fool!” answered 
the Maori, much astonished, “If we had stolen their powder 
and food, how could they have fought ?”’ 

Sometimes two villages would get up a little war, and the 
inhabitants, after potting at each other all day, would come out 
of their ‘“‘ pas” in the evening and talk over their day’s sport in 
the most friendly manner. “I nearly bagged your brother 
to-day.” ‘Ah, but you should have seen how I made your old 
father-in-law skip!” and so on. After one or two had been 
really killed, they would become more in earnest. 

I have heard old Archdeacon , of Tauranga, relate how 
in one of these petty wars he has known the defenders of a 


XVlil INTRODUCTION. 


succeeded in creating in our imaginations an ideal 
Maori about as true to the life as a Fenimore Cooper 
Indian. And then we proceeded to impress the real 
Maori with moral lessons that he could not under- 
stand, and with practical examples that he inter- 
preted all wrong, to appeal to qualities and ideas 
that he did not possess, and ignore those that he did 
possess, till in spite of our patience and good- 
will we became puzzled by and disgusted with him, 
and he contemptuous of and utterly bewildered by 
us. I have heard several comments upon us and 
our policy from intelligent natives, none of them very 
flattering to our sagacity or consistency, but I will 
only give one which struck me as being a most strik- 
ing comment upon a policy that aimed at conciliation, 
forbearance, and patient improvement of the Maori. 
‘‘ You are a good people, but you have no fixed plan 
and no understanding either in matters of peace or 
war. No man can tell when you will fight or when 
you will give presents to buy peace, or at what 


pa send out to their adversaries to say they were short of 
provisions, who immediately sent them a supply to go on with. 
Also how he has performed service on Sunday between two 
belligerent pas, the inhabitants of which came out to pray, and 
met with the most perfect amity, returning to their pas when 
service was over, to recommence hostilities on Monday morning. 
The fact is, that they were, as the Pakeha Maori says, a race so 
demoralized by perpetual war that they had got to look instinc- 
tively upon fighting as the chief object in hfe. How difficult it 
was for the average Englishman to see this at first, and how 
misleading traits such as I have mentioned might be to hin, it 
is not hard to imagine. 


ie eee = 9 


— 


are cess eS 


INTRODUCTION. xix 


sudden moment you will stop doing one and begin 
the other. No man can tell your reasons nor the 
meaning of what you do.” This man had evidently 
caught some vague glimmerings of the meaning of 
our policy which only confused him the more. A 
little knowledge is a dangerous thing. 

From the faithful pictures of Maori character, 
ideas, and feelings contained in these two little 
books, the observant reader will easily perceive how 
mistakes and misconceptions as to what they were, 
and might become, and as to how they should be 
treated, sprang up in the English mind. It is true 
that the Maori question, with all its hopes and fears, 
has practically come to anend. The bubble of Maori 
civilization has burst, the idea, that seemed at one 
time not unlikely to become an actual fact, of a native 
race becoming truly Christianized and civilized, and 
prospering side by side with their white brothers, 
has gone where many a noble and well-fought-for 
idea has gone before. The true level of the Maori, 
intellectually and morally, has become tolerably well 
known; moreover, his numbers are diminishing year 
by year. 

But the English nation is, and I hope always will 
be, in contact with many nations of different blood 
and various forms and degrees of civilization, and as 
long as this is the case it cannot be too much im- 
pressed upon that extremely powerful and somewhat 
hasty and headstrong body, the British public, that 
human nature is not the same all over the world, 
that one man’s meat is another man’s poison, that 


xx INTRODUCTION. 


there is no code either of logic or of feeling or of 
morals universally accepted by humanity, that every 
difference in custom makes some difference in mind 3 
so that (if that public wishes, as I believe it does, to 
manage the races with whom England comes in con- 
tact, not so much by force as by intelligent and 
beneficial moral influence) the first thing to be done 
is to gain an unwarped, accurate, and thorough know- 
ledge of the customs, character, and opinions of the 
races in question. 

If these two little books should suggest to any 
careless Englishman that foreigners of dark com- 
plexion are not all like either those white men who 
seem to have got into brown or black skins by mis- 
take, whom one reads about in anti-slavery books 
and some missionary reports, or those equally tire- 
some black dummies whom one reads about in 
another sort of book who have no marked charac- 
teristic or intelligible custom except shooting spears 
and arrows at people for no apparent reason, I shall 
be glad to have introduced them to an English public ; 
and let me assure those who care more for amuse- 
ment than instruction that they will be amply repaid 
by their perusal. 

I hope the Pakeha Maori will pardon my imper- 
tinence in giving a personal sketch of him to his 
English readers on the plea that his writing would 
not be.complete without one. | 

He was, I believe, sixty years old when I first saw 
him, but, in spite of his age, looked the finest man 
for strength, activity, and grace I had ever seen. 


eT! 


INTRODUCTION. _XXi 


Six feet three in height and big in proportion, with a 
symmetry of shape that almost disguised his immense 
size, I felt I could well understand the stories I had 
heard of his popularity and his feats amongst the 
Maories, especially when I watched the keen, bright 
expression of his humorous Irish face. 

In manner and conversation he was the very oppo- 
site of what one would expect of a man who had 
lived since his boyhood among savages. With areal 
love, and a considerable knowledge of literature, a 
keen appreciation of all intellectual excellence, and 
a most delightful humour, I think I never came 
across so charming a talker as the man whom I may 
not inaptly christen the “ Lever ” of New Zealand. 


PEMBROKE. 


DEC 9 1895 


—t2_ Se OF 


LAV ep A Rif 
HE-ORIGINAL EDITION. 


°)O the English reader, and to most of 
~\ those who have arrived in New Zea- 


VY land within the last thirty years, it 


may be necessary to state that the 
descriptions of Maori life and manners of past 
times found in these sketches owe nothing to fic- 
tion. The different scenes and incidents are given 
exactly as they occurred, and all the persons de- 
scribed are real persons. 

Contact with the British settlers has of late 
years effected a marked and rapid change in the 
manners and mode of life of the natives, and the 
Maori of the present day are as unlike what they 
were when I first saw them as they are still un- 
like a civilised people or British subjects. 

The writer has therefore thought it might be 


XXiV PREFACE. 


worth while to place a few sketches of old Maori 
life on record before the remembrance of them 
has quite passed away; though in doing so he has 
by no means exhausted an interesting subject, and 
a more full and particular delineation of old Maori 


life, manners, and history has yet to be written. 


OLD NEW ZEALAND: 
A TALE OF THE GOOD 
OLD TIMES. 
BY A PAKEHA MAORI. 


“ Of Anthropophagi, and men whose heads 


_Do grow BETWEEN their shoulders.” 


wala 


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fi 
1 


CHAPTER I. 


Introductory.—First view of New Zealand.—First sight of the 
natives, and first sensations experienced by a mere Pakeha.— 
A Maori chief’s notions of trading in the old times.—A disser- 
tation on “courage.”—A few words on dress.—The chief’s 
soliloguy.—The Maori cry of welcome. 


H! those good old times, when first I 
came to New Zealand, we shall never 
see their like again. Since then the 
world seems to have gone wrong some- 
how. A dull sort of world this now. The very 
sun does not seem to me to shine as bright as it 
used. Pigs and potatoes have degenerated ; and 
everything seems ‘flat, stale, and unprofitable.” 
But those were the times !—the ‘‘ good old times ”— 
before Governors were invented, and law, and justice, 

and all that. When every one did as he liked,— 

except when his neighbours would not let him, (the 
more shame for them,)—when there were no taxes, 
or duties, or public works, or public to require them. 

Who cared then whether he owned a coat ?—or 
. 

B 


2 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


believed in shoes or stockings? The men were 
bigger and stouter in those days; and the women,— 
ah! Money was useless and might go a begging. 
A sovereign was of no use except to make a hole in 
and hang it in a child’s ear. The few I brought 
went that way, and I have seen them swapped for 
shillings, which were thought more becoming. What 
cared 1? A fish-hook was worth a dozen of them, 
and I had lots of fish-hooks. Little did I think in 
those days that I should ever see here towns and 
villages, banks and insurance offices, prime ministers 
and bishops; and hear sermons preached, and see. 
men hung, and all the other plagues of civilization. 
Iam a melancholy man. I feel somehow as if I had 
got older. Jam nouse in these dull times. I mope 
about in solitary places, exclaiming often, ‘‘ Oh ! 
where are those good old times?” and echo, or some 
young Maori whelp from the Three Kings, answers 
from behind a bush,—No HEA. 

I shall not state the year in which I first saw the 
mountains of New Zealand appear above the sea ; 
there is a false suspicion getting about that | am 
growing old. This must be looked down, so I will 
at present avoid dates. I always held a theory that 
time was of no account in New Zealand, and I do — 
believe I was right up to the time of the arrival of 
the first Governor. The natives hold this opinion 
still, especially those who are in debt: so I will just 
say it was in the good old times, long ago, that, from 
the deck of a small trading schooner in which I had 
taken my passage from somewhere, I first cast eyes 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 3 


on Maori land. It was Maori land then; but alas! 
what is it now? Success to you, O King of Waikato. 
May your mana never be less!—long may you hold 
at bay the demon of civilization, though fall at last I 
fear you must. Plutus with golden hoof is tramp- 
ling on your landmarks. He mocks the war-song; 
but should J see your fall, at least one Pakeha Maori 
shall raise the tang: ; and with flint and shell as of 
old shall the women lament you. 

Let me, however, leave these melancholy thoughts 
for a time, forget the present, take courage, and talk 
about the past. I have not got on shore yet; a 
thing I must accomplish as a necessary preliminary 
to looking about me, and telling what I saw. I do 
not understand the pakeha way of beginning a story 
in the middle; so to start fair, I must fairly get on 
shore, which, | am surprised to find, was easier to do 
than to describe. 

The little schooner neared the land, and as we 
came closer and closer, I began in a most unaccount- 
able manner to remember all the tales I had ever 
heard of people being baked in ovens, with cabbage 
and potato ‘“‘fixins.” I had before this had some 
considerable experience of ‘savages,’ but as they 
had no regular system of domestic cookery of the 
nature I have hinted at, and being, as I was in those 
days, a mere pakeha (a character I have since learned 
to despise), I felt, to say the least, rather curious as 
to the then existing demand on shore for butchers’ 
meat. 

The ship sailed on, and I went below and loaded 


4 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


my pistols; not that I expected at all to conquer the 
country with them, but somehow because I could not 
help it. We soon came to anchor in a fine harbour 
before the house of the very first settler who had 
ever entered it, and to this time he was the only one. 
He had, however, a few Europeans in his employ; 
and there was at some forty miles distance a sort of 
nest of English, Irish, Scotch, Dutch, French, and 
American runaways from South Sea whalers, with 
whom were also congregated certain other individuals 
of the pakeha race, whose manner of arrival in the 
country was not clearly accounted for, and to enquire 
into which was, as I found afterwards, considered 
extremely impolite, and a great breach of bienséance. 
They lived in a half savage state, or to speak cor- 
rectly, in a savage and-a-half state, being greater 
savages by far than the natives themselves. 

I must, however, turn back a little, for I perceive 
I am not on shore yet. 

The anchoring of a vessel of any size, large or 
small, in a port of New Zealand, in those days, was 
an event of no small importance; and, accordingly, 
from the deck we could see the shore crowded by 
several hundreds of natives, all in a great state of - 
excitement, shouting and running about, many with 
spears and clubs in their hands, and altogether 
looking to the inexperienced new-comer very much 
as if they were speculating on an immediate change 
of diet. I must say these at least were my impres- 
sions on seeing the mass of shouting, gesticulating, 
tattooed fellows, who were exhibiting before us, and 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 5 


who all seemed to be mad with excitement of some 
sort or other. Shortly after we came to anchor, a 
boat came off, in which was Mr. ——, the settler I 
have mentioned, and also the principal chief of the 
tribe of natives inhabiting this part of the country. 
Mr. gave me a hearty welcome to New Zealand, 
and also an invitation to his house, telling me I was 
welcome to make it my home for any unlimited time, 
till I had one of my own. The chief also—having 
made some enquiries first of the captain of the 


schooner, such as whether I was a rangatira, if I had 
plenty of taonga (goods) on board, and other par- 
ticulars; and having been answered by the captain 
in the most satisfactory manner,—came up to me 
and gave me a most sincere welcome. (I love sin- 
cerity.) He would have welcomed me, however, had 
I been as poor as Job, for pakehas were, in those 
days, at an enormous premium. Even Job, at the 
worst (a pakeha Job), might be supposed to have an 
old coat, or a spike nail, or a couple of iron hoops 
left on hand, and these were ‘‘ good trade” in the 
times I speak of; and under a process well under- 
stood at the time by my friend the chief, were sure 
to change hands soon after his becoming aware of 
their whereabouts. His idea of trade was this :— 
He took them, and never paid for them till he took 
something else of greater value, which, whatever it 
- might be, he never paid for till he made a third still 
heavier haul. He always paid just what he thought 
fit to give, and when he chose to withdraw his 
patronage from any pakeha who might be getting 


G OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


too knowing for him, and extend it to some newer 
arrival, he never paid for the last “ lot of trade;” 
but, to give ,him his due, he allowed his pakeha 
friends to make the best bargain they could with the 
rest of the tribe, with the exception of a few of his 
nearest relations, over whose interests he would 
watch. So, after all, the pakeha would make a living; 
but I have never heard of one of the old traders who 
got rich by trading with the natives: there were too 
many drawbacks of the nature I have mentioned, as 
well as others unnecessary to mention just yet, 
which prevented it. 

I positively vow and protest to you, gentle and 
patient reader, that if ever I get safe on shore, I will 
do my best to give you satisfaction; let me get once 
on shore, and I am all right: but unless I get my 
feet on terrd firma, how can I ever begin my tale of 
the good old times? As long as I am on board ship 
I am cramped and crippled, and a mere slave to 
Greenwich time, and can’t get on. Some people, I 
am aware, would make a dash at it, and manage the 
thing without the aid of boat, canoe, or life preserver ; 
but such people are, for the most part, dealers in 
fiction, which I am not: my story is a true story, 
not ‘‘ founded on fact,” but fact itself, and so I can- 
not manage to get on shore a moment sooner than 
circumstances will permit. It may be that I ought 
to have landed before this; but I must confess I 
don’t know any more about the right way to tell a 
story, than a native minister knows how to “ come” 
a war dance. I declare the mention of the war 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 7 


dance calls up a host of reminiscences, pleasurable 
and painful, exhilarating and depressing, in such a 
way as no one but a few, a very few, pakeha Maori, 
can understand. Thunder!—but no; let me get 
ashore; how can I dance on the water, or before I 
ever knew how? On shore I will get this time, I 
am determined, in spite of fate—so now for it. 

The boat of my friend Mr. —— being about to re- 
turn to the shore, leaving the chief and Mr. on 
board, and I seeing the thing had to be done, 
plucked up courage, and having secretly felt the 
priming of my pistols under my coat, got into the 
boat. 

I must here correct myself. I have said, “ plucked 
up courage,” but that is not exactly my meaning. 
The fact is, kind reader, if you have followed me 


thus far, you are about to be rewarded for your per- 
severance. I am determined to make you as wise as 
I am myself on at least one important subject, and 
that is not saying a little, let me inform you, as I 
can hardly suppose you have made the discovery for 
yourself on so short an acquaintance. Falstaff, who 
was a very clever fellow, and whose word cannot be 
doubted, says—‘t The better part of valour is dis- 
cretion.” Now, that being the case, what in the 
name of Achilles, Hector, and Colonel Gold (he, I 
mean Achilles, was a rank coward, who went about 
knocking people on the head, being himself next 
thing to invulnerable, and who could not be hurt till 
he turned his back to the enemy. There is a deep 
moral in this same story about Achilles which per- 


8 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


haps, by and bye, I may explain to you)—what, I 
say again, in the name of everything valorous, can 
the worser part of valour be, if “ discretion” be the 
better? The fact is, my dear sir, I don’t believe in 
courage at all, nor ever did; but there is something 
far better, which has carried me through many 
serious scrapes with écldt and safety; I mean the 
appearance of courage. If you have this you may 
drive the world before you. As for real courage, I 
do not believe there can be any such thing. A man 
who sees himself in danger of being killed by his 
enemy and is not in a precious fright, is simply not 
courageous but mad. The man who is not frightened 
because he cannot see the danger, is a person of 
weak mind—a fool—who ought to be locked up lest 
he walk into a well with eyes open; but the appear- 
ance of courage, or rather, as I deny the existence of 
the thing itself, that appearance which is thought to 
be courage, that is the thing will carry you through! 
—get you made K.C.B., Victoria Cross, and all that! 
Men by help of this quality do the most heroic 
actions, being all the time ready to die of mere 
fright, but keeping up a good countenance all the 
time. Here is the secret—pay attention, it is worth 
much money—if ever you get into any desperate 
battle or skirmish, and feel in such a state of mortal 
fear that you almost wish to be shot to get rid of it, 
just say to yourself—‘If I am _ so _ preciously 
frightened, what must the other fellow be?” The 
thought will refresh you; your own self-esteem will 
answer that of course the enemy is more frightened 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 9 


than you are, consequently, the nearer you feel to 
running away the more reason you have to stand. 
Look at the last gazette of the last victory, where 
thousands of men at one shilling per diem, minus 
certain very serious deductions, ‘‘ covered themselves 
with glory.” The thing is clear: the other fellows 
ran first, and that is all about it! My secret is a 
very good secret; but one must of course do the 
thing properly; no matter of what kind the danger 
is, you must look it boldly in the face and keep your 
wits about you, and the more frightened you get the 
more determined you must be—to keep up appear- 
ances—and half the danger is gone at once. So now, 
having corrected myself, as well as given some 
valuable advice, I shall start again for the shore by 
saying that I plucked up a very good appearance of 
courage and got on board the boat. 

For the honour and glory of the British nation, of 
which I considered myself in some degree a repre- 
sentative on this momentous occasion, I had dressed 
myself in one of my best suits. My frock coat was, 
I fancy, “ the thing ;” my waistcoat was the result of 
much and deep thought, in cut, colour, and material 
—lI may venture to affirm that the like had not been 
often seen in the southern hemisphere. My tailor 
has, as I hear, long since realized a fortune and re- 
tired, in consequence of the enlightenment he at dif- 
ferent times received from me on the great principles 
of, not clothing, but embellishing the human subject. 
My hat looked down criticism, and my whole turn- 
out such as I calculated would “ astonish the na- 


10 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


tives,” and cause awe and respect for myself indi- 
vidually and the British nation in general, of whom 
I thought fit to consider myself no bad sample. 
Here I will take occasion to remark that some atten- 
tion to ornament and elegance in the matter of dress 
is not only allowable but commendable. Man*is the 
only beast to whom a discretionary power has been 
left in this respect: why then should he not take a 
hint from nature, and endeavour to beautify his per- 
son? Peacocks and birds of paradise could no doubt 
live and get fat though all their feathers were the 
colour of a Quaker’s leggings, but see how they are 
ornamented! Nature has, one would say, exhausted 
herself in beautifying them. Look at the tiger and 
leopard! Could not they murder without their 
stripes and spots ?—but see how their coats are 
painted! Look at the flowers—at the whole universe 
—and you will see everywhere the ornamental com- 
bined with the useful. Look, then, to the cut and 
colour of your coat, and do not laugh at the Maori 
of past times, who, not being “seized” of a coat 
because he has never been able to seize one, carves 
and tattoos legs, arms, and face. 

The boat is, however, darting towards the shore, 
rapidly propelled by four stout natives. My friend 
—-— and the chief are on board. ‘The chief has got 
his eye on my double gun, which is hanging up in the 
cabin. He takes it down and examines it closely. 
He is a good judge of a gun. It is the best tupara 
he has ever seen, and his speculations run something 
very like this:—“ A good gun, a first-rate gun; I 


cures 


OLD NEW ZHALAND. 11 


must have this; I must tapw it before I leave the 
ship [here he pulls a piece of the fringe from his 
cloak and ties it round the stock of the gun, thereby 
rendering it impossible for me to sell, give away, or 
dispose of it in any way to anyone but himself]; I 
wonder what the pakeha will want for it! I will 
promise him as much flax or as many pigs as ever he 
likes for it. True, I have no flax just now, and am 
short of pigs, they were almost all killed at the last 
hahunga; but if he is in a hurry he can buy the flax 
or pigs from the people, which ought to satisfy him. 
Perhaps he would take a piece of land!—that would 
be famous. I would give him a piece quite close to 
the kainga, where I would always have him close to 
me; I hope he may take the land; then I should have 
two pakehas, him and All the inland chiefs 
would envy me. This is getting too knowing; 
he has taken to hiding his best goods of late, and sell- 
ing them before I knew he had them. It’s just the 
same as thieving, and I won’t stand it. Hesold three 
muskets the other day to the Ngatiwaki, and I did 
not know he had them, or I should have taken them. 
I could have paid for them some time or another. 
It was wrong, wrong, very wrong, to let that tribe 
have those muskets. He is not their pakeha; let 
them look for a pakeha for themselves. Those Ngati- 
waki are getting too many muskets—those three 
make sixty-four they have got besides two tupara. 
_ Certainly we have a great many more, and the Ngati- 
waki are our relations, but then there was Kohu, we 
killed, and Patu, we stole his wife. There is no say- 


12 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


ing what these Ngatiwaki may do if they should get 
plenty of muskets; they are game enough for any- 
thing. It was wrong to give them those muskets; 
wrong, wrong, wrong!” After-experience enabled 
me to tell just what the chief’s soliloquy was, as 
above. 

But all this time the boat is darting to the shore, 
and as the distance is only a couple of hundred yards, 
I can hardly understand how it is that I have not 
yet landed. The crew are pulling like mad, being 
impatient to show the tribe the prize they have made, 
—a regular pakeha rangatira as well as a rangatira 
pakeha (two very different things), who has lots of 
tomahawks, and fish-hooks, and blankets, and a tupara, 
and is even suspected to be the owner of a great many 
“nots” of gunpowder! ‘He is going to stop with 
the tribe, he is going to trade, he is going to be a 
pakeha for us.” These last conclusions were, how- 
ever, jumped at, the “ pakeha” not having then any 
notions of trade or commerce, and being only inclined 
to look about and amuse himself. The boat nears 
the shore, and now arises from a hundred voices the 
call of welcome,— Haere mai! haere mai! hoe mai! 
hoe mai! haere mat, e-te-pa-ke-ha, haere mai! mats, 
hands, and certain ragged petticoats put into requisi- 
tion for that occasion, all at the same time waving in 
the air in sign of welcome. Thena pause. Then, 
as the boat came nearer, another burst of haere maz! 
But unaccustomed as I was then to the Maori salute, 
I disliked the sound. There was a wailing melancholy 
cadence that did not strike me as being the appropriate. 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 13 


tone of welcome; and, as I was quite ignorant up to 
this time of my own importance, wealth, and general 
value as a pakeha, I began, as the boat closed in with 
the shore, to ask myself whether possibly this same 
“haere mat” might not be the Maori for ‘“‘dilly, dilly, 
come and be killed.” There was, however, no help 
for itnow; we were close to the shore, and so, putting 
on the most unconcerned countenance possible, I 
prepared to make my entrée into Maori land in a 
proper and dignified manner. 


CuaptTer IJ, }- 


The market price of a Pakeha,__The _ value of a Pakeha “as 
such.”—Maori hospitality in the good ol¢ 1 times.—A respectable 
friend.— Maori mermaids.—My notions Voe the value of gold.— 
How I got on shore. Pr 
BORE RE I must remark g that in those days 
the value of a pal ixeha to a tribe was 
enormous. For w want of pakehas to 
trade with, and fro; isn whom to procure 

gunpowder and muskets, many 1 lbribes or sections of 
tribes were about this time exterminated or nearly 
so by their more fortunate nj mighbours who got 
pakehas before them, and who _ Jéonsequently became 
armed with muskets “first. A }se pakeha trader was 
therefore of a value say about -¢ twenty times his own 
weight in muskets. This, a according to my notes 
made at the time, I find to h: 1-ve represented a value 
in New Zealand something ,petbout what we mean in 
England when we talk of 4 t the sum total of the 
national debt. A book-keet e. per, or a second-rate 
pakeha, not a trader, mighaotis be valued at say his 
weight in tomahawks; an w“asenormous sum also. ‘The 
poorest labouring pakeha, aeré;hough he might have no 
property, would earn som:.ewething—his value to the 


OLD NEW ZHALAND. 15 


chief and tribe with whom he lived might be esti- 
mated at say his weight in fish-hooks, or about a 
hundred thousand pounds or so; value estimated by 
eagerness to obtain the article. 

The value of a musket was not to be estimated to 
a native by just what he gave for it; he gave all he 
had, or could procure, and had he ten times as much 
to give he would have given it, if necessary, or if 
not, he would buy ten muskets instead of one. 
Muskets! muskets! muskets! nothing but muskets, 
was the first demand of the Maori; muskets and 
gunpowder at any cost. 

I do not, however, mean to affirm that pakehas 
were at this time valued “as such,”—like Mr. 
Pickwick’s silk stockings, which were very good 
and valuable stockings, “as stockings’’—not at 
all. A loose, straggling pakeha—a runaway from a 
ship for instance,—who had nothing, and was never 
likely to have anything, a vagrant straggler passing 
from place to place,—was not of much account even 
in those times. T'wo men of this description (run- 
away sailors) were hospitably entertained one night 
by a chief, a very particular friend of mine, who, to 
pay himself for his trouble and outlay, eat one of 
them next morning. Remember, my good reader, 
I don’t deal in fiction; my friend eat the pakeha 
sure enough, and killed him before he eat him, which 
was civil, for it was not always done. But then, 
certainly, the pakeha was a tutua, a nobody, a fellow 
not worth a spike nail; no one knew him; he had 
no relations, no goods, no expectations, no anything: 


18 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


beaver hat! Carry! He would lie down and make 
a bridge of his body, with pleasure, for him. Has 
he not half a shipful of taonga ? 

Well, having stepped in as dignified a manner as 
I knew how, from thwart to thwart, till I came to 
the bow of the boat, and having tightened on my hat 
and buttoned up my coat, I fairly mounted on the 
broad shoulders of my aboriginal friend. I felt at 
the time that the thing was a sort of failure—a come 
down; the position was not graceful, or in any way 
likely to suggest ideas of respect or awe, with my 
legs projecting a yard or so from under each arm of 
my bearer, holding on to his shoulders in the most 
painful, cramped, and awkward manner. To be 
sacked on shore thus, and delivered like a bag of 
goods thus, into the hands of the assembled multi- 
tude, did not strike me as a good first appearance on 
this stage. But little, indeed, can we tell in this 
world what one second may produce. Gentle reader, 
fair reader, patient reader! The fates have decreed 
it; the fiat has gone forth; on that man’s back I shall 
never land in New Zealand. Manifold are the doubts 
and fears which have yet to shake and agitate the 
hearts and minds of all my friends as to whether I 
shall ever land at all, or ever again feel terra jirma 
touch my longing foot. My bearer made one step; 
the rock is slippery; backwards he goes; back, back! 
The steep is near—is passed! down, down, we go! 
backwards and headlong to the depths below! 

The ebb tide is running like a sluice; in an instant 
we are forty yards off, and a fathom below the sur- 


OLD NEW ZHALAND. 19 


face; ten more fathoms are beneath us. The heels 
of my boots, my polished boots, point to the upper 
air—ay, point; but when, oh, when again, shall I 
salute thee, gentle air; when again, unchoked by the 
saline flood, cry Vent aura? When, indeed! for now 
I am wrong end uppermost, drifting away with the 
tide, and ballasted with heavy pistols, boots, tight 
clothes, and all the straps and strings of civilization. 
Oh, heavens! and oh earth! and oh ye little thieves 
of fishes who manage to live in the waters under 
the earth (a miserable sort of life you must have of 
it!) oh Maori sea nymphs! who, with yellow hair— 
yellow? egad—that’s odd enough, to say the least 
of it; however the Maori should come to give their 
sea nymphs or spirits yellow hair is curious. The 
Maori know nothing about yellow hair; their hair is 
black. About one in a hundred of them have a sort 
of dirty-brown hair; but even if there should be now 
and then a native with yellow hair, how is it that 
they have come to give this colour to the sea-sprites 
in particular?—who also “dance on the sands, and 
yet no footstep seen.” Now I confess I am rather 
puzzled and struck by the coincidence. I don’t 
believe Shakespeare ever was in New Zealand; Jason 
might, being a seafaring-man, and if he should have 
called in for wood and water, and happened to have 
the golden fleece by any accident on board, and by 
any chance put it on for a wig, why the thing would 
be accounted for at once. The world is mad now-a- 
days about gold, so no one cares a fig about what is 
called “ golden hair;” nuggets and dust have the 


18 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


beaver hat! Carry! He would lie down and make 
a bridge of his body, with pleasure, for him. Has 
he not half a shipful of taonga ? 

Well, having stepped in as dignified a manner as 
I knew how, from thwart to thwart, till I came to 
the bow of the boat, and having tightened on my hat 
and buttoned up my coat, I fairly mounted on the 
broad shoulders of my aboriginal friend. I felt at 
the time that the thing was a sort of failure—a come 
down; the position was not graceful, or in any way 
likely to suggest ideas of respect or awe, with my 
legs projecting a yard or so from under each arm of 
my bearer, holding on to his shoulders in the most 
painful, cramped, and awkward manner. To be 
sacked on shore thus, and delivered like a bag of 
goods thus, into the hands of the assembled multi- 
tude, did not strike me as a good first appearance on 
this stage. But little, indeed, can we tell in this 
world what one second may produce. Gentle reader, 
fair reader, patient reader! The fates have decreed 
it; the fiat has gone forth; on that man’s back I shall 
never land in New Zealand. Manifold are the doubts 
and fears which have yet to shake and agitate the 
hearts and minds of all my friends as to whether I 


shall ever land at all, or ever again feel terra jirmd — 


touch my longing foot. My bearer made one step; 
the rock is slippery; backwards he goes; back, back! 
The steep is near—is passed! down, down, we go! 
backwards and headlong to the depths below! 

The ebb tide is running like a sluice; in an instant 
we are forty yards off, and a fathom below the sur- 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 19 


face; ten more fathoms are beneath us. The heels 
of my boots, my polished boots, point to the upper 
air—ay, point; but when, oh, when again, shall I 
salute thee, gentle air; when again, unchoked by the 
saline flood, cry Vent aura? When, indeed! for now 
I am wrong end uppermost, drifting away with the 
tide, and ballasted with heavy pistols, boots, tight 
clothes, and all the straps and strings of civilization. 
Oh, heavens! and oh earth! and oh ye little thieves 
of fishes who manage to live in the waters under 
the earth (a miserable sort of life you must have of 
it!) oh Maori sea nymphs! who, with yellow hair— 
yellow? egad—that’s odd enough, to say the least 
of it; however the Maori should come to give their 
sea nymphs or spirits yellow hair is curious. The 
Maori know nothing about yellow hair; their hair is 
black. About one in a hundred of them have a sort 
of dirty-brown hair; but even if there should be now 
and then a native with yellow hair, how is it that 
they have come to give this colour to the sea-sprites 
in particular?—who also ‘dance on the sands, and 
yet no footstep seen.” Now I confess I am rather 
puzzled and struck by the coincidence. I don’t 
believe Shakespeare ever was in New Zealand; Jason 
might, being a seafaring-man, and if he should have 
called in for wood and water, and happened to have 
the golden fleece by any accident on board, and by 
any chance put it on for a wig, why the thing would 
be accounted for at once. The world is mad now-a- 
days about gold, so no one cares a fig about what is 
called “ golden hair;” nuggets and dust have the 


20 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


preference; but this is a grand mistake. Gold is no 
use, or very little, except in so far as this—that 
through the foolishness of human beings, one can 
purchase the necessaries and conveniences of life 
with it. Now, this being the case, if I have a chest 
full of gold (which I have not), I am no richer for it 
in fact until I have given it away in exchange for 
necessaries, comforts, and luxuries, which are, pro- 
perly speaking, riches or wealth; but it follows from 
this, that he who has given me this same riches or 
wealth for my gold, has become poor, and his only 
chance to set himself up again is to get rid of the 
gold as fast as he can, in exchange for the same sort 
and quantity of things, if he can get them, which is 
always doubtful. But here lies the gist of the mat- 
ter—how did I, in the first instance, become pos- 
sessed of my gold? If I bought it, and gave real 
wealth for it, beef, mutton, silk, tea, sugar, tobacco, 
ostrich feathers, leather breeches, and crinoline,— 
why, then, all I have done in parting with my gold, 
is merely to get them back again, and I am, con- 
sequently, no richer by the transaction; but if I steal 
my gold, then I am a clear gainer of the whole lot of 
valuables above mentioned. So, uponthe whole, I don’t 
see much use in getting gold honestly, and one must 
not steal it: digging it certainly is almost as good as 
stealing, if it is not too deep, which fully accounts 
for so many employing themselves in this way; but 
then the same amount of labour would raise no end 
of wheat and potatoes, beef and mutton: and all 
farmers, mathematicians, and algebraists will agree 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 21 


with me in this—that after any country is fully 
cultivated, all the gold_in.the world won't force it 
to grow one extra, turnip, Aad whatsmore can any 
one desire? SaSiow WIBRARMIth, McCulloch, and 
all the rest af thempmaey go anmpbe hajiged. The 


whole upshot 
b ponbly 


and golden hair @xhi 
the Colonial Treasurer,)is*this:—I would not give 


one of your golden locks, my dear, for all the gold, 
silver, pearls, diamonds, mere ponamus—stop, let me 
think,—a good mere ponamu would be a temptation. 
I had once a mere, a present from a Maori friend, the 
most beautiful thing of the kind ever seen. It was 
nearly as transparent as glass; in it there were beau- 
tiful marks like fern leaves, trees, fishes, and—I 
would not give much for a person who could not see 
almost anything in it. Never shall I cease to regret 
having parted with it. The Emperor of Brazil, I 
think, has it now; but he does not know the proper 
use of it. It went to the Minister many years ago. 
I did not sell it. I would have scorned to do that; 
but I did expect to be made knight of the golden 
pig knife, or elephant and watch box, or something 
of that nature: but here I am still, a mere pakeha 
Maori, and, as I recollect, in desperate danger of 
being drowned. 

Up we came at last, blowing and puffing like 
grampuses. With a glance I “recognised the situ- 
ation :”—we had drifted a long way from the landing 
place. My hat was dashing away before the land 
breeze towards the sea and had already made a good 


22 OLD NHW ZHALAND. 


“offing.” Three of the boat’s-crew had jumped over- 
board, had passed us a long distance, and were 
seemingly bound after the hat; the fourth man 
was pulling madly with one oar, and consequently 
making great progress in no very particular direc- 
tion. The whole tribe of natives had followed our 
drift along the shore, shouting and gesticulating, 
and some were launching a large canoe, evidently 
bent on saving the hat, on which all eyes were 
turned. As for the pakeha, it appears they must 
have thought it an insult to his understanding to 
suppose he could be drowned anywhere in sight 
of land. ‘‘ Did he not come from the sea?’ Was 
he not a fish? Was not the sea solid land to him? 
Did not his fire burn on the ocean? Had he not 
slept on the crests of the waves?” All this I heard 
afterwards; but at the time had I not been as much 
at home in the water as anything not amphibious 
could be, I should have been very little better than 
a gone pakeha. Here was a pretty wind up! I was 
going to “astonish the natives,” was 1?—with my 
black hat and my koti roa? But the villain is within 
a yard of me—the rascally cause of all my grief. 
The furies take possession of me! I dart upon him 
like a hungry shark! I have him! I have him 
under! Down, villain! down to the kraken and 
the whale, to the Taniwha cave!—down! down! 
down! As we sank I heard one grand roar of 
wild laughter from the shore—the word utw I heard 
roared by many voices, but did not then know its 
import. The pakeha was drowning the Maori for 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 23 


utu for himself, in case he should be drowned. No 
matter, if the Maori can’t hold his own, it’s fair play; 
and then, if the pakeha really does drown the Maori, 
has he not lots of taonga to be robbed of ?—no, not 
exactly to be robbed of, either; let us not use unne- 
cessarily bad language—we will say to be distrained 
upon. Crack! What do I hear? Down in the 
deep I felt a shock, and actually heard a sudden 
noise. Is it the “crack of doom?” No, it is my 
frock-coat gone at one split “from clue to earing ”— 
split down the back. Oh if my pistols would go off, 
a fiery and watery death shouldst thou die, Caliban. 
Egad! they have gone off—they are both gone to 
the bottom! My boots are getting heavy! Humane 
Society, ahoy! where is your boat-hook?—where is 
your bellows? Humane Society, ahoy! We are 
now drifting fast by a sandy point, after which 
there will be no chance of landing—the tide will 
take us right out to sea. My friend is very hard 
to drown—must finish him some other time. We 
both swim for the point, and land; and this is how 
I got ashore on Maori land. 


CHAPTER III. 


A wrestling match.—Beef against melons.—The victor gains 
a loss.—‘“ Our chief.” —His speech.—His status in the tribe.— 
Death of ‘‘ Melons.”—Rumours of peace and war.—Getting the 
Pa in fighting order.—My friend the “ relation eater.””—Expecta- 
tion and preparation.—Arrival of doubtful friends.—Sham fight. 
—The “taki.”—The war dance.—Another example of Maori 
hospitality.—Crocodile’s tears.—Loose notions about heads.— 
Tears of blood.—Brotherly love.—Capital felony.—Peace. 


SOMETHING between a cheer, a scream, 
and a roar, greet our arrival on the 
. sand. An English voice salutes me 
with ‘ Well, you served that fellow 
out.” One half of my coat hangs from my right 
elbow, the other from my left; a small shred of the 
collar is still around my neck. My hai, alas! my 
hat is gone. I am surrounded by a dense mob of 
natives, laughing, shouting, and gesticulating in the 
most grotesque manner. Three Englishmen are 
also in the crowd—they seem greatly amused at 
something, and offer repeated welcomes. At this 
moment up comes my salt-water acquaintance, elbow- 
ing his way through the crowd; there is a strange 
serio-comic expression of anger in his face; he stoops, 
makes horrid grimaces, quivering at the same time his 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 25 


left hand and arm about in a most extraordinary 
manner, and striking the thick part of his left arm 
with the palm of his right hand. ‘“ Hu!” says he, 
“hu! hu!” ‘What canhe mean?” saidI. “ He is 
challenging you to wrestle,” cried one of the English- 
men; “he wants wtu.” ‘What is utu?” said I. 
“Payment.” “I won't pay him.” ‘Oh, that’s not 
it, he wants to take it out of you wrestling.” ‘Oh, 
I see; here’s at him; pull off my coat and boots; 
I'll wrestle him; his foot is in his own country, and 
his name is—what?” “Sir, his name in English 
means ‘An eater of melons;’ he is a good wrestler ; 
you must mind.” ‘ Water-melons, I suppose; beef 
against melons for ever, hurrah! here’s at him.” 
Here the natives began to run between us to separate 
us, but seeing that I was in the humour to “ have it 
out,” and that neither self or friend were actually out 
of temper, and no doubt expecting to see the pakeha 
floored, they stood to one side and made aring. A 
wrestler soon recognises another, and my friend soon 
gave me some hints that showed me I had some 
work before me. I was a youngster in those days, 
all bone and sinew, full of animal spirits, and as 
tough as leather. A couple of desperate main 
strength efforts soon convinced us both that science 
or endurance must decide the contest. My antago- 
nist was a strapping fellow of about five-and-twenty, 
tremendously strong, and much heavier than me. 
I, however, in those days actually could not be 
fatigued; I did not know the sensation, and could 
run from morning till night. I therefore trusted to 


26 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


wearing him out, and avoiding his ta and wir. All 
this time the mob were shouting encouragement to 
one or other of us. Such a row never was seen. | 
soon perceived I had a “party.” ‘Well done, 
pakeha!” ‘Now for it, Melons!” “At him 
again!” ‘Take care, the pakeha is a tanwwha; the 
pakeha is a tino tangata!” ‘‘ Hooray!” (from the 
British element). ‘The Pakeha is down!” “No 
he isn’t!” (from English side). Here I saw my 
friend’s knees beginning to tremble. I made a great 
effort, administered my favourite remedy, and there 
lay the “‘ Eater of melons” prone upon the sand. | 
stood a victor; and like many other conquerors, a 
very great loser. There I stood, minus hat, coat, 
and pistols, wet and mauled, and transformed very 
considerably for the worse since I left the ship. 
When my antagonist fell, the natives gave a great 
shout of triumph, and congratulated me in their own 
way with the greatest goodwill. I could see I had 
got their good opinion, though I scarcely could 
understand how. After sitting on the sand some 
time my friend arose, and with a very graceful 
movement, and a smile of good nature on his dusky 
countenance, he held out his hand and said in 
English, ‘“‘ How do you do ?” 

I was much pleased at this; the natives had given 
me fair play, and my antagonist, though defeated 
both by sea and land, offered me his hand, and wel- 
comed me to the shore with his whole stock of 
English—“ How do you do?” 

But the row is not half over yet. Here comes the 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 27 


chief in the ship’s boat. The other is miles off with 
its one man crew still pulling no one knows, or at all 
cares, where. Some one has been off in a canoe and 
told the chief that ‘‘ Melons” and the ‘‘ New Pakeha”’ 
were fighting like mad on the beach. Here he comes, 
flourishing his mere ponamu. He is a tall, stout fel- 
low, in the prime of life, black with tattooing, and 
splendidly dressed, according to the splendour of 
those days. He has on avery good blue jacket, no 
shirt or waistcoat, a pair of duck trousers, and a red 
sash round his waist; no hat or shoes, these being as 
yet things beyond a chief’s ambition. The jacket 
was the only one in the tribe; and amongst the sur- 
rounding company I saw only one other pair of 
trousers, and it had a large hole at each knee, but 
this was not considered to detract at all from its 
value. The chief jumps ashore; he begins his ora- 
tion, or rather to “blow up” all and sundry the 
tribe in general, and poor ‘‘ Melons” in particular. 
He is really vexed, and wishes to appear to me more 
vexed than he really is. He runs, gesticulating and 
flourishing his mere, about ten steps in one direction, 
in the course of which ten steps he delivers a sen- 
tence; he then turns and runs back the same distance, 
giving vent to his wrath in another sentence, and so 
back and forward, forward and back, till he has ex- 
hausted the subject and tired his legs. The English- 
men were beside me and gave a running translation 
of what he said. ‘“ Pretty work this,’ he began, 
* good work; killing my pakeha; look at him! (Here 
a flourish in my direction with the mere.) I won’t 


28 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


stand this; not at all! not at all! not at all! (The 
last sentence took three jumps, a step, and a turn- 
round, to keep correct time.) Who killed the 
pakeha? It was Melons. You are a nice man, are 
you not? (This witha sneer.) Killing my pakeha! 
(In a voice like thunder, and rushing savagely, mere 
in hand, at poor Melons, but turning exactly at the 
end of the ten steps and coming back again.) It will 
be heard of all over the country; we shall be called 
the ‘ pakeha killers;’ I shall be sick with shame; the 
pakeha will run away, and take all his taonga along 
with him. What if you had killed him dead, or 
broken his bones? his relations would be coming 
across the sea for utw. (Great sensation, and I try 
to look as though I would say ‘ of course they would.’) 
What did I build this pa close to the sea for ?—was 
it not to trade with the pakehas?—and here you are 
killing the second that has come to stop with me. 
(Here poor Melons burst out crying like an infant.) 
Where is the hat?—-where the kot: roa 2?—where the 
shoes?—(Boots were shoes in those days.) The 
pakeha is robbed; he is murdered! (Here a howl 
from Melons, and I go over and sit down by him, 
clap him on the bare back, and shake his hand.) 
Look at that—the pakeha does not bear malice; I 
would kill you if he asked me; you are a bad 
people, killers of pakehas; be off with you, the whole 
of you, away!” This command was instantly obeyed 
by all the women, boys, and slaves. Melons also, 
being in disgrace, disappeared; but I observed that 
‘‘ the whole of you” did not seem to be understood 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. ao 


as including the stout, able-bodied, tattooed part of 
the population, the strength of the tribe—the warriors, 
in fact, many of whom counted themselves to be very 
much about as good as the chief. They were his 
nearest relations, without whose support he could do 
nothing, and were entirely beyond his control. 

I found afterwards that it was only during actual 
war that this chief was perfectly absolute, which 
arose from the confidence the tribe had in him, both 
as a general and a fighting man, and the obvious 
necessity that in war implicit obedience be given to 
one head. I have, however, observed in other tribes, 
that in war they would elect a chief for the occasion, 
a war chief, and have been surprised to see the 
obedience they gave him, even when his conduct was 
very open to criticism. I say with surprise, for the 
natives are so self-possessed, opinionated, and repub- 
lican, that the chiefs have at ordinary times but little 
control over them, except in very rare cases, where 
the chief happens to possess a singular vigour of 
character, or some other unusual advantage, to enable 
him to keep them under. 

I will mention here that my first antagonist, ‘‘ The 
Eater of Melons,’ became a great friend of mine. 
He was my right-hand man and manager when I set 
up house on my own account, and did me many 
friendly services in the course of my acquaintance 
with him. He came to an unfortunate end some 
years later. The tribe were getting ready for a war 
expedition; poor Melons was filling cartridges from a 
fifty-pound barrel of gunpowder, pouring the gun- 


30 OLD NHW ZEALAND. 


powder into the cartridges with his hand, and smok- 
ing his pipe at the time, as I have seen the natives 
doing fifty times since. A spark fell into the cask, 
and it is scarcely necessary to say that my poor 
friend was roasted alive in a second. I have known 
three other accidents of the same kind, from smoking 
whilst fillmg cartridges. In one of these accidents 
three lives were lost, and many injured; and I really 
do believe that the certainty of death will not prevent 
some of the natives from smoking for more than a 
given time. I have often seen infants refuse the 
mother’s breast, and cry for the pipe till it was given 
them; and dying natives often ask for a pipe, and 
die smoking. I can clearly perceive that the young 
men of the present day are neither so tall, or stout, 
or strong as men of the same age were when I first 
came to the country; and I believe that this smoking 
from their infancy is one of the chief causes of this 
decrease in strength and stature. 

I am landed at last, certainly; but I am tattered 
and wet, and in a most deplorable plight: so to make 
my story short, for I see, if | am too particular, I 
shall never come to the end of it, I returned to the 


ship, put myself to rights, and came on shore next 


day with all my taonga, to the great delight of the 
chief and tribe. My hospitable entertainer, Mr. ——, 
found room for my possessions in his store, and a 
room for myself in his house; and so now I am 
fairly housed we shall see what will come of it. 

I have now all New Zealand before me to caper 
about in; so I shall do as I like, and please myself. 


7 y 
a a 


OLD NEW ZLALAND. 31 


I shall keep to neither rule, rhyme, or reason, but 
just write what comes uppermost to my recollection 
of the good old days. Many matters which seemed 
odd enough to me at first, have long appeared such 
mere matters of course, that I am likely to pass 
them over without notice. I shall, however, give 
some of the more striking features of those delec- 
table days, now, alas! passed and gone. Some short 
time after this, news came that a grand war expedi- 
tion, which had been absent nearly two years at the 
South, had returned. This party were about a 
thousand strong, being composed of two parties of 
about five hundred men each, from two different 
tribes, who had joined their force for the purpose of 
the expedition. The tribe with which Mr. —— and 
myself were staying, had not sent any men on this 
war party; but, I suppose to keep their hands in, 
had attacked one of the two tribes who had, and who 
were, consequently, much weakened by the absence 
of so many of their best men. It, however, turned 
out that after a battle—the ferocity of which has 
seldom been equalled in any country but this—our 
friends were defeated with a dreadful loss, having 
inflicted almost as great on the enemy. Peace, how- 
ever, had afterwards been formally made; but, never- 
theless, the news of the return of this expedition was 
not heard without causing a sensation almost amount- 
ing to consternation. The war chief of the party 
who had been attacked by our friends during his 
absence, was now, with all his men, within an easy 
day’s march. His road lay right through our vil- 


32 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


lage, and it was much to be doubted that he would 
keep the peace, being one of the most noted war 
chiefs of New Zealand, and he and his men returning 
from a successful expedition. All now was uproar 
and confusion; messengers were running like mad, 
in all directions, to call in stragglers; the women 
were carrying fuel and provisions into the pa or for- 
tress of the tribe. This pa was a very well built and 
strong stockade, composed of three lines of strong 
fence and ditch, very ingeniously and artificially 
planned ; and, indeed, as good a defence as well could 
be imagined against an enemy armed only with 
musketry. 

All the men were now working like furies, putting 
this fort to rights, getting it into fighting order, 
mending the fences, clearing out the ditches, knock- 
ing down houses inside the place, clearing away 
brushwood and fern all around the outside within 
musket shot. J was in the thick of it, and worked 
all day lashing the fence; the fence being of course 
not nailed, but lashed with toro-toro, a kind of tough 
creeping plant, like a small rope, which was very 
strong and well adapted for the purpose. This lash- 
ing was about ten or twelve feet from the ground, 
and a stage had to be erected for the men to stand 
on. To accomplish this lashing or fastening of the 
fence well and with expedition required two men, 
one inside the fence and another outside; all the men 
therefore worked in pairs, passmg the end of the 
toro-toro from one to the other through the fence of 
large upright stakes and round a cross piece which 


OLD NEW ZHALAND. 53 


went all along the fence, by which means the whole 
was connected into one strong wall. I worked away 
like fury, just as if I had been born and bred a 
member of the community; and moreover, not being 
in those days very particularly famous for what is 
called prudence, I intended also, circumstances per- 
mitting, to fight like fury too, just for the fun of the 
thing. About a hundred men were employed in this 
part of the work new lashing the pa. My vis-d-vis 
in the operation was a respectable old warrior of 
great experience and approved valour, whose name 
being turned into English meant “ The eater of his 
own relations.” (Be careful not to read rations.) 
This was quite a different sort of diet from “ melons,” 
and he did not bear his name for nothing, as I could 
tell you if I had time, but I am half mad with haste 
lashing the pa. I will only say that my comrade 
was a most bloodthirsty, ferocious, athletic savage, 
and his character was depicted in every line of his 
tattooed face. About twenty men had been sent out 
to watch the approach of the dreaded visitors. The 
repairing of the stockade went on all one day and all 
one night by torchlight and by the light of huge 
fires lit in the inside. No one thought of sleep. 
Dogs barking, men shouting, children crying, women 
screaming, pigs squealing, muskets firing (to see if 
they were fit for active service and would go off), 
and above all the doleful tetere sounding. This was 
‘a huge wooden trumpet six feet long, which gave 
forth a groaning moaning sound, like the voice of a 
D 


34: OLD NEW ZHALAND. 
dying wild bull. Babel, with a dash of Pandemo- 


nium, will give a faint idea of the uproar. 

All preparations having been at last made, and no 
further tidings of the enemy, as I may call them, I 
took a complete survey of the fort, my friend the 
‘‘ Relation Eater” being my companion and explain- 
ing to me the design of the whole. I learned some- 
thing that day; and I, though pretty well “up” in 
the noble science of fortification, ancient and modern, 
was obliged to confess to myself that a savage who 
could neither read or write—who had never heard of 
Cohorn or Vauban—and who was moreover avowedly 
a gobbler up of his own relations, could teach me 
certain practical ‘‘ dodges” in the defensive art quite 
well worth knowing. 

A long shed of palm leaves had been also built at 
a safe and convenient distance from the fort. This 
was for the accommodation of the expected visitors, 
supposing they came in peaceful guise. A whole 
herd of pigs were also collected and tied to stakes 
driven into the ground in the rear of the fort. These 
were intended to feast the coming guests, according 
to their behaviour. 


Towards evening a messenger from a neighbouring 


friendly tribe arrived to say that next day, about 
noon, the strangers might be expected; and also that 
the peace which had been concluded with their tribe 
during their absence, had been ratified and accepted 
by them. This was satisfactory intelligence; but, 
nevertheless, no precaution must be neglected. To 
be thrown off guard would invite an attack, and 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 30 


ensure destruction; everything must be in order; 
gun cleaning, flint fixing, cartridge making, was going 
on in all directions; and the outpost at the edge of 
the forest was not called in. All was active prepara- 
tion. 

The path by which these doubtful friends were 
coming led through a dense forest and came out on 
the clear plain about half-a-mile from the pa, which 
plain continued and extended in every direction 
around the fortress to about the same distance, so 
that none could approach unperceived. The outpost 
of twenty men were stationed at about a couple of 
hundred yards from the point where the path emerged 
from the wood; and as the ground sloped consider- 
ably from the forest to the fort, the whole interven- 
ing space was clearly visible. 

Another night of alarm and sleepless expectation, 
the melancholy moan of the ¢etere still continuing to 
hint to any lurking enemy that we were all wide 
awake; or rather, I should say, to assure him most 
positively of it, for who could sleep with that diabo- 
lical din in his ears? Morning came and an early 
breakfast was cooked and devoured hurriedly. Then 
groups of the younger men might be seen here and 
there fully armed, and “getting up steam” by 
dancing the war dance, in anticipation of the grand 
dance of the whole warrior force of the tribe, which, 
as a matter of course, must be performed in honour 
of the visitors when they arrived. In honour, but 
quite as much in intimidation, or an endeavour at it, 
though no one said so. Noon arrived at last. 


36 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


Anxious glances are turning from all quarters to- 
wards the wood, from which a path is plainly seen 
winding down the sloping ground towards the pa. 
The outpost is on the alert. Straggling scouts are 
out in every direction. All is expectation. Now 
there is a movement at the outpost. They suddenly 
spread in an open line, ten yards between each man. 
One man comes at full speed running towards the 
pa, jumping and bounding over every impediment. 
Now something moves in the border of the forest,— 
it is a mass of black heads. Now the men are plainly 
visible. The whole tawa has emerged upon the plain. 
‘‘ Here they come! here they come!” is heard in all 
directions. The men of the outpost cross the line of 
march in pretended resistance; they present their 
guns, make horrid grimaces, dance about like mad 
baboons, and then fall back with headlong speed to 
the next advantageous position for making a stand. 
The taua, however, comes on steadily; they are 
formed in a solid oblong mass. ‘The chief at the 
left of the column leads them on. The men are all 
equipped for immediate action, that is to say, quite 
naked except their arms and cartridge boxes, which 


are a warrior’s clothes. No one can possibly tell — 


what this peaceful meeting may end in, so all are 
ready for action at a second’s notice. The ¢aua still 
comes steadily on. AsI have said, the men are all 
stripped for action, but I also notice that the appear- 
ance of nakedness is completely taken away by the 
tattooing, the colour of the skin, and the arms and 
equipments. The men in fact look much better than 


, 
) 
4 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 37 


when dressed in their Maori clothing. Every man, 
almost without exception, is covered with tattooing 
from the knees to the waist; the face is also covered 
with dark spiral lines. Each man has round his 
middle a belt, to which is fastened two cartridge 
boxes, one behind and one before; another belt goes 
over the right shoulder and under the left arm, and 
from it hangs, on the left side and rather behind, 
another cartridge box, and under the waist-belt is 
thrust, behind, at the small of the back, the short- 
handled tomahawk for close fight and to finish the 
wounded. Each cartridge box contains eighteen 
rounds, and every man has a musket. Altogether 
this tava is better and more uniformly armed and 
equipped than ordinary; but they have been amongst 
the first who got pakehas to trade with them, and 
are indeed in consequence the terror of New Zealand. 
On they come, a set of tall, athletic, heavyy-made men; 
they would, I am sure, in the aggregate weigh some 
tons heavier than the same number of men taken at 
random from the streets of one of our manufacturing 
towns. They are now half way across the plain; 
they keep their formation, a solid oblong, admirably 
as they advance, but they do not keep step; this 
causes a very singular appearance at a distance. In- 
stead of the regular marching step of civilized soldiers, 
which may be observed at any distance, this mass 
seems to progress towards you with the creeping 
motion of some great reptile at a distance, and when 
coming down a sloping ground this effect is quite 
remarkable. 


38 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


The mimic opposition is now discontinued; the 
outpost rushes in at full speed, the men firing their 
guns in the air as theyrun. Takini! takini! is the 
cry, and out spring three young men, the best run- 
ners of our tribe, to perform the ceremony of the 
taki. They hold in their hands some reeds to repre- 
sent darts or kokiri. At this moment a tremendous 
fire of ball cartridge opens from the fort; the balls 
whistle in every direction, over and around the 
advancing party, who steadily and gravely come on, 
not seeming to know that a gun has been fired, 
though they perfectly well understand that this 
salute is also a hint of full preparation for any unex- 
pected turn things may take. Now, from the whole 
female population arises the shrill “ haere mai! haere 
mai!’ Mats are waving, guns firing, dogs barking; 
the chief roaring to “ fall in,” and form for the war 
dance. He appears half mad with excitement, 
anxiety, and something very like apprehension of a 
sudden onslaught from his friends. In the midst of 
this horrible uproar off dart three runners. They 
are not unexpected. Three young men of the taua 
are seen to tighten their waist-belts, and hand their 
muskets to their comrades. On go the three young 


men from the fort. They approach the front of the — 


advancing column; they dance and caper about like 
mad monkeys, twisting their faces about in the most 
extraordinary manner, showing the whites of their 
eyes, and lolling out their tongues. At last, after 
several feints, they boldly advance within twenty 
yards of the supposed enemy, and send the reed 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 39 


darts flying full in their faces: then they turn and 
fly as if for life. Instantly, from the stranger ranks, 
three young men dart forth in eager pursuit; and 
behind them comes the solid column, rushing on at 
full speed. Run now, O “ Sounding Sea,” (Taz 
Haruru) for the ‘‘ Black Cloud,” (Kapua Mangw) the 
swiftest of the Rarawa, is at your back; run now, 
for the honour of your tribe and your own name, 
run! run! It was an exciting scene. The two 
famous runners came on at a tremendous pace, the 
dark mass of armed men following close behind at 
full speed, keeping their formation admirably, the 
ground shaking under them as they rushed on. On 
come the two runners (the others are left behind and 
disregarded). The pursuer gains upon his man; but 
they are fast nearing the goal, where, according to 
Maori custom, the chase must end. Run, “ Sound- 
ing Sea;” another effort! your tribe are near in full 
array, and armed for the war dance; their friendly 
ranks are your refuge; run! run! On came the 
headlong race. When within about thirty yards of 
the place where our tribe was now formed in a solid 
oblong, each man kneeling on one knee, with musket 
held in both hands, butt to ground, and somewhat 
sloped to the front, the pursuing native caught at the 
shoulder of our man, touched it, but could do no 
more. Here he must stop; to go farther would not 
be “correct.” He will, however, boast everywhere 
that he has touched the shoulder of the famous 
“‘ Sounding Sea.” Our man has not, however, been 
caught, which would have been a bad omen. At 


40 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


this moment the charging column comes thundering 
up to where their man is standing; instantly they all 
kneel upon one knee, holding their guns sloped be- 
fore their faces, in the manner already described. 
The élite of the two tribes are now opposite to each 
other, all armed, all kneeling, and formed in two 
solid oblong masses, the narrow end of the oblong to 
the front. Only thirty yards divide them; the front 
ranks do not gaze on each other; both parties turn 
their eyes towards the ground, and with heads bent 
downwards, and a little to one side, appear to listen. 
All is silence; you might have heard a pin drop. 
The uproar has turned to a calm; the men are 
kneeling statues; the chiefs have disappeared; they 
are in the centre of their tribes. The pakeha is be- 
ginning to wonder what will be the end of all this; 
and also to speculate on the eflicacy of the buck shot 
with which his gun is loaded, and wishes it was ball. 
Two minutes have elapsed in this solemn silence, 
the more remarkable as being the first quiet two 
minutes for the last two days and nights. Suddenly 
from the extreme rear of the strangers’ column is 
heard a scream—a horrid yell. A savage, of her- 
culean stature, comes, mere in hand, and rushing 
madly to the front. He seems hunted by all the 
furies. Bedlam never produced so horrid a visage. 
Thrice, as he advances, he gives that horrid cry; 
and thrice the armed tribe give answer with a long- 
drawn gasping sigh. He is at the front; he jumps 
into the air, shaking his stone weapon; the whites 
only of his eyes are visible, giving a most hideous 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. — A} 


appearance to his face; he shouts the first words of 
the war song, and instantly his tribe spring from the 
ground. It would be hard to describe the scene 
which followed. The roaring chorus of the war 
song; the horrid grimaces; the eyes all white; the 
tongues hanging out; the furious yet measured and 
uniform gesticulation, jumping, and stamping. I felt 
the ground plainly trembling. At last the war 
dance ended; and then my tribe, (I find I am already 
beginning to get Maorifed,) starting from the ground 
like a single man, endeavoured to outdo even their 
amiable friends’ exhibition. They end; then the 
new-eomers perform another demon dance; then my 
tribe give another. Silence again prevails, and all 
sit down. Immediately a man from the new arrivals 
comes to the front of his own party; he runs to and 
fro; he speaks for his tribe; these are his words :— 
‘Peace is made! peace is made! peace is firm! 
peace is secure! peace! peace! peace!” This man 
is not a person of any particular consequence in his 
tribe, but his brother was killed by our people in the 
battle I have mentioned, and this gives him the right 
to be the first to proclaim peace. His speech is 
ended and he “‘ falls in.” Some three or four others 
‘* follow on the same side.” ‘Their speeches are short 
also, and nearly verbatim what the first was. Then 
who of all the world starts forth from ‘ ours,” to 
speak on the side of “law and order,” but my 
diabolical old acquaintance the “ Relation Eater.” I 
had by this time picked up a little Maori, and could 
partly understand his speech. ‘‘ Welcome! welcome! 


42 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


welcome! peace is made! not till now has there been 
true peace! I have seen you, and peace is made!” 
Here he broke out into a song, the chorus of which 
was taken up by hundreds of voices, and when it 
ended he made a sudden and very expressive gesture 
of scattering something with his hands, which was a 
signal to all present that the ceremonial was at an 
end for the time. Our tribe at once disappeared into 
the pa, and at the same instant the strangers broke 
into a scattered mob, and made for the long shed 
which had been prepared for their reception, which 
was quite large enough, and the floor covered thickly 
with clean rushes to sleep on. About fifty or sixty 
then started for the border of the forest to bring their 
clothes and baggage, which had been left there as 
incumbrances to the movements of the performers in 
the ceremonials [ have described. Part, however, of 
the “ampedimenta” had already arrived on the backs 
of about thirty boys, women, and old slaves; and I 
noticed amongst other things some casks of cartridges, 
which were, as I thought, rather ostentatiously 
exposed to view. 

I soon found the reason my friend of saturnine 
propensities had closed proceedings so abruptly was, 
that the tribe had many pressing duties of hospitality | 
to fulfil, and that the heavy talking was to commence 
next day. I noticed also that to this time there had 
been no meeting of the chiefs, and, moreover, that 
the two parties had kept strictly separate—the near- 
est they had been to each other was thirty yards 
when the war dancing was going on, and they seemed 


OLD NEW ZHALAND. 43 


quite glad, when the short speeches were over, to 
move off to a greater distance from each other. 

Soon after the dispersion of the two parties, a 
firing of muskets was heard in and at the rear of the 
fort, accompanied by the squeaking, squealing, and 
dying groans of a whole herd of pigs. Directly 
afterwards a mob of fellows were seen staggering 
under the weight of the dead pigs, and proceeding to 
the long shed already mentioned, in front of which 
they were flung down, sans-ceremonie, and without a 
word spoken. I counted sixty-nine large fat pigs 
flung in one heap, one on the top of the other, before 
that part of the shed where the principal chief was 
sitting; twelve were thrown before the interesting 
savage who had “started” the war dance; and 
several single porkers were thrown without any 
remark before certain others of the guests. The 
parties, however, to whom this compliment was paid 
sat quietly saying nothing, and hardly appearing to 
see what was done. Behind the pigs was placed, by 
the active exertion of two or three hundred people, a 
heap of potatoes and kumera, in quantity about ten 
tons, so there was no want of the raw material for a 
feast. 

The pigs and potatoes having been deposited, a 
train of women appeared—the whole, indeed, of the 
young and middle-aged women of the tribe. They 
advanced with a half-dancing half-hopping sort of 
step, to the time of a wild but not unmusical chant, 
each woman holding high in both hands a smoking 
dish of some kind or other of Maori delicacy, hot 


4A ODD NEW ZHALAND. 


from the oven. The groundwork of this feast ap- 
peared to be sweet potatoes and taro, but on the top 
of each smoking mess was placed either dried shark, 
eels, mullet, or pork, all “ piping hot.” This treat 
was intended to stay our guests’ stomachs till they 
could find time to cook for themselves. The women 
having placed the dishes, or to speak more correctly, 
baskets, on the ground before the shed, disappeared ; 
and in a miraculously short time the feast disappeared 
also, as was proved by seeing the baskets flung in 
twos, threes, and tens, empty out of the shed. 

Next day, pretty early in the morning, I saw our 
chief (as I must call him for distinction) with a few 
of the principal men of the tribe, dressed in their best 
Maori costume, taking their way towards the shed of 
the visitors. When they got pretty near, a cry of 
haere mai! hailed them. They went on gravely, and 
observing where the principal chief was scated, our 
chief advanced towards him, fell upon his neck em- 
bracing him in the most affectionate manner, com- 
menced a tang?, or melancholy sort of ditty, which 
‘lasted a full half hour, and during which, both parties, 
as in duty bound and in compliance with custom, 
shed floods of tears. How they managed to do it is 


more than I can tell to this day, except that I suppose 


you may train a man to do anything. Right well 
do I know that either party would have almost given 
his life for a chance to exterminate the other with all 
his tribe ; and twenty-seven years afterwards I saw 
the two tribes fighting in the very quarrel which was 
pretended to have been made up that day. Before 


*. 


OLD NEW ZHALAND. 45 


this, however, both these chiefs were dead, and others 
reigned in their stead. While the tang? was going 
on between the two principals, the companions of our 
chief each selected one of the visitors, and rushing 
into his arms, went through a similar scene. Old 
‘Relation Eater” singled out the horrific savage 
who had began the war dance, and these two tender- 
hearted individuals did, for a full half hour, seated on 
the ground, hanging on each other’s necks, give vent 
to such a chorus of skilfully modulated howling as 
would have given Momus the blue devils to listen to. 

After the tangz was ended, the two tribes seated 
themselves in a large irregular circle on the plain, 
and into this circle strode an orator, who, having said 
his say, was followed by another, and so the greater 
part of the day was consumed. No arms were to be 
seen in the hands of either party, except the green- 
stone mere of the principal chiefs; but I took notice 
that about thirty of our people never left the nearest 
gate of the pa, and that their loaded muskets, although 
out of sight, were close at hand, standing against the 
fence inside the gate, and I also perceived that under 
their cloaks or mats they wore their cartridge boxes 
and tomahawks. This caused me to observe the 
other party more closely. They also, I perceived, 
had some forty men sleeping in the shed; these 
fellows had not removed their cartridge boxes either, 
and all their companions’ arms were carefully ranged 
behind them in a row, six or seven deep, against the 
back wall of the shed. 

The speeches of the orators were not very interest- 


4.6 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


ing, so I took a stroll to a little rising ground at 
about a hundred yards distance, where a company of 
natives, better dressed than common, were seated. 
They had the best sort of ornamented cloaks, and 
had feathers in their heads, which I already knew 
“commoners” could not afford to wear, as they were 
only to be procured some hundreds of miles to the 
south. I therefore concluded these were magnates 
or ‘“‘personages”’ of some kind or other, and deter- 
mined to introduce myself. As I approached, one of 
these splendid individuals nodded to me in a very 
familiar sort of manner, and I, not to appear rude, 
returned the salute. I stepped into the circle formed 
by my new friends, and had just commenced a tena 
koutou, when a breeze of wind came sighing along 
the hill-top. My friend nodded again,—his cloak 
blew to one side. What do I see ?—or rather what 
doI not see? The head has no body under it! The 
heads had all been stuck on slender rods, a cross 
stick tied on to represent the shoulders, and the 
cloaks thrown over all in such a natural manner as 
to deceive anyone at a short distance, but a green 
pakeha, who was not expecting any such matter, toa 
certainty. I fell back a yard or two, so as to take a 
full view of this silent circle. I began to feel as if at 
last I had fallen into strange company. I began to 
look more closely at my companions, and to try to 
fancy what their characters in life had been. One 
had undoubtedly been a warrior; there was some- 
thing bold and defiant about the whole air of the 
head. Another was the head of a very old man, 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 47 


grey, shrivelled, and wrinkled. I was going on with 
my observations when I was saluted by a voice from 
behind with, “‘ Looking at the eds, sir?” It was one 
of the pakehas formerly mentioned. “ Yes,” said I, 
turning round just the least possible thing quicker 
thanordinary. ‘‘ Eds has been a getting scarce,” says 
he. “I should think so,” says I. ‘ We an’t ad a 
ed this long time,” says he. “The devil!” says I. 
‘One o’ them eds has been hurt bad,” says he. “I 
should think all were, rather so,” says I. ‘Oh no, 
only one on ’em,” says he, “the skull is split, and it 
won't fetch nothin,” says he. ‘Oh, murder! I see, 
now,” says I. “Eds was werry scarce,” says he, 
shaking hisown “ed.” “Ah!” said I. ‘‘ They had 
to tattoo a slave a bit ago,” says he, ‘“ and the villain 
ran away, tattooin’ and all!” says he. ‘ What?” 
said I. ‘ Bolted afore he was fit to kill,” says he. 
‘‘ Stole off with his own head?” saysI. “ That’s just 
it,” says he. “ Capital felony!” saysI. ‘“ You may 
say that, sir,’ says he. ‘Good morning,” said I. I 
walked away pretty smartly. ‘‘ Loose notions about 
heads in this country,” said I to myself; and involun- 
tarily putting up my hand to my own, I thought 
somehow the bump of combativeness felt smaller, or 
indeed had vanished altogether. ‘It’s all very 
funny,” said I. 

I walked down into the plain. I saw in one place 
a crowd of women, boys, and others. There was a 
great noise of lamentation going on. I went up to 
the crowd, and there beheld, lying on a clean mat, 
which was spread on the ground, another head. A 


48 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


number of women were standing in a row before it, 
screaming, wailing, and quivering their hands about 
ina most extraordinary manner, and cutting them- 
selves dreadfully with sharp flints and shells. One 
old woman, in the centre of the group, was one clot 
of blood from head to feet, and large clots of 
coagulated blood lay on the ground where she stood. 
The sight was absolutely horrible, I thought at the 
time. She was singing or howling a dirge-like wail. 
In her right hand she held a piece of tuhua, or 
volcanic glass, as sharp as a razor: this she placed 
deliberately to her left wrist, drawing it slowly up- 
wards to her left shoulder, the spouting blood follow- 
ing as it went; then from the left shoulder down- 
wards, across the breast to the short ribs on the 
right side; then the rude but keen knife was shifted 
from the right hand to the left, placed to the right 
wrist, drawn upwards to the right shoulder, and so 
down across the breast to the left side, thus making 
a bloody cross on the breast; and so the operation 
went on all the time I was there, the old creature all 
the time howling in time and measure, and keeping 
time also with the knife, which at every cut was 
shifted from one hand to the other, as I have 
described. She had scored her forehead and cheeks 
before I came; her face and body was a mere clot of 
blood, and a little stream was dropping from every 
finger—a more hideous object could scarcely be con- 
ceived. I took notice that the younger women, 
though they screamed as loud, did not cut near so 
deep as the old woman, especially about the face. 


| 
) 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 49 


This custom has been falling gradually out of use; 
and when practised now, in these degenerate times, 
the cutting and maiming is mere form, mere scratch- 
ing to draw enough blood to swear by: but, in ‘‘ the 
good old times,” the thing used to be done properly. 
I often, of late years, have felt quite indignant to see 
some degenerate hussy making believe with a piece 
of flint in her hand, but who had no notion of cutting 
herself up properly as she ought to do. It shows a 
want of natural affection in the present generation, I 
think; they refuse to shed tears of blood for their 
friends as their mothers used to do. 

This head, I found on enquiry, was not the head of 
an enemy. A small party of our friends had been 
surprised; two brothers were flying for their lives 
down a hill-side; a shot broke the leg of one of 
them and he fell; the enemy were close at hand; 
already the exulting cry “na! na! mate rawa!” was. 
heard; the wounded man cried to the brother, ‘‘ Do 
not leave my head a plaything for the foe.” There 
was no time for deliberation. The brother did not 
deliberate; a few slashes with the tomahawk saved 
his brother’s head, and he escaped with it in his 
hand, dried it, and brought it home; and the old 
woman was the mother,—the young ones were 
cousins. There was no sister, as I heard, when I 
enquired. All the heads on the hill were heads of 
enemies, and several of them are now in museums in 
Europe. 

With reference to the knowing remarks of the 
pakeha who accosted me on the hill on the state of 

E 


50 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


the head market, I am bound to remark that my 
friend Mr. —— never speculated in this “ article;” 
but the skippers of many of the colonial trading 
schooners were always ready to deal with a man who 
had “ a real good head,” and used to commission such 
men as my companion of the morning to “ pick up 
heads” for them. It is a positive fact that some time 
after this the head of a live man was sold and paid 
for beforehand, and afterwards honestly delivered 
‘as per agreement.” 

The scoundrel slave who had the conscience to 
run away with his own head after the trouble and 
expense had been gone to to tattoo it to make it more 
valuable, is no fiction either. Even in “the good old 
times” people would sometimes be found to behave 
in the most dishonest manner. But there are good 
and bad to be found in all times and places. 

Now if there is one thing I hate more than 
another it is the raw-head-and-bloody-bones style of 
writing, and in these random reminiscences I shall 
avoid all particular mention of battles, massacres, and 
onslaughts, except there be something particularly 
characteristic of my friend the Maori in them. As 
_ for mere hacking and hewing, there has been enough 
of that to be had in Europe, Asia, and America of 
late, and very well described too, by numerous “ our 
correspondents.” If I should have to fight a single 
combat or two, just to please the ladies, I shall do 
my best not to get killed, and hereby promise not to 
kill any one myself if I possibly can help it. I, how- 
ever, hope to be excused for the last two or three 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 51 


pages, as it was necessary to point out that in the 
good old times, if one’s own head was not sufficient, 
it was quite practicable to get another. 

I must, however, get rid of our visitors. Next 
day, at daylight, they disappeared: canoes from 
their own tribe had come to meet them (the old 
woman with the flint had arrived in these canoes), 
and they departed sans-ceremonie, taking with them 
all that was left of the pigs and potatoes which had 
been given them, and also the ‘fine lot of eds.” 
Their departure was felt as a great relief, and though 
it was satisfactory to know peace was made, it was 
even more so to be well rid of the peacemakers. 

Hail, lovely peace, daughter of heaven! meek-eyed 
inventor of Armstrong guns and Enfield rifles; you 
of the liquid fire-shell, hail! Shooter at ‘ bulls’- 
eyes,” trainer of battalions, killer of wooden French- 
men, hail! (A bit of fine writing does one good.) 
Nestling under thy wing, I will scrape sharp the 
point of my spear with a pzpz shell; I will carry 
fern-root into my pa; I will cure those heads which 
I have killed in war, or they will spoil and ‘‘ won’t 
fetch nothin:” for these are thy arts, O peace! 


CHAPTER LV. 


A little affair of “flotsam and jetsam.’’—Rebellion crushed in 
the bud.—A Pakeha’s house sacked.— Maori law.—A Maori 
lawsuit.— Affair thrown into Chancery. 


's 2 NO) AKEHAS, though precious in the good 


old times, would sometimes get into 
awkward scrapes. Accidents, I have 
245@3| observed, will happen at the best of 
times. Some time after the matters I have been 
recounting happened, two of the pakehas who were 
“knocking about” Mr. ——’s premises, went fishing. 
One of them was a very respectable old man-of-war’s 
man; the other was the connoisseur of heads, who, I 
may as well mention, was thought to be one of that 
class who never could remember to a nicety how 
they had come into the country, or where they came 
from. It so happened that on their return, the little 
boat, not being well fastened, went adrift in the 
night, and was cast on shore at about four miles 
distance, in the dominions of a petty chief who was a 
sort of vassal or retainer of ours. He did not 
belong to the tribe, and lived on the land by the 


OLD NEW ZHALAND. 53 


permission of our chief as a sort of tenant at will. 
Of late an ill-feeling had grown up between him and 
the principal chief. The vassal had in fact begun to 
show some airs of independence, and had collected 
more men about him than our chief cared to see; but 
up to this time there had been no regular outbreak 
between them, possibly because the vassal had not 
yet sufficient force to declare independence formally. 
Our chief was however watching for an excuse to 
fall out with him before he should grow too strong. 
As soon as it was heard where the boat was, the two 
men went for it as a matter of course, little thinking 
that this encroaching vassal would have the insolence 
to claim the right of ‘‘ flotsam and jetsam,” which 
belonged to the principal chief, and which was 
always waived in favour of his pakehas. On arrival, 
however, at this rebellious chief’s dominions, they 
were informed that it was his intention to stick to 
the boat until he was paid a “stocking of gun- 
powder”—meaning a quantity as much as a stocking 
would hold, which was the regular standard measure 
in those days in that locality. A stocking of gun- 
powder! who ever heard of such an awful imposi- 
tion? The demand was enormous in value and 
rebellious in principle. The thing must be put an 
end to at once. The principal chief did not hesi- 
tate: rebellion must be crushed in the bud. He at 
once mustered his whole force (he did not approve of 
“little wars,”) and sent them off under the command 
of the Relation Eater, who served an ejectment in 
regular Maori form, by first plundering the village 


54 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


and then burning it to ashes; also destroying the 
cultivation and provisions, and forcing the vassal to 
decamp with all his people on pain of instant mas- 
sacre—a thing they did not lose a moment in doing, 
and I don’t think they either eat or slept till they 
had got fifty miles off, where a tribe related to them 
received them and gave them a welcome. 

Well, about three months after this, about day- 
light in the morning, I was aroused by a great 
uproar of men shouting, doors smashing, and women 
screaming. Up I jumped, and pulled on a few 
clothes in less time, I am sure, than ever I had done 

before in my life; out I ran, and at once perceived 
that Mr. ——’s premises were being sacked by the 
rebellious vassal, who had returned with about fifty 
men, and was taking this means of revenging himself 
for the rough handling he had received from our 
chief. Men were rushing in mad haste through the 
smashed windows and doors, loaded with anything and 
everything they could lay hands on. The chief was 
stamping against the door of a room in which he was 
aware the most valuable goods were kept, and shout- 
ing for help to break it open. A large canoe was 
floating close to the house, and was being rapidly 
filled with plunder. I saw a fat old Maori woman, 
who was washerwoman to the establishment, being 
dragged along the ground by a huge fellow, who was 
trying to tear from her grasp one of my shirts, to 
which she clung with perfect desperation. I per- 
ceived at a glance that the faithful old creature would 
probably save a sleeve. A long line of similar articles, 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 55 


my property, which had graced the tazepa fence the 
night before, had disappeared. The old man-of-war’s 
man had placed his back exactly opposite to that part 
of the said fence where hung a certain striped cotton 
shirt and well scrubbed canvas trowsers, which could 
belong to no one but himself. He was “hitting out” 
lustily right and left. Mr. had been absent some 
days on a journey, and the head merchant, as we found 
after all was over, was hiding under a bed. When 
the old sailor saw me, he “sang out,” in a voice clear 
as a bell, and calculated to be distinctly heard above 
the din :—‘ Hit out, sir, if you please; let’s make a 
fight of it the best we can; our mob will be here in 
five minutes; Tahuna has run to fetch them.” While 
he thus gave both advice and information, he also set 
a good example, having delivered just one thump per 
word or thereabouts. The odds were terrible, but 
the time was short that I was required to fight; so I 
at once floored a native who was rushing by me. He 
fell like a man shot, and I then perceived he was one 
of our own people who had been employed about the 
place ; so, to balance things, I knocked down another, 
and then felt myself seized round the waist from be- 
hind, by a fellow who seemed to be about as strong 
asa horse. At this moment I cast an anxious glance 
around the field of battle. The old Maori woman 
had, as I expected, saved a good half of my shirt; she 
had got on the top of an outhouse, and was waving 
it in a “Sister Anne” sort of manner, and calling to 
an imaginary friendly host, which she pretended to 
see advancing to the rescue. The old sailor had 


56 OLD NHW ZHALAND. 


fallen under, but not surrendered to, superior force. 
Three natives had got him down; but it took all they 
could do to keep him down: he was evidently carry- 
ing out his original idea of making a fight of it, and 
gaining time ;—the striped shirt and canvas trowsers 
still hung proudly on the fence. None of his assail- 
ants could spare a second to pull them down. I was 
kicking and flinging in the endeavour to extricate 
myself ; or, at least to turn round, so as to carry out 
a ‘‘face to face” policy, which it would be a grand 
mistake to suppose was not understood long ago in 
the good old times. I had nearly succeeded, and 
was thinking what particular form of destruction I 
should shower on the foe, when a tremendous shout 
was heard. It was ‘‘our mob” coming to the rescue; 
and, like heroes of old, ‘‘ sending their voice before 
them.” In an instant both myself and the gallant 
old tar were released; the enemy dashed on board 
their canoe, and in another moment were off, darting 
away before a gale of wind and a fair tide at a rate 
that put half a mile at least between them and us 
before our protectors came up. ‘‘ Load the gun!” 
cried the sailor—(there was a nine-pound carronade 
on the cliff before the house, overlooking the river). 
A cartridge was soon found, and a shot, and the gun 
loaded. ‘“Slue her a little,” cried my now com- 
mander; “‘fetch a fire stick.” “Aye, aye, sir” (from 
self). “Wait a little; that will do—Fire!”—(in a 
voice as if ordering the discharge of the whole broad- 
side of a three-decker). Bang! The elevation was 
perfectly correct. The shot struck the water at 


OLD NEW ZHALAND. 57 


exactly the right distance, and only a few feet to one 
side. A very few feet more to the right and the shot 
would have entered the stern of the canoe, and, as 
she was end on to us, would have killed half the 
people in her. A miss, however, is as good as a mile 
off. The canoe disappeared behind a point, and there 
we were with an army of armed friends around us, 
who, by making great expedition, had managed to 
come exactly in time to be too late. 

This was a tawa muru (a robbing expedition) in 
revenge for the leader having been cleaned out by our 
chief, which gave them the right to rob any one con- 
nected with, related to, or under the protection of, 
our chief aforesaid, provided always that they were 
able. We, on the other hand, had the clear right to 
kill any of the robbers, which would then have given 
them the right to kill us; but until we killed some of 
them, it would not have been “‘correct”’ for them to 
have taken life, so they managed the thing neatly, so 
that they should have no occasion to do so. The 
whole proceeding was unobjectionable in every 
respect, and tka (correct). Had we put in our nine- 
pound shot at the stern of their canoe, it would have 
been correct also, but as we were not able, we had no 
right whatever to complain. 

The above is good law, and here I may as well in- 
form the New Zealand public that I am going to 
write the whole law of this land in a book, which I 
shall call “ Ko nga ture;” and as I intend it for the 
good of both races, I shall mix the two languages up 
in such a way that neither can understand; but this 


58 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


does not matter, as I shall add a “ glossary,” in Cop- 
tic, to make things clear. 

Some time after this, a little incident happened at 
my friend Mr. ——’s place worth noting. Our chief 
had, for some time back, a sort of dispute with 
another magnate, who lived about ten miles off. I 
really cannot say who was in the right—the argu- 
ments on both sides were so nearly balanced, that I 
should not like to commit myself to a judgment in 
the case. The question was at last brought to a fair 
hearing at my friend’s house. The arguments on 
both sides were very forcible, so much so that in the 
course of the arbitration our chief and thirty of his 
principal witnesses were shot dead in a heap before 
my friend’s door, and sixty others badly wounded, 
and my friend’s house and store blown up and burnt 
to ashes. My friend was all but, or indeed, quite 
ruined, but it would not have been ‘‘correct” for him 
to complain—Ais loss in goods being far overbalanced 
by the loss of the tribe in men. He was, however, 
consoled by hundreds of friends who came in large 
parties to condole and tangi with him, and who, as 
was quite correct in such cases, shot and eat all his 
stock, sheep, pigs, goats, ducks, geese, fowls, &c., all 
in high compliment to himself, at which he felt proud, — 
as a well conducted and conditioned pakeha Maori (as 
he was) should do. He did not, however, survive 
these honours long, poor fellow. He died, and 
strange to say, no one knew exactly what was the 
matter with him—some said it was the climate, they 
thought. 


OLD NEW ZHALAND. 59 


After this the land about which this little mis- 
understanding had arisen, was, so to speak, thrown 
into chancery, where it has now remained about forty 
years; but I hear that proceedings are to commence 
de novo (no allusion to the “new system’’) next 
summer, or at farthest the summer after; and as I 
witnessed the first proceedings, when the case comes 
on again ‘“‘ may I be there to see.” 


CHAPTER V. 


Every Englishman’s house is his castle.—My estate and 
castle.—How I purchased my estate.—Native titles to land, of 
what nature.—Value of land in New Zealand.—Land commis- 
sioners.—The triumphs of eloquence.—Magna Charta. 


VERY Englshman’s house is_ his 

castle,” “‘I scorn the foreign yoke,” 
? and glory in the name of Briton, and 
all that. The natural end, however, of 
all castles is to be burnt or blown up. In England 
it is true you can call the constable, and should any 
foreign power attack you with grinding organ and 
white mice, you may hope for succours from without, 
from which cause “ castles” in England are more 
long lived. In New Zealand, however, it is different, 
as, to the present day, the old system prevails, and 
castles continue to be disposed of in the natural way, 
as has been seen lately at Taranaki. 

I now purchased a piece of land and built a 
“castle” for myself. I really can’t tell to the pre- 
sent day who I purchased the land from, for there 
were about fifty different claimants, every one of whom 
assured me that the other forty-nine were “‘humbugs,” 
and had no right whatever. The nature of the diffe- 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 61 


rent titles of the different claimants was various. 
One man said his ancestors had killed off the first 
owners; another declared his ancestors had driven 
off the second party; another man, who seemed to 
be listened to with more respect than ordinary, de- 
clared that his ancestor had been the first possessor 
of all, and had never been ousted, and that this 
ancestor was a huge lizard that lived in a cave on 
the land many ages ago, and sure enough there was 
the cave to prove it. Besides the principal claims, 
there were an immense number of secondary ones— 
a sort of latent equities—which had lain dormant 
until it was known the pakeha had his eye on the 
land. Some of them seemed to me at the time odd 
enough. One man required payment because his 
ancestors, as he affirmed, had exercised the right of 
catching rats on it, but which he (the claimant) had 
never done, for the best of reasons, z.e, there were 
no rats to catch, except indeed pakeha rats, which 
were plenty enough, but this variety of rodent was 
not counted as game. Another claimed because his 
erandfather had been murdered on the land, and—as 
I am a veracious pakeha—another claimed pay- 
ment because fis grandfather had committed the 
murder! Then half the country claimed payments 
of various value, from one fig of tobacco to a 
musket, on account of a certain wahi tapu, or ancient 
burying-ground, which was on the land, and in 
which every one almost had had relations or rather 
ancestors buried, as they could clearly make out, in 
old times, though no one had been deposited in it for 


62 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


about two hundred years, and the bones of the 
others had been (as they said) removed long ago to a 
torere in the mountains. It seemed an awkward 
circumstance that there was some difference of 
opinion as to where this same wahi tapu was situated, 
being, and lying, for in case of my buying the land 
it was stipulated that I should fence it round and 
make no use of it, although I had paid for it. (I, 
however, have put off fencing till the exact bounda- 
ries have been made out; and indeed I don’t think I 
shall ever be called on to do so, the fencing proviso 
having been made, as I now believe, to give a 
stronger look of reality to the existence of the 
sacred spot, it having been observed that I had some 
doubts on the subject. No mention was eyer made 
of it after the payments had been all made, and so I 
think I may venture to affirm that the existence of 
the said waht tapu is of very doubtful authenticity, 
though it certainly cost me a round “ lot of trade.”) 
There was one old man who obstinately persisted in 
declaring that he, and he alone, was the sole and 
rightful owner of the land; he seemed also to have a 
“fixed idea” about certain barrels of gunpowder; 
but as he did not prove his claim to my satisfaction, 
and as he had no one to back him, I of course gave 
him nothing; he nevertheless demanded the gun- 
powder about once a month for five-and-twenty 
years, till at last he died of old age, and I am now a 
landed proprietor, clear of all claims and demands, 
and have an undeniable right to hold my estate as 
long as ever I am able. 


i, 


OLD NEW ZULALAND. 63 


It took about three months’ negotiation before the 
purchase of the land could be made; and, indeed, I 
at one time gave up the idea, as I found it quite im- 
possible to decide who to pay. If I paid one party, 
the others vowed I should never have possession, and 
to pay all seemed impossible; so at last I let all 
parties know that I had made up my mind not to 
have the land. This, however, turned out to be the 
first step I had made in the right direction; for, 
thereupon, all the different claimants agreed amongst 
themselves to demand a certain quantity of goods, 
and divide them amongst themselves afterwards. I 
was glad of this, for I wished to buy the land, as I 
thought, in case I should ever take a trip to the 
‘“‘ colonies,” it would look well to be able to talk of 
“my estate in New Zealand.” The day being now 
come on which I was to make the payment, and all 
parties present, I then and there handed over to the 
assembled mob the price of the land, consisting of a 
great lot of blankets, muskets, tomahawks, tobacco, 
spades, axes, &c. &c.; and received in return a very 
dirty piece of paper with all their marks on it, I 
- having written the terms of transfer on it in English to 
my own perfect satisfaction. The cost per acre to me 
was, as near as can be, about five and a half times 
what the same quantity of land would have cost me at 
the same time in Tasmania; but this was not of much 
importance, as the value of land in New Zealand then, 
and indeed now, being chiefly imaginary, one could just 
as easily suppose it to be of a very great value as a 
very small one; I therefore did not complain of the cost. 


64 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


While I am on the subject of land and land titles, 
I may as well here mention that many years after the 
purchase of my land I received notice to appear before 
certain persons called “‘ Land Commissioners,’ who 
were part and parcel of the new inventions which had 
come up soon after the arrival of the first governor, 
and which are still a trouble to the land. I was in- 
formed that I must appear and prove my title to the 
land I have mentioned, on pain of forfeiture of the 
same. Now I could not see what right any one could 
have to plague me in this way, and if I had had no 
one but the commissioners and two or three hundred 
men of their tribe to deal with, I should have put my 
pa in fighting order, and told them to ‘come on;” 
for before this time I had had occasion to build a pa, 
(a little misunderstanding,) and being a regularly 
naturalized member of a strong tribe, could raise men 
to defend it at the shortest notice. But somehow 
these people had cunningly managed to mix up the 
name of Queen Victoria, God bless her! (no dis- 
paragement to King Potatau) in the matter; and I, 
though a pakeha Maori, am a loyal subject to her 
Majesty, and will stick up and fight for her as long as 
ever I can muster a good imitation of courage ora leg 
to stand upon. This being the case, I made a very 
unwilling appearance at the court, and explained and 
defended my title to the land in an oration of four 
hours and a half’s duration; and which, though I was 
much out of practice, I flatter myself was a good 
specimen of English rhetoric, and which, for its own 
merits as well as for another reason which I was not 


OLD NEW ZHALAND. 65 


aware of at the time, was listened to by the court with 
the greatest patience. When I had concluded, and 
having been asked “‘if I had any more to say?” I 
saw the commissioner beginning to count my words, 
which had been all written, I suppose, in shorthand ; 
and having ascertained how many thousand I had 
spoken, he handed me a bill, in which I was charged 
by the word, for every word I had spoken, at the rate 
of one farthing and one twentieth per word. Oh, 
Cicero! Oh, Demosthenes! Oh, Pitt, Fox, Burke, 
Sheridan! Oh, Daniel O’Connell! what would have 
become of you, if such a stopper had been clapt on 
your jawing tackle? Fame would never have cracked 
her trumpet, and “ Dan” would never have raised the 
rint. For my part I have never recovered the shock. 
I have since that time become taciturn, and have 
adopted a Spartan brevity when forced to speak, and 
I fear I shall never again have the full swing of my 
mother tongue. JBesides this, I was charged ten 
shillings each for a little army of witnesses who I had 
brought by way of being on the sure side—five shil- 
lings a head for calling them into court, and five more 
for ‘examining ”’ them; said examination consisting 
of one question each, after which they were told to 
“be off.” I do believe had I brought up a whole 
tribe, as | had thoughts of doing, the commissioners 
‘vould not have minded examining them all. They 
were, [ am bound to say, very civil and polite; one 
of them told me I was ‘a damned, infernal, clever 
fellow, and he should like to see a good many more 
like me.” I hope I am not getting tedious, but this 
F 


66 OLD NEW ZEALAND, 


business made such an impression on me, that I can’t 
help being too prolix, perhaps, when describing it. I 
have, however, often since that time had my doubts 
whether the Queen (God bless her!) got the money or 
knew half as much of the affair as they wanted to 
make out. I don’t believe it. Our noble Queen 
would be clean above such a proceeding; and I mean 
to say it’s against Magna Charta, it is! ‘“ Justice 
shall not be sold,” saith Magna Charta; and if it’s not 
selling justice to make a loyal pakeha Maori pay for 
every word he speaks when defending his rights in a 
court of justice, I don’t know what is. 

Well, to make matters up, they after some time 
gave me a title for my land (as if I had not one 
before); but then, after some years, they made me 
give it back again, on purpose, as they said, that they 
might give me a better! But since that time several 
more years have passed, and I have not got it; so, as 
these things are now all the fashion, “I wish I may 
get 1.” 


CHapPTer VI. 


How I kept house.—Maori freebooters.— An ugly customer.— 
The “suaviter in modo.”—A single combat to amuse the ladies. 
—The true Maori gentleman.—Character of the Maori people. 


NEVER yet could get the proper knack 

of telling a story. Here I am now, a 
good forty years ahead of where I ought 
to be, talking of “title deeds” and 
‘‘land commissioners,” things belonging to the new 
and deplorable state of affairs which began when this 
country became ‘“‘a British colony and possession,” 
and also “‘ one of the brightest jewels in the British 
crown.” I must go back. 

Having purchased my “estate,” I set up house- 
keeping. My house was a good commodious raupo 
building; and as I hada princely income of a few 
hundred a year “in trade,” I kept house in a very 
magnificent and hospitable style. I kept always eight 
stout paid Maori retainers, the pay being one fig of 
tobacco per week, and their potatoes, which was about 
asmuch more. Their duties were not heavy; being 
chiefly to amuse themselves fishing, wrestling, shoot- 
ing pigeons, or pig-hunting, with an occasional pull in 
the boat when I went on a water excursion. Besides 


68 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


these paid retainers, there was always about a dozen 
hangers-on, who considered themselves a part of 
the establishment, and who, no doubt, managed to 
live at my expense; but as that expense was merely 
a few hundredweight of potatoes a week, and an odd 
pig now and then, it was not perceptible in the good 
old times. Indeed these hangers-on, as I call them, 
were necessary; for now and then, in those brave 
old times, little experiments would be made by certain 
Maori gentlemen of freebooting propensities, and who 
were in great want of “ British manufactures,” to see 
what could be got by bullying ‘‘ the pakeha,” and to 
whom a good display of physical force was the only 
argument worth notice. These gentry generally came 
from a long distance, made a sudden appearance, and, 
thanks to my faithful retainers, who, as a matter of 
course, were all bound to fight for me, though I 
should have found it hard to get much work out of 
them, made as sudden a retreat, though on one or two 
occasions, when my standing army were accidentally 
absent, I had to do battle single-handed. I think I 
have promised somewhere that I would perform a 
single combat for the amusement of the ladies, and so 
I may as well do it now as at any other time. I 
shall, therefore, recount a little affair I had with one 
of these gentry, as it is indeed quite necessary I should, 
if I am to give any true idea of ‘“‘ the good old times.” 
I must, however, protest against the misdeeds of a few 
ruffians—human wolves—being charged against the 
whole of their countrymen. At the time I am speaking 
of, the only restraint on such people was the fear of 


me 


OLD NEW ZHALAND. 69 


retaliation, and the consequence was, that often a 
dare-devil savage would run a long career of murder, 
robbery, and outrage before meeting with a check, 
simply from the terror he inspired, and the “luck” 
which often accompanies outrageous daring. Ata 
time, however, and in a country like New Zealand, 
where every man was a fighting man or nothing, these 

esperadoes, sooner or later, came to grief, being at 
last invariably shot, or run through the body, by 
some sturdy freeholder, whose rights they had in- 
vaded. I had two friends staying with me, young 
men who had come to see me from the neighbouring 
colonies, and to take a summer tour in New Zealand; 
and it so happened that no less than three times 
during my absence from home, and when I had taken 
almost all my people along with me, my castle had 
been invaded by one of the most notorious ruffians 
who had ever been an impersonation of, or lived by, 
the law of force. This interesting specimen of the 
genus homo had, on the last of these visits, demanded 
that my friends should hand over to him one pair of 
blankets; but as the prospectus he produced, with 
respect to payment, was not at all satisfactory, my 
friends declined to enter into the speculation, the 
more particularly as the blankets were mine. Our 
freebooting acquaintance then, to explain his views 
more clearly, knocked both my friends down; threat- 
ened to kill them both with his tomahawk; then 
rushed into the bed-room, dragged out all the bed- 
clothes, and burnt them on the kitchen fire. 

This last affair was rather displeasing to me. I 


70 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


held to the theory that every Englishman’s house was 
his castle, and was moreover rather savage at my 
guests having been so roughly handled. I in fact 
began to feel that though I had up to this time 
managed to hold my own pretty well, I was at last 
in danger of falling under the imposition of “ black 
mail,” and losing my status as an independent poten- 
tate—a rangatira of the first water. I then and there 
declared loudly that it was well for the offender that 
I had not been at home, and that if ever he tried his 
tricks with me he would find out his mistake. These 
declarations of war, I perceived, were heard by my 
men in a sort of incredulous silence, (silence in New 
Zealand gives dis-sent,) and though the fellows were 
stout chaps, who would not mind a row with any 
ordinary mortal, I verily believe they would have all 
ran at the first appearance of this redoubted ruffian. 
Indeed his antecedents had been such as might have 
almost been their excuse. He had killed several men 
in fair fight, and had also—as was well known—com- 
mitted two most diabolical murders, one of which was 
on his own wife, a fine young woman, whose brains 
he blew out at half a second’s notice for no further 
provocation than this :—He was sitting in the verandah 
of his house, and told her to bring him a light for his 
pipe. She, being occupied in domestic affairs, said, 
“ Can’t you fetch it yourself? I am going for water.” 
She had the calibash in her hand and their infant 
child on her back. He snatched up his gun and 
instantly shot her dead on the spot; and I had heard 
him afterwards describing quite coolly the comical 


OLD NEW ZHALAND. 71 


way in which her brains had been knocked out by 
the shot with which the gun was loaded. He also 
had, for some trifling provocation, lopped off the arm 
of his own brother or cousin, I forget which, and was, 
altogether, from his tremendous bodily strength and 
utter insensibility to danger, about as “ugly a 
customer” as one would care to meet. 

I am now describing a regular Maori ruffian of the 
good old times, the natural growth of a state of society 
wherein might was to a very great extent right, and 
where bodily strength and courage were almost the 
sole qualities for which a man was respected or 
valued. He was a bullet-headed, scowling, bow- 
legged, broad-shouldered, herculean savage, and all 
these qualifications combined made him unquestion- 
ably “a great rangatira,” and, as he had never been 
defeated, his mana was in full force. 

A few weeks after the affair of the blankets, as I 
was sitting all alone reading a Sydney newspaper, 
which, being only a year old, was highly interesting, 
my iriends and all my natives having gone on an 
expedition to haul a large fishing net, who should I 
see enter the room and squat down on the floor, as if 
taking permanent possession, but the amiable and 
highly interesting individual I have taken so much 
trouble to describe. He said nothing, but his posture 
and countenance spoke whole volumes of defiance 
and murderous intent. He had heard of the threats 
I had made against him, and there he was, let me 
turn him outif I dare. That was his meaning—there 
was no mistaking it. 


72 OLD NEW ZEALAND 


I have all my life been an admirer of the swaviter 
in modo, though it is quite out of place in New 
Zealand. If you tell a man—a Maori I mean—in a 
gentle tone of voice and with a quiet manner, that if 
he continues a given line of conduct you will begin to 
commence to knock him down, he simply disbelieves 
you, and thereby forces you to do that which, if you 
could have persuaded yourself to have spoken very 
uncivilly at first, there would have been no occasion 
for, I have seen many proofs of this, and though I 
have done my best for many years to improve the 
understanding of my Maori friends in this particular, 
I find still there are but very few who can understand 
at all how it is possible that the swaviter ir modo can 
be combined with the fortiter in re. They in fact 
can’t understand it for some reason perfectly inexplic- 
able to me. It was, however, quite a matter of in- 
difference, I could perceive, how I should open pro- 
ceedings with my friend, as he evidently meant 
mischief. ‘‘Habit is second nature,” so I instinctively 
took to the suaviter. “ Friend,” said I, in a very 
mild tone and with as amiable a smile as I could get 
up, in spite of a certain clenching of the teeth which 
somehow came on me at the moment, ‘‘ my advice to 
you is to be off.” Heseemed to nestle himself firmer 
in his seat, and- made no answer but a scowl of 
defiance. “I am thinking, friend, that this is my 
house,” said I, and springing upon him I placed my 
foot to his shoulder, and gave a shove which would 
have sent most people heels over head. Not so, how- 
ever, with my friend. It shook him, certainly, a 


a 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 73 


little; but in an instant, as quick as lightning, and as 
it appeared with a single motion, he bounded from 
the ground, flung his mat away over his head, and 
struck a furious blow at my head with his tomahawk. 
I escaped instant death by a quickness equal to or 
greater than his own. My eye was quick, and so was 
my arm; life was at stake. I caught the tomahawk 
in full descent; the edge grazed my hand; but my 
arm, stiffened like a bar of iron, arrested the blow. 
He made one furious, but ineffectual, effort to tear the 
tomahawk from my grasp; and then we seized one 
another round the middle, and struggled like maniacs 
in the endeavour to dash each other against the boarded 
floor, I holding on for dear life to the tomahawk, and 
making desperate efforts to get it from him, but with- 
out a chance of success, as it was fastened to his wrist 
by a strong thong of leather. He was, as I soon 
found, somewhat stronger than me, and heavier; but 
I was as active as a cat, and as long-winded as an 
emu, and very far from weak. At last he got a wiri 
round my leg ; and had it not been for the table on 
which we both fell, and which, in smashing to pieces, 
broke our fall, | might have been disabled, and in 
that case instantly tomahawked. We now rolled 
over and over on the floor like two mad bulldogs; he 
trying to bite, and I trying to stun him by dashing 
his bullet head against the floor. Up again!—still 
both holding on to the tomahawk. Another furious 
struggle, in the course of which both our heads, and 
half our bodies, were dashed through the two glass 
windows in the room, and every single article of fur- 


74: OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


niture was reduced to atoms. Down again, rolling 
like mad, and dancing about amongst the rubbish— 
the wreck of the house. By this time we were both 
covered with blood from various wounds, received I 
don’t know how. I had been all this time fighting 
under a great disadvantage, for my friend was trying 
to kill me, and I was only trying to disarm and tie 
him up—a much harder thing than to kill My 
reason for going to this trouble was, that as there 
were no witnesses to the row, if I killed him, I might 
have had serious difficulties with his tribe. Up again; 
another terrific tussle for the tomahawk; down again 
with a crash; and so this life or death battle went on, 
down and up, up and down, for a full hour. At last 
I perceived that my friend was getting weaker, and 
felt that victory was only now a question of time. 1, 
so far from being fatigued, was even stronger. 
Another desperate wrestling match. I lifted my 
friend high in my arms, and dashed him, panting, 
furious, foaming at the mouth, but beaten, against the 
ground. There he lies; the worshipper of force. His 
god has deserted him. But no, not yet. He has one 
more chance, and a fatal one it nearly proved to me. 
I began to unfasten the tomahawk from his wrist. 
An odd expression came over his countenance. He 
spoke for the first time. “Enough, I am beaten; let 
me rise.” Now I had often witnessed the manly and 
becoming manner in which some Maoris can take 
defeat, when they have been defeated in what they 
consider fair play. I had also ceased to fear my 
friend, and so incautiously let go his left arm. Like 


OLD NEW ZHALAND. 75 


lightning he snatched at a large carving fork which, 
unperceived by me, was lying on the floor amongst 
the smashed furniture and débris of my household 
effects ; his fingers touched the handle, and it rolled 
away out of his reach, and my life was saved. He 
then struck me with all his remaining force on the 
side of the head, causing the blood to flow out of my 
mouth. One more short struggle, and he was con- 
quered. But now I had at last got angry. The 
drunkenness, the exhilaration of fight, which comes 
on some constitutions, was fairly on me. I had also 
a consciousness that now I must kill my man, or, 
sooner or later, he would kill me. I thought of the 
place I would bury him ; how I would stun him first 
with the back of the tomahawk, to prevent too much 
blood being seen ; how I would then carry him off (I 
could carry two such men now, easy). I would 
murder him and cover him up. I unwound the 
tomahawk from his wrist: he was passive and help- 
less now. I wished he was stronger, and told him to 
get up and “die standing,” as his countrymen say. 
I clutched the tomahawk for the coup-de-grace, (I 
can’t help it, young ladies, the devil is in me,)—at 
this instant a thundering sound of feet is heard,— 
a whole tribe are coming! Now am I either lost or 
saved !—saved from doing that which I should after- 
wards repent, though constrained by necessity to do 
it. The rush of charging feet comes closer. In an 
instant comes dashing and smashing through doors 
and windows, in breathless haste and alarm, a whole 
tribe of friends. Small ceremony now with my an- 


76 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


tagonist. He was dragged by the heels, stamped on, 
kicked, and thrown half-dead, or nearly quite dead, 
into his canoe. All the time we had been fighting a 
little slave imp of a boy belonging to my antagonist 
had been loading the canoe with my goods and chat- 
tels, and had managed to make a very fair plunder of 
it. These were all now brought back by my friends, 
except one cloth jacket, which happened to be con- 
cealed under the wharikt, and which I only mention 
because I remember that the attempt to recover it 
some time afterwards cost one of my friends his life. 
The savage scoundrel who had so nearly done for 
me, broke two of his ribs, and so otherwise injured 
him that he never recovered, and died after lingering 
about a year. My friends were going on a journey, 
and had called to see me as they passed. They saw 
the slave boy employed as I have stated, and knowing 
to whom he belonged had rushed at once to the 
rescue, little expecting to find me alive. I may as 
well now dispose of this friend of mine by giving his 
after history. He for a long time after our fight 
went continually armed with a double gun, and said 
he would shoot me wherever he met me; he how- 
ever had had enough of attacking me in my “ castle,” 
and so did not call there any more. I also went 
continually armed, and took care also to have always 
some of my people at hand. After this, this fellow 
committed two more murders, and also killed in fair 
fight with his own hand the first man in a native 
battle, in which the numbers on each side were about 
three hundred, and which I witnessed. The man he 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 77 


killed was a remarkably fine young fellow, a great 
favourite of mine. At last, having attacked and 
attempted to murder another native, he was shot 
through the heart by the person he attempted to 
murder, and fell dead on the spot, and so there died 
““a oreat rangatira.” His tribe quietly buried him 
and said no more about it, which showed their sense 
of right. Had he been killed in what they considered 
an unjust manner, they would have revenged his 
death at any cost; but I have no doubt they themselves 
were glad to get rid of him, for he was a terror to all 
about him. I have been in many a scrape both by sea 
and land, but I must confess that I never met a more 
able hand at an argument than this Maori rangatira. 

I have not mentioned my friend’s name with whom 
I had this discussion on the rights of Englishmen, 
because he has left a son, who is a great rangatira, 
and who might feel displeased if I was too particular, 
and I am not quite so able now to carry out a “‘ face- 
to-face”’ policy as I was a great many years ago; 
besides there is a sort of ‘honour amongst thieves” 
‘ feeling between myself and my Maori friends on 
certain matters which we mutually understand are 
not for the ears of the “‘ new people.” 

Now, ladies, I call that a fairish good fight, con- 
sidering no one is killed on either side. I promise to 
be good in future and to keep the peace, if people 
will let me; and indeed, I may as well mention, that 
from that day to this I have never had occasion to 
explain again to a Maori how it is that “every 
Englishman’s house is his castle.” 


78 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


‘Fair play is a jewel;” and I will here, as bound 
in honour to do, declare that I have met amongst 
the natives with men who would.be a credit to any 
nation; men on whom nature had plainly stamped 
the mark of “‘ Noble,” of the finest bodily form, quick 
and intelligent in mind, polite and brave, and capable 
of the most self-sacrificing acts for the good of others; 
patient, forbearing, and affectionate in their families; 
in a word, gentlemen. These men were the more 
remarkable, as they had grown up surrounded by a 
set of circumstances of the most unfavourable kind 
for the development of the qualities of which they 
were possessed; and I have often looked on with 
admiration, when I have seen them protesting against, 
and endeavouring to restrain some of, the dreadful 
barbarities of their countrymen. 

As for the Maori people in general, they are neither 
so good or so bad as their friends and enemies have 
painted them, and I suspect are pretty much like 
what almost any other people would have become, if 
subjected for ages to the same external circumstances. 
For ages they have struggled against necessity in all 
its shapes. This has given to them a remarkable 
greediness for gain in every visible and immediately 
tangible form. It has even left its mark on their 
language. Without the aid of iron the most trifling 
tool or utensil could only be purchased by an enor- 
mously disproportionate outlay of labour in its con- 
struction, and, in consequence, became precious to a 
degree scarcely conceivable by people of civilised and 
wealthy countries. This great value attached to 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 79 


personal property of all kinds, increased proportion- 
ately the temptation to plunder; and where no law 
existed, or could exist, of sufficient force to repress 
the inclination, every man, as a natural consequence, 
became a soldier, if it were only for the defence of 
his own property and that of those who were banded 
with him—his tribe, or family. From this state of 
things regular warfare arose, as a matter of course; 
the military art was studied as a science, and brought 
to great perfection as applied to the arms used; and 
a marked military character was given to the people. 
The necessity of labour, the necessity of warfare, and 
a temperate climate, gave them strength of body, 
accompanied by a perseverance and energy of mind 
perfectly astonishing. With rude and blunt stones 
they felled the giant kauri—toughest of pines; and 
from it, in process of time, at an expense of labour, 
perseverance, and ingenuity perfectly astounding to 
those who know what it really was—produced, carved, 
painted, and inlaid, a masterpiece of art, and an object 
of beauty—the war canoe, capable of carrying a hun- 
dred men on a distant expedition, through the boister- 
ous seas surrounding their island. 

As a consequence of their warlike habits and cha- 
racter, they are self-possessed and confident in them- 
selves and their own powers, and have much diplo- 
matic finesse and casuistry at command. Their 
intelligence causes them theoretically to acknowledge 
the benefits of law, which they see established 
amongst us, but their hatred of restraint causes them 
practically to abhor and resist its full enforcement 


80 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


amongst themselves. Doubting our professions of 
friendship, fearing our ultimate designs, led astray 
by false friends, possessed of that “little learning” 
which is, in their case, most emphatically ‘a dan- 
gerous thing,” divided amongst themselves,—such 
are the people with whom we are now in contact,— 
such the people to whom, for our own safety and 
their preservation, we must give new laws and insti- 
tutions, new habits of life, new ideas, sentiments, and 
informationn—whom we must either civilise or by 
our mere contact exterminate. How is this to be 
done? Let me see. I think I shall answer this 
question when I am prime minister. 


1 PRINTER’S Duvin:—How is this to be done P—which ? what? 
—how ?—civilise or exterminate? PaxkEena Maort:—LHaha mau! 


CHAPTER VIL. 


Excitement caused by first contact with Huropeans.—The two 
great institutions of Maori land.—The Muru.—The Tapu.— 
Instances of legal robbery.—Descriptions and Examples of the 
Muru.—Profit and loss.—Explanation of some of the workings 
of the law of Muru. 


i. Laks ©) 
ifs 


EX hy 


HE natives have been for fifty years or 
é more in a continual state of excitement 
ni; hex on one subject or another, which has 
<3) hada markedly bad effect on their cha- 
racter and physical condition, as I shall by-and-by 
take occasion to point out. When the first strag- 
gling ships came here the smallest bit of iron was a 
prize so inestimable that I might be thought to exag- 
gerate were I to tell the bare truth on the subject. 
The excitement and speculation caused by a ship 
being seen off the coast was immense. Where would 
she anchor? What zron could be got from her? 
Would it be possible to seize her? The oracle was 
consulted, preparations were made to follow her along 
the coast, even through an enemy’s country, at all 
risks; and when she disappeared she was not for- 
gotten, and would continue long to be the subject of 
anxious expectation and speculation. 
G 


82 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


After this, regular trading began. The great mad- 
ness then was for muskets and gunpowder. A furious 
competition was kept up. Should any tribe fail to 
procure a stock of these articles as soon as its neigh- 
bours, extermination was its probable doom. We 
may then imagine the excitement, the over-labour, 
the hardship, the starvation (occasioned by crops 
neglected whilst labouring to produce flax or other 
commodity demanded in payment)—I say imagine, 
but I have seen at least part of it. 

After the demand for arms was supplied, came a 
perfect furore for iron tools, instruments of husbandry, 
clothing, and all kinds of pakeha manufactures. 
These things having been quite beyond their means 
while they were supplying themselves with arms, 
they were in the most extreme want of them, parti- 
cularly iron tools. A few years ago the madness 
ran upon horses and cattle; and now young New 
Zealand believes in nothing but money, and they 
are continually tormenting themselves with plans to 
acquire it in large sums at once, without the trouble 
of slow and saving industry, which, as applied to the 
accumulation of money, they neither approve of nor 
understand; nor will:they ever, as a people, take this 
mode till convinced that money, like everything else — 
of value, can only be procured as a rule by giving 
full value for it, either in labour or the produce of 
labour. 

- Here I am, I find, again before my story. Right. 
down to the present time talking of ‘young New 
Zealand,” and within a hair’s-breadth of settling 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 85 


“the Maori difficulty ” without having been paid for 
it, which would have been a great oversight, and con- 
trary to the customs of New Zealand. | must go back. 

There were in the old times two great institutions, 
which reigned with iron rod in Maori land—the Tapu 
and the Muru. Pakehas who knew no better, called 
the muru simply ‘‘ robbery,” because the word muru, 
in its common signification, means to plunder. But 
I speak of the regular legalized and established 
system of plundering as penalty for offences, which 
in a rough way resembled our law by which a man is 
obliged to pay “damages.” Great abuses had, how- 
ever, crept into this system—so great, indeed, as to 
render the retention of any sort of moveable pro- 
perty almost an impossibility, and to, in a great mea- 
sure, discourage the inclination to labour for its ac- 
quisition. These great inconveniences were, how- 
ever, met, or in some degree softened, by an expe- 
dient of a peculiarly Maori nature, which I shall by- 
and-by explain. The offences for which people were 
plundered were sometimes of a nature which, to a 
mere pakeha, would seem curious. A man’s child 
fell in the fire and was almost burnt to death. The 
father was immediately plundered to an extent that 
almost left him without the means of subsistence: 
fishing nets, canoes, pigs, provisions—all went. His 
canoe upset, and he and all his family narrowly 
escaped drowning—some were, perhaps, drowned. 
He was immediately robbed, and well pummelled 
with a club into the bargain, if he was not good at 
the science of self-defence—the club part of the 


84. OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


eeremony being always fairly administered one against 
one, and after fair warning given to defend himself. 
He might be clearing some land for potatoes, burning 
off the fern, and the fire spreads farther than he in- 
tended, and gets into a wahi tapu or burial-ground. 
No matter whether any one has been buried in it or 
no for the last hundred years, he is tremendously 
robbed. In fact, for ten thousand different causes a 
man might be robbed; and I can really imagine a 
case in which a man for scratching his own head 
might be legally robbed. Now, as the enforcers 
of this law were also the parties who received 
the damages, as well as the judges of the amount, 
which in many cases (such as that of the burnt 
child) would be everything they could by any means 
lay hands on, it is easy to perceive that under 
such a system personal property was an evanescent 
sort of thing altogether. These executions or dis- 
traints were never resisted; indeed, in many cases, as 
I shall explain by-and-by, it would have been felt as 
a slight, and even an insult, not to be robbed; the 
sacking of a man’s establishment being often taken as 
a high compliment, especially if his head was broken 
into the bargain; and to resist the execution would 
not only have been looked upon as mean and dis- | 
graceful in the highest degree, but at would have de- 
barred the contemptible individual from the privilege of 
robbing his neighbours, which was the compensating 
expedient I have alluded to. All this may seem a 
waste of words to my pakeha Maori readers, to whom 
these things have become such matters of course as 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 85 


to be no longer remarkable; but I have remembered 
that there are so many new people in the country 
who don’t understand the beauty of being knocked 
down and robbed, that I shall say a few more words 
on the subject. 

The tract of country inhabited bya single tribe 
might be say from forty to a hundred miles square, 
and the different villages of the different sections of 
the tribe would be scattered over this area at different 
distances from each other. We will, by way of illus- 
trating the working of the muru system, take the case 
of the burnt child. Soon after the accident it would 
be heard of in the neighbouring villages; the family 
of the mother are probably the inhabitants of one of 
them; they have, according to the law of muru, the 
first and greatest right to clean out the afflicted 
father—a child being considered to belong to the 
family of the mother more than to that of the father 
—in fact it is their child, who the father has the 
rearing of. The child was moreover a promising 
lump of a boy, the makings of a future warrior, and 
consequently very valuable to the whole tribe in 
general, but to the mother’s family in particular. 
“ A pretty thing to let him get spoiled.” Then he is 
a boy of good family, a rangatira by birth, and it 
would never do to let the thing pass without making 
a noise about it. That would be an insult to the 
dignity of the families of both father and mother. 
Decidedly, besides being robbed, the father must be 
assaulted with the spear. True, he is a famous 
spearman, and for his own credit must “ hurt” some 


86 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


one or another if attacked. But this is of no conse- 
quence; a flesh wound more or less deep is to be 
counted on; and then think of the plunder! It is 
against the law of muru that any one should be killed, 
and first blood ends the duel. Then the natural 
affection of all the child’s relations is great. They 
are all ina great state of excitement, and trying to 
remember how many canoes, and pigs, and other 
valuable articles, the father has got: for this must be 
a clean sweep. <A strong party is now mustered, 
headed probably by the brother of the mother of the 
child. He is-a stout chap, and carries a long tough 
spear. A messenger is sent to the father, to say that 
the taua muru is coming, and may be expected to- 
morrow, or the next day. He asks, “ Is it a great 
taua?” “ Yes; itis a very great taua indeed.” The 
victim smiles, he feels highly complimented, he is 
then a man of consequence. His child is also of great 
consideration; he is thought worthy of a large force 
being sent to rob him! Now he sets all in motion to 
prepare a huge feast for the friendly robbers his re- 
lations. He may as well be liberal, for his provisions 
are sure to go, whether or no. Pigs are killed and 
baked whole, potatoes are piled up in great heaps, all 
is made ready, he looks out his best spear, and keeps 
it always ready in his hand. At last the tawa appears 
on a hill half a mile off; then the whole fighting men 
of the section of the tribe of which he is an important 
member, collect at his back, all armed with spear and 
club, to show that they could resist if they would—a 
thing, however, not to be thought of under the cir- 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 87 


cumstances. On comes the taua. The mother begins 
to cry in proper form; the tribe shout the call of 
welcome to the approaching robbers; and then with 
a grand rush, all armed, and looking as if they in- 
tended to exterminate all before them, the haz muru 
appear on the scene. They dance the war dance, 
which the villagers answer with another. Then the 
chief’s brother-in-law advances, spear in hand, with 
the most alarming gestures. ‘‘ Stand up!—stand up! 
I will kill you this day,” is his cry. The defendant 
is not slow to answer the challenge. A most exciting, 
and what to a new pakeha would appear a most 
desperately dangerous, fencing bout with spears in- 
stantly commences. The attack and defence are in 
the highest degree scientific; the spear shafts keep 
up a continuous rattle; the thrust, and parry, and 
stroke with the spear shaft follow each other with 
almost incredible rapidity, and are too rapid to be 
followed by an unpractised eye. At last the brother- 
in-law is slightly touched; blood also drops from our 
chief’s thigh. The fight instantly ceases; leaning on 
their spears, probably a little badinage takes place 
between them, and then the brother-in-law roars out 
“murua!l murua! murua!” Then the new arrivals 
commence a regular sack, and the two principals sit 
down quietly with a few others for a friendly chat, in 
which the child’s name is never mentioned, or the 
inquiry as to whether he is dead or alive even made. 
The case I have just described would, however, be 
one of more than ordinary importance;  slighter 
“accidents and offences” would be atoned for by a 


88 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


milder form of operation. But the general effect was 
to keep personal property circulating from hand to 
hand pretty briskly, or indeed to convert it into 
public property; for no man could say who would 
be the owner of his canoe or blanket in a month’s 
time. Indeed, in that space of time, I once saw a 
nice coat, which a native had got from the captain of 
a trading schooner, and which was an article much 
coveted in those days, pass through the hands, and 
over the backs, of six different owners, and return, 
considerably the worse for wear, to the original pur- 
chaser; and all these transfers had been made by 
legal process of muru. I have been often myself paid 
the compliment of being robbed for little accidents 
occurring in my family, and have several times also, 
from a feeling of politeness, robbed my Maori friends, 
though I can’t say I was a great gainer by these 
transactions. I think the greatest haul I ever made 
was about half a bag of shot, which I thought a 
famous joke, seeing that I had sold it the day before 
to the owner for full value. A month after this I 
was disturbed early in the morning by a voice shout- 
ing, “Get up!—get up! I will kill you this day. 
You have roasted my grandfather. Get up!—stand 
up!” I, of course, guessed that I had committed 
some heinous though involuntary offence, and the 
“stand up” hinted the immediate probable conse- 
quences; so out I turned, spear in hand, and who 
should I see, armed with a bayonet on the end of a 
long pole, but my friend the umwhile owner of the 
bag of shot. He came at me with pretended fury, 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 89 


made some smart bangs and thrusts, which I parried, 
and then explained to me that I had “cooked his 
erandfather ;” and that if I did not come down 
handsome in the way of damages, deeply as he might 
regret the necessity, his own credit, and the law of 
muru, compelled him either to sack my house or die 
in the attempt. I was glad enough to prevent either 
event, by paying him two whole bags of shot, two 
blankets, divers fish-hooks, and certain figs of tobacco, 
which he demanded. I found that I had really and 
truly committed a most horrid crime. I had on a 
journey made my fire at the foot of a tree, in the top 
of which the bones of my friend’s grandfather had 
once been deposited, but from which they had been 
removed ten years before; the tree caught fire and 
had burnt down: and I, therefore, by a convenient 
sort of figure of speech, had “roasted his grand- 
father,’ and had to pay the penalty accordingly. 

It did not require much financial ability on my 
part, after a few experiences of this nature, to per- 
ceive that I had better avail myself of my privileges 
as a pakeha, and have nothing further to do with the 
law of muru—a determination I have kept to strictly. 
If ever I have unwittingly injured any of my neigh- 
bours, I have always made what I considered just 
compensation, and resisted the muru altogether; and 
I will say this for my friends, that when any of them 
have done an accidental piece of mischief, they have, 
in most cases without being asked, offered to pay 
for it. 

The above slight sketch of the penal law of New 


90 OLD NHW ZEALAND. 


Zealand I present and dedicate to the Law Lords of 
England, as it might, perhaps, afford some hints for a 
reform in our own. ‘The only remark I shall have to 
add is, that if a man killed another, ‘‘ malice prepense 
aforethought,” the act, In nineteen cases out of twenty, 
would be either a very meritorious one, or of no con- 
sequence whatever ; in either of which cases the penal 
code had, of course, nothing to do in the matter. If, 
however, a man killed another by accident, in the 
majority of cases the consequences would be most 
serious; and not only the involuntary homicide, but 
every one connected with him, would be plundered of 
everything they possessed worth taking. This, how- 
ever, to an English lawyer, may require some expla- 
nation, which is as follows:—If a man thought fit to 
kill his own slave, it was nobody’s affair but his own ; 
the law had nothing to do withit. If he killed a 
man of another tribe, he had nothing to do but 
declare it was in revenge or retaliation for some 
aggression, either recent or traditional, by the other 
tribe, of which examples were never scarce. In this 
case the action became at once highly meritorious, 
and his whole tribe would support and defend him to 
the last extremity. If he, however, killed a man by 
accident, the slain man would be, as a matter of 
course, in most instances, one of his ordinary com- 
panions—z.e., one of his own tribe. The accidental 
discharge of a gun often caused death in this way. 
Then, indeed, the law of muru had full swing, and the 
wholesale plunder of the criminal and family was the 
penalty. Murder, as the natives understood it—that 


OLD NEW ZHALAND. 91 


is to say, the malicious destruction of a man of the 
same tribe—did not happen as frequently as might be 
expected; and when it did, went in most cases un- 
punished; the murderer in general managing to escape 
to some other section of the tribe where he had rela- 
tions, who, as he fled to them for protection, were 
bound to give it, and always ready to do so; or other- 
wise he would stand his ground and defy all comers, 
by means of the strength of his own family or section, 
who all would defend him and protect him as a mere 
matter of course; and as the law of utu or lex talionis 
was the only one which applied in this case, and as, 
unlike the law of muru, nothing was to be got by en- 
forcing it but hard blows, murder in most cases went 
unpunished. 

{ And so, in this day, when a Maori, for some real or 
fancied injury, or as a means to elevate his name, kills 
some wretched white man, he nearly always goes un- 
punished. The Government ask for him to be given 
up, the tribe refuse, and there is an end of the 
matter.—Pembroke. | 


Bd. 


Cuapter VIII. 


The Muru falling into disuse.—Why ?—EHxamples of the 
Tapu.—tThe personal Tapu.—Evading the Tapu.—The under- 
taker’s Tapu.—How I got tabooed.—Frightful difficulties.— 
How I got out of them.—The war Tapu.—Maori war customs. 


HE law of muru is now but little used, » 
3) and only ona small scale. The dege- 

nerate men of the present day in general 

content themselves with asking “ pay- 
after some cavilling as to the amount, it 
is generally given; but if refused, the case is brought 
before a native magistrate, and the pleadings on 
both sides are often such as would astound our most 
famous barristers, and the decisions of a nature to 
throw those famous ones by Sancho Panza and Walter 
the Doubter for ever into the shade. 

I think the reason that the muru is so much less 
practised than formerly is the fact that the natives 
are now far better supplied with the necessaries and 
comforts of life than they were many years ago, espe- 
cially iron tools and utensils, and in consequence the 
temptation to plunder is proportionately decreased. 
Money would still be a temptation; but it is so easily 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 93 


concealed, and in general they have so little of it, that 
other means are adopted for its acquisition. When I 
first saw the natives, the chance of getting an axe or 
a spade by the short-hand process of muru, or—at a 
still more remote period—a few wooden implements, 
or a canoe, was so great that the lucky possessor was 
continually watched by many eager and observant 
eyes, in hopes to pick a hole in his coat, by which the 
muru might be legally brought to bear upon him. I[ 
say legally, for the natives always tried to have a 
sufficient excuse; and I absolutely declare, odd as it 
may seem, that actual, unauthorized, and inexcusable 
robbery or theft was less frequent than in any country 
I ever have been in, though the temptation to steal 
was a thousandfold greater. The natives of the pre- 
sent day are, however, improving in this respect, and, 
amongst other arts of civilization, are beginning to 
have very pretty notions of housebreaking, and have 
even tried highway robbery, though in a bungling 
way. The fact is they are just now between two 
tides. The old institutions which, barbarous and 
rude as they were, were respected and in some degree 
useful, are wearing out, and have lost all beneficial 
effect, and at the same time the laws and usages of 
civilization have not acquired any sufficient force. 
This state of things is very unfavourable to the morale 
of Young New Zealand; but it is likely to change 
for the better, for it 1s a maxim of mine that ‘“ laws, 
if not made, will grow.” 

I must now take some little notice of the other 
great institution, the tapu. The limits of these flying 


94: OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


sketches of the good old times will not allow of more 
than a partial notice of the all-pervading tapu. Earth, 
air, fire, water, goods and chattels, growing crops, 
men, women, and children,—everything absolutely 
was subject to its influence, and a more perplexing 
puzzle to new pakehas who were continually from 
ignorance infringing some of its rules, could not be 
well imagined. The natives, however, made con- 
siderable allowance for this ignorance, as well they 
might, seeing that they themselves, though from 
infancy to old age enveloped in a cloud of tapu, would 
sometimes fall into similar scrapes. 

The original object of the ordimary tapu seems to 
have been the preservation of property. Of this 
nature in a great degree was the ordinary personal 
tapu. This form of the tapu was permanent, and 
consisted in a certain sacred character which attached 
to the person of a chief and never left him. It was 
his birthright, a part in fact of himself, of which he 
could not be divested, and which was well understood 
and recognized at all times as a matter of course. The 
fighting men and petty chiefs, and every one indeed 
who could by any means claim the title of rangatira 
—which in the sense I now use it means gentleman— 
were all in some degree more or less possessed of this 
mysterious quality. It extended or was communicated 
to all their moveable property, especially to their 
clothes, weapons, ornaments, and tools, and to every- 
thing in fact which they touched. This prevented 


their chattels from being stolen or mislaid, or spoiled | 


by children, or used or handled in any way by others. 


ee ete i 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 95 


And as in the old times, as I have before stated, 
every kind of property of this kind was precious in 
consequence of the great labour and time necessarily, 
for want of iron tools, expended in the manufacture, 
this form of the tapu was of great real service. An 
infringement of it subjected the offender to various 
dreadful imaginary punishments, of which deadly 
sickness was one, as well as to the operation of the 
law of muru already mentioned. If the transgression 
was involuntary, the chief, or a priest, or tohunga, 
could, by a certain mystical ceremony, prevent or 
remit the doleful and mysterious part of the punish- 
ment if he chose, but the civil action, or the robbery 
by law of muru, would most likely have to take its 
course, though possibly in a mitigated form, according 
to the circumstances. 

I have stated that the worst part of the punish- 
ment of an offence against this form of the tapu was 
imaginary, but in truth, though imaginary it was not 
the less a severe punishment. ‘‘ Conscience makes 
cowards of us all,” and there was scarcely a man in a 
thousand, 2f one, who had sufficient resolution to dare 
the shadowy terrors of the tapu. I actually have 
seen an instance where the offender, though an in- 
voluntary one, was killed stone dead in six hours, by _ 
what I considered the effects of his own terrified 
imagination, but what all the natives at the time 
believed to be the work of the terrible avenger of the 
tapu. ‘The case I may as well describe, as it was a 
strong one, and shows how, when falsehoods are once 
believed, they will meet with apparent proof from 


96 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


accidental circumstances. A chief of very high rank, 
standing, and mana was on a war expedition; with 
him were about five hundred men. His own personal 
tapw was increased twofold, as was that of all the 
warriors who were with him, by the war tapu. The 
taua being on a very dangerous expedition, they were 
over and above the ordinary personal tapu made 
sacred in the highest degree, and were obliged to 
observe strictly several mysterious and sacred customs, 
some of which I may have to explain by-and-by. 
They were, in fact, as irreverent pakehas used to say, 
“tabooed an inch thick,” and as for the head chief, 
he was perfectly unapproachable. The expedition 
halted to dine. The portion of food set apart for the 
chief, in a neat paro or shallow basket of green flax 
leaves, was, of course, enough for two or three men, 
and consequently the greater part remained uncon- 
sumed. The party having dined, moved on, and 
soon after a party of slaves and others, who had been 
some mile or two in the rear, came up carrying am- 
munition and baggage. One of the slaves, a stout, 
hungry fellow, seeing the chief’s unfinished dinner, 
eat it up before asking any questions, and had hardly 
finished when he was informed by a horror-stricken 
individual—another slave who had remaimed behind 
when the tawa had moved on—of the fatal act he had 
committed. IJ knew the unfortunate delinquent well. 
He was remarkable for courage, and had signalized 
himself in the wars of the tribe. (The able-bodied 
slaves are always expected to fight in the quarrels of 
their masters, to do which they are nothing loth.) 


7 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 97 


No sooner did he hear the fatal news than he was 
seized by the most extraordinary convulsions and 
cramps in the stomach, which never ceased till he 
died, about sundown the same day. He was a strong 
man, in the prime of life, and if any pakeha free- 
thinker should have said he was not killed by the 
tapu of the chief, which had been communicated to 
the food by contact, he would have been listened to 
with feelings of contempt for his ignorance and in- 
ability to understand plain and direct evidence. 

It will be seen at once that this form of the tapu 
was a great preserver of property. The most valuable 
articles might, in ordinary circumstances, be left to 
its protection, in the absence of the owners, for any 
length of time. It also prevented borrowing and 
lending in a very great degree; and though much 
laughed at and grumbled at by unthinking pakehas, 
who would be always trying to get the natives to give 
it up, without offering them anything equally effec- 
tive in its place, or, indeed, knowing its real object or 
uses, it held its ground in full force for many years, 
and, in a certain but not so very observable a form, 
exists still. This form of the tapu, though latent in 
young folks of rangatira rank, was not supposed to 
develope itself fully till they had arrived at mature 
age, and set up house on their own account. The 
lads and boys “ knocked about” amongst the slaves 
and lower orders, carried fuel or provisions on their 
backs, and did all those duties which this personal 
tapu prevented the elders from doing, and which re- 
straint was sometimes very troublesome and inconve- 

H 


98 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


nient. A man of any standing could not carry pro- 
visions of any kind on his back, or if he did they 
were rendered tapu, and, in consequence, useless to 
any one but himself. If he went into the shed used 
as a kitchen (a thing, however, he would never think 
of doing except on some great emergency), all the 
pots, ovens, food, &c. would be at once rendered use- 
less—none of the cooks or inferior people could make 
use of them, or partake of anything which had been 
cooked in them. He might certainly light a little 
fire in his own house, not for cooking, as that never 
by any chance could be done in his house, but for 
warmth; but that, or any other fire, if he should have 
blown upon it with his breath in lighting it, became 
at once tapu, and could be used for no common or 
culinary purpose. Even to light a pipe at it would 
subject any inferior person, or In many instances an 
equal, to a terrible attack of the tapu morbus, besides 
being a slight or affront to the dignity of the person 
himself. I have seen two or three young men fairly 
wearing themselves out on a wet day and with bad 
apparatus trying to make fire to cook with, by rub- 
bing two sticks together, when on a journey, and at 
the same time there was a roaring fire close at hand 
at which several rangatira and myself were warming 
ourselves, but it was tapu, sacred fire—one of the 
rangatira had made it from his own tinder-box, and 
blown upon it in lighting it, and as there was not 
another tinder-box amongst us, fast we must, though 
hungry as sharks, till common culinary fire could be 
obtained <A native whose personal tapw was perhaps 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 99 


of the strongest, might, when at the house of a 
pakeha, ask for a drink of water; the pakeha, being 
green, would hand him some water in a glass, or in 
those days, more probably in a tea-cup; the native 
would drink the water, and then gravely and quietly 
break the cup to pieces, or otherwise he would appro- 
priate it by causing it to vanish under his mat. The 
new pakeha would immediately fly into a passion, to 
the great astonishment of the native, who considered, 
as a matter of course, that the cup or glass was, in the 
estimation of the pakeha, a very worthless article, or 
he would not have given it into his hand and allowed 
him to put it to his head, the part most strongly in- 
fected by the tapu. Both parties would be surprised 
and displeased; the native wondering what could have 
put the pakeha into such a taking, and the pakeha 
‘“ wondering at the rascal’s impudence, and what he 
meant by it?” The proper line of conduct for the 
pakeha in the above case made and provided, sup- 
posing him to be of a hospitable and obliging disposi- 
tion, would be to lay hold of some vessel containing 
about two gallons of water (to allow for waste), hold 
it up before the native’s face, the native would then 
stoop down and put his hand, bent into the shape of 
a funnel or conductor for the water, to his mouth; 
then, from the height of a foot or so, the pakeha 
would send a cataract of water into the said funnel, 
and continue the shower till the native gave a slight 
upward nod of the head, which meant “enough,” by 
which time, from the awkwardness of the pakeha, the 
two gallons of water would be about expended, half, 


100 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


at least, on the top of the native’s head, who would 
not, however, appear to notice the circumstance, and 
would appreciate the civility of his pakeha friend. I 
have often drank in this way in the old times; asking 
for a drink of water at a native village, a native would 
gravely approach with a calabash, and hold it up 
before me ready to pour forth its contents; I, of 
course, cocked my hand and lip in the most knowing 
manner. If I had laid hold of the calabash and 
drank in the ordinary way as practised by pakehas, I 
would have at once fallen in the estimation of all by- 
standers, and been set down as a tutwa—a nobody, 
who had no tapu or mana about him; a mere scrub 
of a pakeha, whom any one might eat or drink after 
without the slightest danger of being poisoned. These 
things are all changed now, and though I have often 
in the good old times been tabooed in the most 
diabolical and dignified manner, there are only a 
few old men left now who, by little unmistakable 
signs, I perceive consider it would be very uncivil to 
act in any way which would suppose my tapu to have 
disappeared before the influx of new-fangled pakeha 
notions. Indeed I feel myself sometimes as if I was 
somehow insensibly partially civilized. What it will 
all end in, I don’t know. 

This same personal tapw would even hold its own 
in some cases against the muru, though not in a sufii- 
ciently general manner to seriously affect the opera- 
tion of that well-enforced law. Its inconveniences 
were, on the other hand, many, and the expedients 
resorted to to avoid them were sometimes comical 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 101 


enough. I was once going on an excursion with a 
number of natives; we had two canoes, and one of 
them started a little before the other. I was with 
the canoe which had been left behind, and just as we 
were setting off it was discovered that amongst twenty 
stout fellows, my companions, there was no one who 
had a back !—as they expressed it—and, consequently, 
no one to carry our provisions into the canoe: all the 
lads, women, and slaves had gone off in the other 
canoe—all those who had backs—and so there we 
were left, a very disconsolate lot of rangatira, who 
could not carry their own provisions into the canoe, 
and who at the same time could not go without them. 
The provisions consisted of several heavy baskets of 
potatoes, some dried sharks, and a large pig baked 
whole. What was to be done? We were all brought 
to a full stop, though in a great hurry to goon. We 
were beginning to think we must give up the expedi- 
tion altogether, and were very much disappointed 
accordingly, when a clever fellow, who, had he been 
bred a lawyer, would have made nothing of driving a 
mail coach through an act of parliament, set us all to 
rights in a moment. “I'll tell you what we must do,” 
said he, “we will not carry (pzkau) the provisions, we 
will hike them.” (iki is the word in Maori which 
- describes the act of carrying an infant in the arms.) 
This was a great discovery! A huge handsome 
fellow seized on the baked pig and dandled it, or heki’d 
it, in his arms like an infant; another laid hold of a 
shark, others took baskets of potatoes, and carrying 
them in this way deposited them in the canoe. And 


102 OLD NHW ZHALAND. 


so, having thus evaded the law, we started on our ex- 
pedition. 

I remember another amusing instance in which the 
inconvenience arising from the tapu was evaded. I 
must, however, notice that these instances were only 
evasions of the tapu of the ordinary kind, what I have 
called the personal tapu, not the more dangerous and 
dreadful kind connected with the mystic doings of the 
tuhunga, or that other form of tapw connected with the 
handling of the dead. Indeed, my companions in the 
instance I have mentioned, though all rangatira, were 
young men on whom the personal tapu had not arrived 
at the fullest perfection ; it seemed, indeed, sometimes 
to sit very lightly on them, and I doubt very much if 
the play upon the words hike and pikaw would have 
reconciled any of the elders of the tribe to carrying a 
roasted pig in their arms, or if they did do so, I feel 
quite certain that no amount of argument would 
have persuaded the younger men to eat it; as for 
slaves or women, to look at it would almost be danger- 
ous to them. 

The other instance of dodging the law was as fol- 
lows :—I was the first pakeha who had ever arrived 
at a certain populous inland village. The whole of 
the inhabitants were in a great state of commotion 
and curiosity, for many of them had never seen a 
pakeha before. As I advanced, the whole juvenile 
population ran before me at a safe distance of about a 
hundred yards, eyeing me, as I perceived, with great 
terror and distrust. At last I suddenly made a charge 
at them, rolling my eyes and showing my teeth, and | 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 103 


to see the small savages tumbling over one another, 
and running for their lives, was something curious, 
and though my “demonstration ” did not continue 
more than twenty yards, I am sure some of the little 
villains ran a mile before looking behind to see 
whether the ferocious monster called a pakeha was 
gaining on them. They did run! [ arrived at the 
centre of the village, and was conducted to a large 
house or shed, which had been constructed as a place 
of reception for visitors, and as a general lounging 
place for all the inhabitants. It was a whare noa, a 
house to which, from its general and temporary uses, 
the tapu was not supposed to attach, I mean, of course, 
the ordinary personal tapu or tapu rangatira. Any 
person, however, znjected with any of the more serious 
or extraordinary forms of the tapu entering it, would 
at once render it uninhabitable. I took my seat. 
The house was full, and nearly the whole of the rest 
of the population were blocking up the open front of 
the large shed, all striving to see the pakeha, and 
passing to the rear from man to man every word he 
happened to speak. I could hear them say to the 
people behind, “‘ The pakeha has stood up!” ‘ Now 
he has sat down again!” ‘‘ He has said, how do you 
all do?” ‘He has said, this is a nice place of yours!’ 
etc.,etc. Now there happened to be at a distance an 
old gentleman engaged in clearing the weeds from a 
kumera or sweet potato field, and as the kumera in the 
old times was the crop on which the natives depended 
chiefly for support, like all valuable things it was tapu, 
and the parties who entered the field to remove the 


104 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


weeds were tapu, pro tem., also. Now one of the 
effects of this temporary extra tapu was that the 
parties could not enter any regular dwelling-house, or 
indeed any house used by others. Now the breach of 
this rule would not be dangerous in a personal sense, 
but the effect would be that the crop of sweet potatoes 
would fail. The industrious individual I have alluded 
to, hearing the cry of ‘“‘ A pakeha! a pakeha!” from 
many voices, and having never had an opportunity to 
examine that variety of the species, or genus homo, 
flung down his wooden kaheru or weed exterminator 
and rushed towards the town house before mentioned. 
What could he do? The tapu forbade his entrance, and 
the front was so completely blocked up by his admir- 
ing neighbours that he could not get sight of the 
wonderful guest. In these desperate circumstances a 
bright thought struck him; he would, by a bold and 
ingenious device, give the tapu the slip. He ran to 
the back of the house, made with some difficulty a 
hole in the padded raupo wall, and squeezed his head 
through it. The elastic wall of raupo closed again 
around his neck; the tapwu was fairly beaten! Noone 
could say he was zm the house. He was certainly 
more out than in, and there, seemingly hanging from 
or stuck against the wall, remained for hours, with 
open mouth and wondering eyes, this brazen head, 
till at last the shades of night obstructing its vision, a 
rustling noise in the wall of flags and reeds announced 
the departure of my bodyless admirer. 

Some of the forms of the tapu were not to be played 
with, and were of a most virulent kind. Of this kind 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 105 


was the tapu of those who handled the dead, or con- 
veyed the body to its last resting-place. This tapu 
was, in fact, the uncleanness of the old Jewish law, 
and lasted about the same time, and was removed in 
almost the same way. It was a most serious affair. 
The person who came under this form of the tapu was 
cut off from all contact, and almost all communication 
with the human race. He could not enter any house, 
or come in contact with any person or thing, without 
utterly bedevilmg them. He could not even touch 
food with his hands, which had become so frightfully 
tapu or unclean as to be quite useless. Food would 
be placed for him on the ground, and he would then 
sit or kneel down, and, with his hands carefully held 
behind his back, would gnaw it in the best way he 
could. In some cases he would be fed by another 
person, who, with outstretched arm, would manage to 
do it without touching the tapu’d individual; but this 
feeder was subjected to many and severe restrictions, 
not much less onerous than those to which the other 
was subject. In almost every populous native village 
there was a person who, probably for the sake of im- 
munity from labour, or from being good for nothing 
else, took up the undertaking business as a regular 
profession, and, in consequence, was never for a 
moment, for years together, clear of the horrid incon- 
veniences of the ¢apu, as well as its dangers. One of 
these people might be easily recognized, after a little 
experience, even by a pakeha. Old, withered, hag- 
gard, clothed in the most miserable rags, daubed all 
over from head to foot with red paint (the native 


106 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


funereal colour), made of stinking shark oil and red 
ochre mixed, keeping always at a distance, silent 
and solitary, often half insane, he might be seen 
sitting motionless all day at a distance, forty or 
fifty yards from the common path or thoroughfare of 
the village. There, under the “lee” of a bush, or 
tult of flax, gazing silently, and with “ lack-lustre 
eye,’ on the busy doings of the Maori world, of which 
he was hardly to be called a member. Twice a day 
some food would be thrown on the ground before him, 
to gnaw as best he might, without the use of hands; 
and at night, tightening his greasy rags around him, 
he would crawl into some miserable lair of leaves and 
rubbish, there, cold, half-starved, miserable, and dirty, 
to pass, in fitful ghost-haunted slumbers, a wretched 
night, as prelude to another wretched day. It re- 
quires, they say, all sorts of people to make a world; 
and I have often thought, in observing one of these 
miserable objects, that his or her’s was the very lowest 
ebb to which a human being’s prospects in life could 
be brought by adverse fate. When I met, or rather 
saw, a female practitioner, I fairly ran for it; and so, 
believing my readers to be equally tender-hearted, I 
shall not venture on any more description, but merely 
say that the man undertaker, such as I have described _ 
him, would be taken for Apollo if seen in one of these 
hag’s company. 

What will my kind reader say when I tell him that 
I myself once got tapw’d with this same horrible, 
horrible, most horrible style of tapu? I hold it to be 
a fact that there is not one man in New Zealand but 
myself who has a clear understanding of what the 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 107 


word ‘‘excommunication”” means, and I did not un- 
derstand what it meant till I got tapw’d. I was re- 
turning with about sixty men from a journey along 
the west coast. I was a short distance in advance of 
the party, when I came to where the side of a hill 
had fallen down on to the beach, and exposed a 
number of human bones. There was a large skull 
rolling about in the water. I took up this skull with- 
out consideration, carried it to the side of the hill, 
scraped a hole, and covered it up. Just as I had 
finished covering it up, up came my friends, and I saw 
at once, by the astonishment and dismay depicted on 
their countenances, that I had committed some most 
unfortunate act. They soon let me know that the 
hill had been a burying-place of their tribe, and 
jumped at once to the conclusion that the skull was 
the skull of one of their most famous chiefs, whose 
name they told me, informing me also that I was no 
1 nger fit company for human beings, and begging me 
to fall to the rear and keep my distance. They told 
me all this from a very respectful distance, and if I 
made a step towards them, they all ran as if I had 
been infected by the plague. This was an awkward 
state of things, but as it could not be helped, I voted 
myself tapu, and kept clear of my friends till night. 
At night when they camped I was obliged to take my 
solitary abode at a distance, under shelter of a rock. 
When the evening meal was cooked, they brought me 
a fair allowance, and set it down at a respectful 
distance from where I sat, fully expecting, I suppose, 
that I should bob at it as Maori haz tango atua or un- 
dertakers are wont to do. I had, however, no idea of 


108 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


any such proceeding; and pulling out my knife pro- 
ceeded to operate in the usual manner. I was checked 
by an exclamation of horror and surprise from the 
whole band, “Oh, what are you about, you are not 
going to touch food with your hands?” ‘Indeed, 
but I am,” said I, and stretched out my hand. Here 
another scream—“ You must not do that, it’s the 
worst of all things; one of us will feed you; it’s 
wrong, wrong, very wrong!” ‘Oh, bother,” said I, 
and fell to at once. I declare positively I had no 
sooner done so than I felt sorry. The expression of 
horror, contempt, and pity observable in their faces, 
convinced me that I had not only offended and hurt 
their feelings, but that I had lowered myself greatly 
in their estimation. Certainly I was a pakeha, and 
pakehas will do most unaccountable things, and may 
be, mn ordinary cases, excused; but this, I saw at 
once, was an act which, to my friends, seemed the ne 
plus ultra of abomination. I now can well understand 
that I must have, sitting there eating my potatoes, 
appeared to them a ghoul, a vampire—worse than 
even one of their own dreadful atua, who, at the com- 
mand of a witch, or to avenge some breach of the 
tapu, enters into a man’s body and slowly eats away 
his vitals. I can see it now, and understand what a 
frightful object I must have appeared. My friends 
broke up their camp at once, not feeling sure, after 
what I had done, but I might walk in amongst them 
in the night, when they were asleep, and bedevil them 
all. They marched all night, and in the morning 
came to my house, where they spread consternation 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 109 


and dismay amongst my household by telling them in 
what a condition I was coming home. The whole of 
my establishment at this time being natives, they ran 
at once; and when I got home next evening, hungry 
and vexed, there was not a soul to be seen. The 
house and kitchen were shut up, fires out, and, as I 
fancied, everything looked dreary and uncomfortable. 
If only a dog had come and wagged his tail in wel- 
come, it would have been something; but even my 
dog was gone. Certainly there was an old tom cat, 
but I hate cats, there is no sincerity in them, and so 
I had kicked this old tom on principle whenever he 
came in my way, and now, when he saw me, he ran 
for his life into the bush. The instinct of a hungry 
man sent me into the kitchen; there was nothing eat- 
able to be seen but a raw leg of pork, and the fire was 
out. I now began to suspect that this attempt of 
mine to look down the tapu would fail, and that I 
should remain excommunicated for some frightfully 
indefinite period. I began to think of Robinson 
Crusoe, and to wonder if I could hold out as well as 
he did. Then I looked hard at the leg of pork. The 
idea that I must cook for myself brought home to me 
the fact more forcibly than anything else how I had 
“fallen from my high estate’—cooking being the 
very last thing a rangatira can turn his hand to. But 
why should [ have anything more to do with cook- 
ing? Was I not cast off and repudiated by the 
human race? (A horrible misanthropy was fast 
taking hold of me.) Why should I not tear my leg 


of pork raw, like a wolf? “I will run a muck!” 


110 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


suddenly said I. “I wonder how many I can kill 
before they ‘bag’ me? I will kill, kill, kill! but—I 
must have some supper.” 

I soon made a fire, and after a little rummaging 
found the matériel for a good meal. My cooking was 
not so bad either, I thought ; but certainly hunger 
is not hard to please in this respect, and I had eaten 
nothing since the diabolical meal of the preceding 
evening, and had travelled more than twenty miles. 
I washed my hands six or seven times, scrubbing 
away and muttering with an intonation that would 
have been a fortune to a tragic actor. ‘“ Out, damned 
spot;” and so, after having washed and dried my 
hands, looked at them, returned, and washed again, 
again washed, and so on several times, I sat down 
and demolished two days’ allowance. After which, 
reclining before the fire with my pipe and a blanket 
over my shoulders, a more kindly feeling towards my 
fellow men stole gradually upon me. ‘I wonder,” 
said I to myself, “how long this devilish tapw will 
last! I wonder if there is to be any end at all to it! 
I won’t run a muck for a week, at all events, till I 
see what may turn up. Confounded plague though 
to have to cook!” Having resolved as above, not to 
take any one’s life for a week, I felt more patient. © 
Four days passed somehow or another, and on the 
morning of the fifth, to my extreme delight, I saw a 
small canoe, pulled by one man, landing on the beach 
before the house. He fastened his canoe and ad- 
vanced towards the kitchen, which was .detached 
from the house, and which, in the late deplorable 


, » 
 " S 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 1il 


state of affairs, had become my regular residence. 
I sat in the doorway, and soon perceived that my 
visitor was a famous tohunga, or priest, and who also 
had the reputation of being a witch of no ordinary 
dimensions. He was an old, grave, stolid-looking 
savage, with one eye, the other had been knocked 
out long ago in a fight before he turned parson. On 
he came, with a slow, measured step, slightly gesti- 
culating with one hand, and holding in the other 
a very small basket, not more than nine or ten 
inches long. He came on, mumbling and grumbling 
a perfectly unintelligible karakia or incantation. I 
guessed at once he was coming to disenchant me, 
and prepared my mind to submit to any conditions or 
ceremonial he should think fit to impose. My old 
friend came gravely up, and putting his hand into 
the little basket pulled out a baked kumera, saying, 
‘‘ He kat mau.” I of course accepted the offered 
food, took a bite, and as I ate he mumbled his incanta- 
tion over me. I remember I felt a curious sensation 
at the time, like what I fancied. a man must feel who 
had just sold himself, body and bones, to the devil. 
For a moment I asked myself the question whether 
I was not actually being then and there handed over 
to the powers of darkness. The thought startled me. 
There was I, an unworthy bift believing member of 
the Church of England as by Parliament established, 
‘“‘Inuckling down” abjectly to the ministration of a 
ferocious old cannibal, wizard, sorcerer, high priest, 
—as it appeared very probable,—to Satan himself: 
“Blacken his remaiming eye! knock him over and 


112 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


run the country!” whispered quite plainly m my ear 
my guardian angel, or else a little impulsive sprite 
who often made suggestions to me in those days. 
For a couple of seconds the sorcerer’s eye was in des- 
perate danger; but just in those moments the cere- 
mony, or at least this most objectionable part of it, 
came to an end. He stood back and said, “ Have 
you been in the house?” Fortunately I had pre- 
sence of mind enough to forget that I had, and said, 
“¢ No.” - “ Throw out all those pots and kettles.” I 
saw it was no use to resist—so out they went. 
“Fling out those dishes” was the next command. 
“The dishes?—they will break.” ‘I am going to 
break them all.” Capital fun this—out go the dishes ; 
“and may the ——.” I fear I was about to say 
something bad. ‘Fling out those knives, and those 
things with sharp points”—/(the old villain did not 
know what to call the forks!)—‘ and those shells 
with handles to them ”—(spoons !)—‘‘ out with every- 
thing.” The last sweeping order is obeyed and the 
kitchen is fairly empty. The worst is over now at 
last, thank goodness, said I to myself. ‘‘ Strip off all 
your clothes.” ‘What? strip naked! you desperate 
old thief—mind your eye.” Human patience could 
bear no more. OutI jumped. I did “strip.” Off 
came my jacket. ‘How would you prefer being 
killed, old ruffian? can you do anything in this 
way?” (Here a pugilistic demonstration.) “ Strip! 
he doesn’t mean to give me five dozen, does he?” said 
I, rather bewildered, and looking sharp to see if he 
had anything like an instrument of flagellation in 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 113 


his possession. ‘Come on! what are you waiting 
for?” said I. In those days, when labouring under 
what Dickens calls the “description of temporary 
insanity which arises from a sense of injury,” I 
always involuntarily fell back upon my mother tongue, 
which in this case was perhaps fortunate, as my necro- 
mantic old friend did not understand the full force of 
my eloquence. He could not, however, mistake my 
warlike and rebellious attitude, and could see clearly 
I was going into one of those most unaccountable rages 
that pakehas were liable to fly into, without any im- 
aginable cause. ‘ Boy,” said he, gravely and quietly, 
and without seeming to notice my very noticeable de- 
claration of war and independence, “don’t act fool- 
ishly ; don’t gomad. No one willever come near you 
while you have those clothes. You will be miserable 
here by yourself. And what is the use of being angry? 
what will anger do for you?” The perfect coolness 
of my old friend, the complete disregard he paid to 
my explosion of wrath, as well as his reasoning, 
began to make me feel a little disconcerted. He 
evidently had come with the purpose and intention 
to get me out of a very awkward scrape. I began 
also to feel that, looking at the affair from his point 
of view, I was just possibly not making a very 
respectable figure; and then, if I understood him 
rightly, there would be no flogging. ‘‘ Well,” said I, 
at last, ‘‘ Fate compels; to fate, and not old Hurlo- 
thrumbo there, I yield—so here goes.’ Let me not 
dwell upon the humiliating concession to the powers 
of tapu. Suflice it to say, I disrobed, and received 
I 


114 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


permission to enter my own house in search of other 
garments. When I came out again, my old friend 
was sitting down with a stone in his hand, battering 
the last pot to pieces, and looking as if he was per- 
forming a very meritorious action. He carried away 
all the smashed kitchen utensils and my clothes in 
baskets, and deposited them in a thicket at a consi- 
derable distance from the house. (I stole the knives, 
forks, and spoons back again some time after, as he 
had not broken them.) He then bid me good-bye, 
and the same evening all my household came flock- 
ing back; but years passed before any one but 
myself would go into the kitchen, and I had to build 
another. And for several years also I could observe, 
by the respectable distance kept by young natives 
and servants, and the nervous manner with which 
they avoided my pipe in particular, that they consi- 
dered I had not been as completely purified from the 
tapu tango atua as I might have been. I now am 
aware, that in consideration of my being a pakeha, 
and also perhaps, lest driven to desperation, I should 
run away entirely, which would have been looked upon 
as a great misfortune to the tribe, I was let off very 
easy, and might. therefore be supposed to retain some 
tinge of the dreadful infection. 

Besides these descriptions of tapu, there were 
many others. There was the war tapu, which in 
itself included fifty different ‘sacred customs,” one 
of which was this—that often when the fighting 
men left the pa or camp, they being themselves made 
tapu, or sacred, as in this particular case the word 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 115 


means, all those who remained behind, old men, 
women, slaves, and all non-combatants were obliged 
strictly to fast while the warriors were fighting; and, 
indeed, from the time they left the camp till their 
return, even to smoke a pipe would be a breach of 
this rule. These war customs, as well as other forms 
of the tapu, are evidently derived from a very ancient 
religion, and did not take their rise in this country. 
I shall probably, some of these days, treat of them 
at more length, and endeavour to trace them to their 
source. 

Sacrifices were often made to the war demon, and 
I know of one instance in which, when a tribe were 
surrounded by an overwhelming force of their ene- 
mies, and had nothing but extermination, immediate 
and unrelenting, before them, the war chief cut out 
the heart of his own son as an offering for victory, and 
then he and his tribe, with the fury of despair and the 
courage of fanatics, rushed upon the foe, defeated 
them with terrific slaughter, and the war demon had 
much praise, and many men were eaten. 

The warriors, when on a dangerous expedition, also 
observed strictly the custom to which allusion is 
made. 1 Samuel, xxi. 4-5. 


CHAPTER IX. 


The Tapu Tohunga.—The Maori oracle-—Responses of the 
oracle.—Priestcraft. 


YON PMIOS ES 


—<") 


hes 


HEN came the tapu tohunga, or priest’s 
tapu, a quite different kind or form of 
X* tapu from those which I have spoken of. 
x03) These tohunga presided over all those 
ceremonies and customs which had something ap- 
proaching to a religious character. They also pre- 
tended to the power, by means of certain familiar 
spirits, to foretell future events, and even in some 
cases to control them. The belief in the power of 
these tohunga to foretell events was very strong, and 
the incredulous pakeha who laughed at them was 
thought a person quite incapable of understanding 
plain evidence. I must allow that some of their pre- 
dictions were of a most daring nature, and happening 
to turn out perfectly successful, there may be some 
excuse for an ignorant people believing im them. 
Most of these predictions were, however, given, like 
the oracles of old, in terms which would admit a 
double meaning, and secure the character of the sooth- 
sayer no matter how the event turned out. It is also 


ail 


OLD NHW ZEALAND. 117 


remarkable that these tohunga did not pretend to 
divine future events by any knowledge or power exist 
ing in themselves ; they pretended to be for the time 
inspired by the familiar spirit, and passive in his 
hands. This spirit ‘‘entered into” them, and, on 
being questioned, gave a response in a sort of half- 
whistling, half-articulate voice, supposed to be the 
proper language of spirits; and I have known a 
tohunga who, having made a false prediction, laid the 
blame on the “ tricksey spirit,” who he said had pur- 
posely spoken false for certain good and sufficient 
spiritual reasons, which he then explained. Amongst 
the fading customs and beliefs of the good old times 
the tohunga still holds his ground, and the oracle is as 
often consulted, though not so openly, as it was a 
hundred years ago, and is as firmly believed in, and 
this by natives who are professed Christians; and the 
inquiries are often on subjects of the most vital im- 
portance to the welfare of the colony. A certain 
tohunga has even quite lately, to my certain know- 
ledge, been paid a large sum of money to do a 
miracle! J saw the money paid, and I saw the 
miracle. And the miracle was a good enough sort of 
miracle, as miracles go in these times. The natives 
know we laugh at their belief in these things. They 
would much rather we were angry, for then they 
would defy us; but as we simply laugh at their 
credulity, they do all they can to conceal it from us; 
but nevertheless the chiefs, on all matters of import- 
ance, continue to consult the Maori oracle. 

I shall give two instances of predictions which came 


118 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


under my own observation, and which will show how 
much the same priestcraft has been in all times. 

A man—a petty chief—had a serious quarrel with 
his relations, left his tribe, and went to a distant part 
of the country, saying that he cast them off, and 
would never return. After a time the relations be- 
came both uneasy at his absence and sorry for the 
disagreement. The presence of the head of the 
family was also of consequence to them. They there- 
fore inquired of the oracle if he would return. At 
night the tohunga imvoked the familiar spirit, he 
became inspired, and in a sort of hollow whistle came 
the words of fate:—‘ He will return, but yet not 
return.” This response was given several times, and 
then the spirit departed, leaving the priest or tohunga 
to the guidance of his own unaided wits. No one 
could understand the meaning of the response. The 
priest himself said he could make nothing of it. The 
spirit of course knew his own meaning; but all 
agreed that, whatever that meaning was, it would 
turn out true. Now the conclusion of this story is 
rather extraordinary. Some time after this several 
of the chief’s relations went to offer reconciliation 
and to endeavour to persuade him to return home. 
Six months afterwards they returned, bringing him ~ 
along with them a corpse; they had found him 
dying, and carried his body home. Now all knew 
the meaning of the words of the oracle, “ He will 
return, but yet not return.” 

Another instance, which I witnessed myself, was 
as follows:—A captain of a large ship had run away 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 119 


with a Maori girl; or a Maori girl had run away 
with a ship captain; I should not like to swear which 
is the proper form of expression; and the relations, 
as in such cases happens in most countries, thought 
it incumbent on them to get into a great taking, and 
make as much noise as possible about the matter. 
Off they set to the tohunga; I happened to be at his 
place at the time, and saw and heard all I am about 
to recount. The relations of the girl did not merely 
confine themselves to asking questions, they demanded 
active assistance. The ship had gone to sea loaded 
for along voyage. The fugitives had fairly escaped ; 
and what the relations wanted was that the atua, or 
familiar spirit of the tohunga, should bring the ship 
back into port, so that they might have an oppor- 
tunity to recover the lost ornament of the family. 
I heard the whole. The priest hummed and hawed. 
‘“‘ He did not know, could not say. We should hear 
what the ‘boy’ would say. He would do as he 
_ liked. Could not compel him;” and so forth. At 
night all assembled in the house where the priest 
usually performed. All was expectation. I saw I was 
de trop in the opinion of our soothsayer; in fact, I 
had got the name of an infidel (which I have since 
taken care to get rid of), and the spirit was unwilling 
to enter the company of unbelievers. My friend the 
priest hinted to me politely that a nice bed had been 
made for me in the next house. I thanked him in 
the most approved Maori fashion, but said I was 
“‘very comfortable where I was;” and, suiting the 
action to the word, rolled my cloak about me, and 


120 OLD NHW ZEALAND. 


lay down on the rushes with which the floor was 
covered. About-midnight I heard the spirit saluting 
the guests, and they saluting him; and I also noticed 
they hailed him as “ relation,” and then gravely pre- 
ferred the request that he would ‘drive back the ship 
which had stolen his cousin.” The response, after a 
short time, came in the hollow, mysterious, whistling 
voice,—“‘ The ship’s nose I will batter out on the 
great sea.” This answer was repeated several times, 
and then the spirit departed and would not be re- 
called. The rest of the night was spent in conjec- 
turing what could be the meaning of these words. 
All agreed that there must be more in them than 
met the ear; but no one could say it was a clear 
concession of the request made. As for the priest, 
he said he could not understand it, and that ‘ the 
spirit was a great rogue ”—a koroke hangareka. He, 
however, kept throwing out hints now and then that 
something more than common was meant, and talked 
generally in the “we shall see” style. Now here 
comes the end of the affair. About ten days after 
this in comes the ship. She had been “battered” 
with a vengeance. She had been met by a terrible 
gale when a couple of hundred miles off the land, 
and had sprung a leak in the bow. The bow in 
Maori is called the “nose” (thu). The vessel had 
been in great danger, and had been actually forced 
to run for the nearest port, which happened to be 
the one she had left. Now, after such a coincidence 
as this, I can hardly blame the ignorant natives for 
believing in the oracle, for I actually caught myself 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 121 


quoting, ‘“‘Can the devil speak truth?” Indeed I 
have in the good old times known several pakehas 
who “thought there was something in it,” and two 
who formally and believingly consulted the oracle, 
and paid a high douceur to the priest. 

I shall give one more instance of the response of 
the Maori oracle. A certain northern tribe, noted 
for their valour, but not very numerous, sent the 
whole of their best men on a war expedition to the 
south. This happened about forty years ago. Be- 
fore the tawa started the oracle was consulted, and 
the answer to the question, “Shall this expedition 
be successful?” came. ‘‘ A desolate country !—a de- 
solate country!—a desolate country!” This the 
eager warriors accepted as a most favourable re- 
sponse. They said the enemy’s country would be 
desolated. It, however, so turned out that they 
were all exterminated to a man, and the miserable 
remnant of their tribe, weakened and rendered help- 
less by their loss, became a prey to their more imme- 
diate neighbours, lost their lands, and have ceased 
from that day to be heard of as an independent tribe. 
So, in fact, it was the country of the eager inquirers 
which was laid “ desolate.” Every one praised the 
oracle, and its character was held higher than ever. 


CHAPTER X. 


The priest evokes a spirit.—The consequences.—A Maori 
tragedy. The “ Tohunga”’ again. 


WHESE priests or tohunga would, and dc 
) to this hour, undertake to call up the 
spirit of any dead person, if paid for the 
same. I have seen many of these ex- 
hibitions, but one instance will suffice as an example. 


A young chief, who had been very popular and 
greatly respected in his tribe, had been killed in 
battle, and, at the request of several of his nearest 
friends, the tohunga had promised on a certain night 
to call up his spirit to speak to them, and answer cer- 
tain questions they wished to put. The priest was to 
come to the village of the relations, and the interview 
was to take place in a large house common to all the 
population. This young man had been a great friend 
of mine; and so, the day before the event, I was sent 
to by his relations, and told that an opportunity 
offered of conversing with my friend once more. | 
was not much inclined to bear a part in such out- 
rageous mummery, but curiosity caused me to go. 
Now it is necessary to remark that this young chief 


OLD NEW ZHALAND. 123 


was a man in advance of his times and people in many 
respects. He was the first of his tribe who could 
read and write; and, amongst other unusual things 
for a native to do, he kept a register of deaths and 
births, and a journal of any remarkable events which 
happened in the tribe. Now this book was lost. No 
one could find it, although his friends had searched 
unceasingly for it, as it contained many matters of 
interest, and also they wished to preserve it for his 
sake. I also wished to get it, and had often inquired 
if it had been found, but had always been answered in 
the negative. The appointed time came, and at night 
we all met the priest in the large house I have men- 
tioned. Fires were lit, which gave an uncertain, 
flickering light. The priest retired to the darkest 
corner. All was expectation, and the silence was 
only broken by the sobbing of the sister and other fe- 
male relations of the dead man. They seemed to be, 
and indeed were, in an agony of excitement, agitation, 
and grief. This state of things continued for a long 
time, and I began to feel in a way surprising to my- 
self, as if there was something real in the matter. 
The heart-breaking sobs of the women, and the grave 
and solemn silence of the men, convinced me that, to 
them at least, this was a serious matter. I saw the 
brother of the dead man now and then wiping the 
tears in silence from his eyes. I wished I had not 
come, for I felt that any unintentional symptom of in- 
credulity on my part would shock and hurt the feel- 
ings of my friends extremely; and yet, whilst feeling 
thus, I felt myself more and more near to believing in 


124 OLD NEW ZLALAND. 


the deception about to be practised. The real grief, 
and also the general undoubting faith, in all around 
me, had this effect. We were all seated on the rush- 
strewn floor, about thirty persons. The door was 
shut; the fire had burnt down, leaving nothing but 
glowing charcoal. The room was oppressively hot. 
The light was little better than darkness, and the part 
of the room in which the tohunga sat was now in per- 
fect darkness. Suddenly, without the slightest warn- 
ing, a voice came out of the darkness. “Salutation !— 
salutation to you all!—salutation !—salutation to you, 
my tribe!—family, I salute you!—friends, I salute 
you !—friend, my pakeha friend, I salute you!”’ The 
high-handed, daring imposture was successful; our 
feelings were taken by storm. A cry expressive of 
affection and despair, such as was not good to hear, 
came from the sister of the dead chief, a fine, stately, 
and really handsome woman of about five-and-twenty. 
She was rushing, with both arms extended, into the 
dark, in the direction from whence the voice came. 
She was instantly seized round the waist and re- 
strained by her brother by main force, till moaning 
and fainting she lay still on the ground. Atthe same 
instant another female voice was heard from a young 
girl who was held by the wrists by two young men, 
her brothers. ‘‘Isit you?—is it you?—truly is it you ?— 
aue! aue! they hold me, they restrain me; wonder 
not that I have not followed you; they restrain me, 
they watch me, but I go to you. The sun shall not 
rise, the sun shall not rise, awe! awe!” Here she fell 
insensible on the rush floor, and with the sister was 


OLD NEW ZHALAND. 125 


carried out. The remaining women were all weeping 
and exclaiming, but were silenced by the men, who 
were themselves nearly as much excited, though not 
so clamorous. I, however, did notice two old men, 
who sat close to me, were not in the slightest degree 
moved in any way, though they did not seem at all 
incredulous, but quite the contrary. The spirit spoke 
again. ‘‘ Speak to me, the tribe!—speak to me, the 
family !—speak to me, the pakeha!” The “‘ pakeha,” 
however, was not at the moment inclined for conver- 
sation. The deep distress of the two women, the 
evident belief of all around him of the presence of the 
spirit, the “darkness visible,’ the novelty of the 
scene, gave rise to a state of feeling not favourable to 
the conversational powers. Besides, I felt reluctant 
to give too much apparent credence to an imposture, 
which at the very same time, by some strange im- 
pulse, I felt half ready to give way to. At last the 
brother spoke. “ How is it with you?—is it well with 
you in that country?” The answer came—(the voice 
all through, it is to be remembered, was not the voice 
of the tohunga, but a strange melancholy sound, like 
the sound of the wind blowing into a hollow vessel), 
—‘]I¢ is well with me; my place is a good place.” 
The brother spoke again. ‘‘ Have you seen 
and ——, and °” (1 forget the names men- 
tioned.) ‘‘ Yes, they are all with me.” A woman’s 
voice now from another part of the room anxiously 
cried out, ‘‘ Have you seen my sister?” ‘“ Yes, I 
have seen her.” ‘ Tell her my love is great towards 
her and never will cease.” ‘ Yes, I will tell.” Here 


126 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


the woman burst into tears, and the pakeha felt a 
strange swelling of the chest, which he could in no 
way account for. The spirit spoke again. “Give my 
large tame pig to the priest (the pakeha was disen- 
chanted at once) and my double-gun.” Here the 
brother interrupted, ‘‘ Your gun is a manatunga, I 
shall keep it.” He is also disenchanted, thought I, 
but I was mistaken. He believed, but wished to 
keep the gun his brother had carried so long. An 
idea now struck me that I could expose the imposture 
without showing palpable disbelief. ‘‘We cannot find 
your book,” said I, “where have you concealed it?” 
The answer instantly came, ‘‘ I concealed it between 
the tahuhu of my house and the thatch, straight over 
you as you go in at the door.” Here the brother 
rushed out; all was silence till his return. In five 
minutes he came back with the book in his hand. 1 
was beaten, but made another effort. ‘ What have 
you written in that book?” said I. “ A great many 
things.” “Tell me some of them.” ‘“ Which of 
them?” “Any of them.” “ You are seeking for 
some information, what do you want to know? I 
will tell you.” Then suddenly, “ Farewell, O tribe! 
farewell, my family, I go!” Here a general and im- 
pressive cry of ‘‘ farewell” arose from every one in the 
house. ‘‘ Farewell,” again cried the spirit, from deep 
beneath the ground! ‘ Farewell,” again from high in 
air! “Farewell,” once more came moaning through 
the distant darkness of the night. ‘ Farewell!” I 
was for a moment stunned. The deception was 
perfect. There was a dead silence — at last. 


OLD NHW ZHALAND. 127 


‘A ventriloquist,’ said I; ‘ or—or—perhaps the 
devil.” 

I was fagged and confused. It was past midnight; 
the company broke up, and I went to a house where 
a bed had been prepared for me. I wished to be 
quiet and alone; but it was fated there should be little 
quiet that night. I was just falling asleep, after 
having thought for some time on the extraordinary 
scenes I had witnessed, when I heard the report of a 
musket at some little distance, followed by the shout- 
ing of men and the screams of women. Out I rushed. 
I had a presentiment of some horrible catastrophe. 
Men were running by, hastily armed. I could get no 
information, so went with the stream. There was a 
bright flame beginning to spring up at a short distance, 
and every one appeared going in that direction. I 
was soon there. A house had been set on fire to make 
alight. Before another house, close at hand, a dense 
circle of human beings was formed. I pushed my 
way through, and then saw, by the bright light of the 
flaming house, a scene which is still fresh before me: 
there, in the verandah of the house, was an old grey- 
bearded man; he knelt upon one knee, and on the 
other he supported the dead body of the young girl 
who had said she would follow the spirit to spirit 
land. The delicate-looking body from the waist up- 
wards was bare and bloody; the old man’s right arm 
was under the neck, the lower part of his long grey 
beard was dabbled with blood, his left hand was 
twisting his matted hair; he did not weep, he howled, 
and the sound was that of a heathen despair, knowing 


128 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


no hope. The young girl had secretly procured a 
loaded musket, tied a loop for her foot to the trigger, 
placed the muzzle to her tender breast, and blown her- 
self to shatters. And the old man was her father, 
and a tohunga. A calm low voice now spoke close 
beside me, ‘She has followed her rangatira,” it said. 
I looked round, and saw the famous tohunga of the 
night. 

Now, young ladies, I have promised not to frighten 
your little wits out with raw-head-and-bloody-bones 
stories, a sort of thing I detest, but which has been 
too much the fashion with folks who write of matters 
Maori. I have vowed not to draw a drop of blood 
except in a characteristic manner. But this story is 
tragedy, or I don’t know what tragedy is, and the 
more tragic because, in every particular, literally true, 
and so if you cannot find some pity for the poor 
Maori girl who “ followed her lord to spirit land,” I 
shall make it my business not to fall in love with any 
of you any more for I won’t say how long. 


CHAPTER XI. 


The local Tapu.—The Taniwha.—The battle on Motiti.— 
The death of Tiki Whenua.—Reflections.—Brutus, Marcus An- 
tonius, and Tiki Whenua.—Suicide. 


pugilist, must be born, and not made, 
and I begin to fancy I have not been 
born under a story-telling planet, for 
by no effort that I can make can I hold on to the 
thread of my story, and I am conscious the whole 
affair is fast becoming one great parenthesis. If I 
could only get clear of this tapu I would “ try back.” 
I believe I ought to be just now completing the pur- 
chase of my estate. I am sure I have been keeping 
house a long time before it is built, which is I believe 
clear against the rules, so I must get rid of this talk 
about the tapu the best way I can, after which I will 
start fair and try not to get before my story. 

Besides these different forms of the tapw which I 
have mentioned, there were endless others, but the 
temporary local tapus were the most tormenting to a 
pakeha, as well they might be, seeing that even a native 
could not steer clear of them always. A place not 
K 


130 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


tapu yesterday might be most horribly tapu to-day, 
and the consequences of trespassing thereon propor- 
tionately troublesome. Thus, sailing along a coast 
or a river bank, the most inviting landing-place 
would be almost to a certainty the freehold property 
of the Taniwha, a terrific sea-monster, who would to 
a certainty, if his landed property was trespassed on, 
upset the canoe of the trespassers and devour them 
all the very next time they put to sea. The place 
was tapu, and let the weather be as bad as it might, 
it was better to keep to sea at all risks than to land 
there. Even pakeha, though in some cases invul- 
nerable, could not escape the fangs of the terrible 
Taniwha. ‘ Was not little Jackey-poto, the sailor, 
drowned by the Taniwha? He would go on shore, 
in spite of every warning, to get some water to mix 
with his waipiro, and was not his canoe found next 
day floating about with his paddle and two empty 
case bottles in it?—a sure sign that the Taniwha had 
lifted him out bodily. And was not the body of the 
said Jackey found some days after with the Taniwha’s 
mark on it,—one eye taken out?” 

These Taniwha would, however, sometimes attach 
themselves to a chief or warrior, and in the shape of 
a huge sea monster, a bird, or a fish, gambol round 
his canoe, and by their motions give presage of good 
or evil fortune. 

When the Ngati Kuri sailed on their last and fated 
expedition to the south, a huge Taniwha, attached to 
the famous warrior, Tiki Whenua, accompanied the 
expedition, playing about continually amongst the 


——s 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 131 


canoes, often coming close to the canoe of Tiki 
Whenua, so that the warrior could reach to pat him 
approvingly with his paddle, at which he seemed 
much pleased; and when they came in sight of the 
island of Tuhua, this Taniwha chief called up the 
legions of the deep! The sea was blackened by an 
army of monsters, who, with uncouth and awful 
floundering and wallowing, performed before the 
chief and his companions a hideous tu ngarahu, and 
then disappeared. The Ngati Kuri, elated, and ac- 
cepting this as a presage of victory, landed on Tuhua, 
stormed the pa, and massacred its defenders. But 
they had mistaken the meaning of the monster 
review of the Taniwha. It was a leave-taking of his 
favourite warrior, for the Ngati Kuri were fated to 
die to a man on the next land they trod. A hundred 
and fifty men were they—the pick and prime of their 
tribe. All rangatira, all warriors of name, few in 
numbers, but desperately resolute, they thought it 
little to defeat the thousands of the south, and take 
the women and children asa prey! Having feasted 
and rejoiced at Tuhua, they sail for Motiti. This 
world was too small for them. They were impatient 
for battle. They thought to make the name of Kuri 
strike against the skies; but in the morning the sea 
is covered with war canoes. The thousands of the 
south are upon them! Ngati Awa, with many an 
allied band, mad for revenge, come on. Fight now, 
oh Ngati Kuri!—not for victory, no, nor for life. 
Think only now of utw/—for your time is come. 
That which you have dealt to many, you shall now 


132 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


receive. Fight!—fight! Your tribe shall be exter- 
minated, but you must leave a name! Now came 
the tug of war on “bare Motiti.” From early 
morning till the sun had well declined, that ruthless 
battle raged. Twice their own number had the 
Ngati Kuri slain; and then Tiki Whenua, still 
living, saw around him his dead and dying tribe. A 
handful of bleeding warriors still resisted—a last and 
momentary struggle. He thought of the utw; it was 
great. He thought of the ruined remnant of the 
tribe at home, and then he remembered—horrid 
thought !—that ere next day’s setting sun, he and all 
the warriors of his tribe would be baked and eaten. 
(Tiki, my friend, thou art in trouble.) A cannon 
was close at hand—a nine-pound carronade. They 
had brought it in the canoes. Hurriedly he filled it 
half full of powder, seized a long firebrand, placed 
his breast to the cannon’s mouth, fired with his own 
hand. Tiki Whenua, Good night! 

Now I wonder if Brutus had had such a thing as 
a nine-pounder about him at Phillippi, whether he 
would have thought of using it inthis way. I really 
don’t think he would. I have never looked upon 
Brutus as anything of an original genius, but Tiki 
Whenua most certainly was. I don’t think there is 
another instance of a man blowing himself from a 
gun—of course there are many examples of people 
blowing others from cannon, but that is quite a 
different thing—any blockhead can do that. But the 
exit of Tiki Whenua has a smack of originality about 
it which I like, and so I have mentioned it here. 


OLD NEW ZHALAND. 135 


But all this is digression on digression; how- 
ever, I suppose the reader is getting used to it, and I 
cannot help it; besides, I wanted to show them how 
poor Tiki “‘ took arms against a sea of troubles,” and 
for the want of a “bare bodkin” made shift with a 
carronade. I shall never cease to lament those nice 
lads who met with that little accident (poor fellows !) 
on Motiti. A fine, strapping, stalwart set of fellows, 
who believed in force. We don’t see many such men 
now-a-days; the present generation of Maori are a 
stunted, tobacco-smoking, grog-drinking, psalm-sing- 
ing, special-pleading, shilling-hunting set of wretches ; 
not above one in a dozen of them would know how 
to cut up a man secundem artem. Pshaw! I am 
ashamed of them. 

I am getting tired of this tapu, so will give only 
one or two more instances of the local temporary tapw. 
In the autumn, when the great crop of kumera was 
gathered, all the paths leading to the village and cul- 
tivated lands were made tapu, and any one coming 
along them would have notice of this by finding a 
rope stretched across the road about breast-high; 
when he saw this, his business must be very urgent 
indeed or he would go back, and it would have been 
taken as a very serious affront indeed, even in a near 
relation, supposing his ordinary residence was not in 
the village, to disregard the hint given by the rope, 
—that for the present there was ‘‘no thoroughfare.” 
Now, the reason of this blockade of the roads was 
this. The report of an’ unusually fine crop of 
kumera had often cost its cultivators and the whole 


134 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


tribe their lives. The news would spread about that 
Ngati so-and-so, living at so-and-so, had housed so 
many thousands of baskets of kumera. Exaggeration 
would multiply the truth by ten, the fertile land 
would be coveted, and very probably its owners, or 
rather its holders, would have to fight both for it and 
their lives before the year was out. For this reason 
strangers were not welcome at the Maori harvest 
home. The kumera were dug hurriedly by the 
whole strength of the working hands, thrown in 
scattered heaps, and concealed from any casual ob- 
servation by strangers by being covered over with 
the leaves of the plants, and when all were dug then - 
all hands set to work, at night, to fill the baskets and 
carry off the crop to the storehouse or rua, and every 
effort was made to get all stored and out of sight 
before daylight, lest any one should be able to form 
any idea of the extent of the crop. When the 
digging of one field was completed another would be 
done in the same manner, and so on till the whole 
crop was housed in this stealthy manner. I have 
been at several of these midnight labours, and have 
admired the immense amount of work one family 
would do in a single night, working as it were for 
life and death. In consequence of this mode of pro- 
ceeding, even the families inhabiting the same 
village did not know what sort of a crop their neigh- 
bours had, and if a question was asked (to do which 
was thought impertinent and very improper), the 
invariable answer was, ‘‘ Nothing at all; barely got 
back the seed; hardly that; we shall be starved; we 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 135 


shall have to eat fern root this year,” &c. The last 
time I observed this custom was about twenty-seven 
years ago, and even then it was nearly discontinued 
and no longer general. 

Talking of bygone habits and customs of the 
natives, | remember I have mentioned two cases of 
suicide. I shall, therefore, now take occasion to 
state that no more marked alteration in the habits of 
the natives has taken place than in the great decrease 
of cases of suicide. In the first years of my resi- 
dence in the country, it was of almost daily occur- 
rence. When a man died, it was almost a matter of 
course that his wife, or wives, hung themselves. 
When the wife died, the man very commonly shot 
himself. I have known young men, often on the 
most trifling affront or vexation, shoot themselves; 
and I was acquainted with a man who, having been for 
two days plagued with the toothache, cut his throat 
with avery blunt razor, without a handle, as a radical 
cure, which it certainly was. I do not believe that one 
case of suicide occurs now, for twenty when I first 
came into the country. Indeed, the last case I have 
heard of in a populous district, occurred several years 
ago. It was rather aremarkable one. A native owed 
another a few shillings; the creditor kept continually 
asking for it; but the debtor, somehow or other, never 
could raise the cash. At last, being out of patience, 
and not knowing anything of the Insolvent Court, he 
loaded his gun, went to the creditor’s house, and 
called him out. Out came the creditor and his wife. 
The debtor then placed the gun to his own breast, 


136 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


and saying, ‘Here is your payment,” pulled the 
trigger with his foot, and fell dead before them. I 
think the reason suicide has become so comparatively 
unfrequent is, that the minds of the natives are now 
filled and agitated by a flood of new ideas, new wants 
and ambitions, which they knew not formerly, and 
which prevents them, from one single loss or disap- 
pointment, feeling as if there was nothing more to 
live for. 


CHapTer XII. 


The Tapa.—Instances of.—The storming of Mokoia.—Pomare.— 
Hongi Ika.—Tareha.—Honour amongst thieves. 


S<ZHERE was a kind of variation on the 
3?) tapu, called tapa, of this nature. For 
instance, if a chief said, ‘* That axe is 
my head,” the axe became his to all 
intents and purposes, except, indeed, the owner of 
the axe was able to break his “ head,” in which case, 
I have reason to believe, the tapa would fall to the 
ground. It was, however, in a certain degree neces- 
sary to have some legal reason, or excuse, for making 
the tapa; but to give some idea of what constituted 
the circumstances under which a man could fairly 
tapa anything, I must needs quote a case in point. 
When the Ngapuhi attacked the tribe of Neati 
Wakawe, at Rotorua, the Ngati Wakawe retired to 
the island of Mokoia in the lake of Rotorua, which 
they fortified, thinking that, as the Ngapuhi canoes 
could not come nearer than Kaituna on the east 
coast, about thirty miles distant, they in their island 
position would be safe. But in this they were 
fatally deceived, for the Ngapuhi dragged a whole 
fleet of war canoes over land. When, however, the 


138 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


advanced division of the Ngapuhi arrived at Rotorua, 
and encamped on the shore of the lake, Ngati Wak- 
awe were not aware that the canoes of the enemy 
were coming, so every morning they manned their 
large canoes, and leaving the island fort, would come 
dashing along the shore, deriding the Ngapuhi, and 
erying, “Ma wai koe e kawe mai ki Rangitiki?”— 
‘“Who shall bring you, or how shall you arrive, at 
Rangitiki?” Rangitiki was the name of one of their 
hill forts. The canoes were fine large ornamented 
totara canoes, very valuable, capable of carrying from 
fifty to seventy men each, and much coveted by the 
Ngapuhi. The Ngapuhi, of course, considered all 
these canoes as their own already, but the different 
chiefs and leaders, anxious to secure one or more of 
these fine canoes for themselves and people, and not 
knowing who might be the first to lay hands on them 
in the confusion of the storming of Mokoia, which 
would take place when their own canoes arrived, each 
tapa’d one or more for himself, or, as the native ex- 
pression is, to himself. Up jumped Pomare, and 
standing on the lake shore, in front of the encamp- 
ment of the division of which he was leader, he shouts, 
pointing at the same time to a particular canoe at the 
time carrying about sixty men, ‘“ That canoe is my ~ 
back-bone.” Then Tareha, in bulk like a sea-elephant, 
and sinking to the ankles in the shore of the lake, with 
a hoarse, croaking voice roars out, “That canoe! my 
skull shall be the baler to bale it out.” This was a 
horribly strong tapa. Then the soft voice of the 
famous Hongi Ika, surnamed “‘ The eater of men,” of 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 139 


Hongi kat tangata, was heard, ‘‘Those two canoes are 
my two thighs.” And so the whole flotilla was ap- 
propriated by the different chiefs. Now it followed 
from this that in the storming and plunder of Mokoia, 
when a warrior clapped his hand on a canoe and 
shouted, ‘‘This canoe is mine,” the seizure would not 
stand good if it was one of the canoes which were 
tapa-tapa, for it would be a frightful insult to Pomare 
to claim to be the owner of his “back-bone,” or to 
Tareha to go on board a canoe which had been made 
sacred by the bare supposition that his “skull” should 
be a vessel to bale it with. Of course the first man 
laying his hand on any other canoe, and claiming it, 
secured it for himself and tribe, always provided that 
the number of men there present representing his 
tribe or hapu were sufficient to back his claim, and 
render it dangerous to dispossess him. I have seen 
men shamefully robbed, for want of sufficient support, 
of their honest lawful gains, after all the trouble and 
risk they had gone to in killing the owners of their 
plunder. But dishonest people are to be found almost 
everywhere, and I will say this, that my friends the 
Maoris seldom act against law, and always try to be 
able to say what they do is “ correct” (tka). 

This tapu is a bore, even to write about, and I fear 
the reader is beginning to think it a bore to read 
about. It began long before the time of Moses, and 
I think that steam navigation will be the death of it; 
but lest it should kill my reader, I will have done with 
it for the present, and “try back,” for I have left my 
story behind completely. 


CuapTrer XIII. 


“ My Rangatira.”—The respective duties of the Pakeha and 
his Rangatira.—Public opinion.—A “ Pakeha Kino.”—Descrip- 
tion of my Rangatira.—His exploits and misadventures.—His 
moral principles.—Decline in the numbers of the natives.— 
Proofs of former large population.—Ancient forts.—Causes of 


decrease. 


+HEN I purchased my land the payment 
’) 4 was made on the ground, and imme- 
i diately divided and subdivided amongst 
IVS) the different sellers. Some of them, 
who, according to their own representations formerly 
made to me, were the sole and only owners of the 
land, received for their share about the value of one 
shilling, and moreover, as I also observed, did not 
appear at all disappointed. 

One old rangatira, before whom a considerable por- 
tion of the payment had been laid as his share of the 
spoil, gave it a slight shove with his foot, expressive 
of refusal, and said, “‘I will not accept any of the pay- 
ment, I will have the pakeha.” I saw some of the 
magnates present seemed greatly disappointed at this, 
for I dare say they had expected to have the pakeha 
as well as the payment. But the old gentleman had 
regularly checkmated them by refusing to accept any 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 141 


payment, and being also a person of great respect- 
ability, z.¢., a good fighting man, with twenty more at 
his back, he was allowed to have his way, and thereby, 
in the opinion of all the natives present, making a far 
better thing of the land sale than any of them, though 
he had received no part of the payment. 

I consequently was therefore a part, and by no 
means an inconsiderable one, of the payment for my 
own land; but though now part and parcel of the 
property of the old rangatira aforementioned, a good 
deal of liberty was allowed me. The fact of my 
having become his pakeha made our respective rela- 
tions and duties to each other about as follows :— 

Firstly.—At all times, places, and companies my 
owner had the right to call me “his pakeha.” 

Secondly.—He had the general privilege of ‘ pot- 
luck” whenever he chose to honour my establishment 
with a visit; said pot-luck to be tumbled out to him 
on the ground before the house, he being far too 
great a man to eat out of plates or dishes, or any de- 
generate invention of that nature; as, if he did, they 
would all become tapu, and of no use to any one but 
himself, nor indeed to himself either, as he did not see 
the use of them. 

Thirdly.—It was well understood that to avoid 
the unpleasant appearance of paying “black mail,” 
and to keep up general kindly relations, my owner 
should from time to time make me small presents, 
and that in return I should make him presents of five 
or six times the value: all this to be done as if 
arising from mutual love and kindness, and not the 


142 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


slightest allusion to be ever made to the relative 
value of the gifts on either side (an important 
article). | 

Fourthly.—It was to be a sine qua non that I must 
purchase ‘everything the chief or his family had to 
sell, whether I wanted them or not, and give the 
highest market price, or rather more. (Another 
very important article.) 

Fifthly.—The chief’s own particular pipe never to 
be allowed to become extinguished for want of the 
needful supply of tobacco. 

Sixthly.—AIl desirable jobs of work, and all 
advantages of all kinds, to be offered first to the 
family of my rangatira before letting any one else 
have them; payment for same to be about 25 per 
cent. more than to any one else, exclusive of a dou- 
ceur to the chief himself because he did not work. 

In return for these duties and customs, well and 
truly performed on my part, the chief was under- 
stood to— 

Firstly Stick up for me in a general way, and 
not let me be bullied or imposed upon by any one 
but himself, as far as he was able to prevent it. 

Secondly.—In case of my being plundered or mal- 
treated by any powerful marauder, it was the duty 
of my chief to come in hot haste with all his family, 
armed to the teeth, to my rescue, after all was over, 
and when it was too late to be of any service. He 
was also bound on such occasions to make a great 
noise, dance the war dance, and fire muskets, (I find- 
ing the powder, ) and to declare loudly what he would 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 143 


have done had he only been in time. I, of course, 
on such occasions, for my own dignity, and in con- 
sideration of the spirited conduct of my friends, was 
bound to order two or three fat pigs to be killed, and 
lots of potatoes to be served out to the “army,” who 
were always expected to be starving, as a general 
rule. A distribution of tobacco, in the way of 
largess, was also a necessity of the case. 

Thirdly.—In case of my losing anything of conse- 
quence by theft—a thing which, as a veracious 
pakeha, I am bound to say, seldom happened; the 
natives in those days being, as I have already men- 
tioned, a very law-observing people, (the law of 
muru,) had, indeed, little occasion to steal, the above- 
named law answering their purposes in a general 
way much better, and helping them pretty certainly 
to any little matter they coveted; yet, as there are 
exceptions to all rules, theft would sometimes be 
committed; and then, as I was saying, it became 
the bounden duty of my rangatira to get the stolen 
article back if he was able, and keep it for himself 
for his trouble, unless I gave him something of more 
value in lieu thereof. 

Under the above regulations things went on 
pleasantly enough, the chief being restrained, by 
public opinion and the danger of the pakeha running 
away from pushing his prerogative to the utmost 
limit; and the pakeha, onthe other hand, making 
the commonalty pay for the indirect taxation he was 
subjected to; so that in general, after ten or fifteen 
years’ residence, he would not be much poorer than 


144 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


a 


when he arrived, unless, indeed, some unlucky 
accident happened, such as pakehas were liable to 
sometimes in the good old times. 

Mentioning “public opinion” as a restraint on 
the chiefs’ acquisitiveness, I must explain that a chief 
possessing a pakeha was much envied by his neigh- 
bours, who, in consequence, took every opportunity 
of scandalizing him, and blaming him for any rough 
plucking process he might submit the said pakeha to; 
and should he, by any awkward handling of this sort, 
cause the pakeha at last to run for it, the chief would 
never hear the end of it from his own family and 
connections, pakehas being, in those glorious old 
times, considered to be geese who laid golden eggs, 
and it would be held to be the very extreme of fool- 
ishness and bad policy either to kill them, or, by too 
rough handling, to cause them to fly away. 

On the other hand, should the pakeha fail in a 
culpable manner in the performance of his duties, 
though he would not, as a rule, be subjected to any 
stated punishment, he would soon begin to find a 
most unaccountable train of accidents and all sorts of 
unpleasant occurrences happening, enough, in the 
aggregate, to drive Job himself out of his wits; and, 
moreover, he would get a bad name, which, though he 
removed, would follow him from one end of the 
island to the other, and effectually prevent him having 
the slightest chance of doing any good,—that is, 
holding his own in the country, as the natives, wher- 
ever he went, would consider him a person out of 
whom the most was to be made at once, as he was not 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 145 


to be depended on as a source of permanent revenue. 
I have known several industrious, active, and sober 
pakeha who never could do any good, and whose life, 
' for a long series of years, was a mere train of mis- 
haps, till at last they were reduced to extreme poverty, 
merely from having, in their first dealings with the 
natives, got a bad name, in consequence of not having 
been able to understand clearly the beauty of the set 
of regulations I have just mentioned, and from an 
inability to make them work smoothly. The bad 
name I have mentioned was short and expressive ; 
wherever they went, there would be sure to be some 
one who would introduce them to their new acquaint- 
ances as “a pakeha pakeke,”—a hard pakeha; “a 
pakeha taehae,’—a miser; or, to sum up all, “a pake- 
ha kino.” 

The chief who claimed me was a good specimen of 
the Maori rangatira. He was a very old man, and 
had fought the French when Marion, the French cir- 
cumnavigator, was killed. He had killed a French- 
man himself, and carried his thighs and legs many 
miles as a bonne bouche for his friends at home at the 
pa. This old gentleman was not head of his tribe. 
He was a man of good family, related to several 
high chiefs. He was head of a strong family, 
or hapu, which mustered a considerable number of 
fighting men, all his near relations. He had been 
himself a most celebrated fighting man, and a war 
chief; and was altogether a highly respectable person, 
and of great weight in the councils of the tribe. I 
may say I was fortunate in having been appropriated 

L 


146 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


by this old patrician. He gave me very little trouble; 
did not press his rights and privileges too forcibly on 
my notice, and in fact behaved in all respects towards 
me in so liberal and friendly a manner, that before 
long I began to have a very sincere regard for him, 
and he to take a sort of paternal interest in me, which 
was both gratifying to observe, and also extremely 
comical sometimes, when he, out of real anxiety to 
see me a perfectly accomplished rangatira, would 
lecture on good manners, etiquette, and the use of the 
spear. He was, indeed, a model of a rangatira, and 
well worth being described. He wasa little man, with 
a high massive head, and remarkably high square fore- 
head, on which the tattooer had exhausted his art. 
Though, as I have said, of a great age, he was still 
nimble and active. He had evidently been one of 
those tough, active men, who, though small in stature, 
areamatch for anyone. There wasin my old friend’s 
eyes a sort of dull fiery appearance, which, when any- 
thing excited him, or when he recounted some of 
those numerous battles, onslaughts, massacres, or 
stormings in which all the active part of his life had 
been spent, actually seemed to blaze up and give 
forth real fire. His breast was covered with spear- 
wounds, and he also had two very severe spear- 
wounds on his head; but he boasted that no single 
man had ever been able to touch him with the 
point of a spear. It was in grand mélées, where he 
would have sometimes six or eight antagonists, that 
he had received these wounds. He was a great 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 147 


general, and I have heard him criticize closely the 
order and conduct of every battle of consequence 
which had been fought for fifty years before my 
arrival in the country. On these occasions the old 
‘“ martialist ” would draw on the sand the plan of the 
battle he was criticizing and describing; and in the 
course of time I began to perceive that, before the 
introduction of the musket, the art of war had been 
brought to great perfection by the natives: and that, 
when large numbers were engaged in a pitched 
battle, the order of battle resembled, in a most 
striking manner, some of the most approved orders of 
battle of the ancients. Since the introduction of fire- 
arms the natives have entirely altered their tactics, 
and adopted a system better adapted to the new 
weapon and the nature of the country. 

My old friend had a great hatred for the musket. 
He said that in battles fought with the musket there 
were never so many men killed as when, in his young 
days, men fought hand to hand with the spear; when 
a good warrior would kill six, eight, ten, or even 
twenty men in a single fight; for when once the 
enemy broke and commenced to run, the combatants 
being so close together, a fast runner would knock a 
dozen on the head in a short time; and the great aim 
of these fast-running warriors, of whom my old friend 
had been one, was to chase straight on and never 
stop, only striking one blow at one man, so as to 
cripple him, so that those behind should be sure to 
overtake and finish him. It was not uncommon for 


148 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


one man, strong and swift of foot, when the enemy 
were fairly routed, to stab with a light spear ten or a 
dozen men in such a way as to ensure their being 
overtaken and killed. On one occasion of this kind 
my old tutor had the misfortune to stab a running 
man in the back. He did it, of course, scientifically, 
so as to stop his running, and as he passed him by he 
perceived it was his wife’s brother. He was finished 
immediately by the men close behind. I should have 
said the man was a brother of one of my friend’s four 
wives, which being the case, I dare say he had a 
sufficient number of brothers-in-law to afford to kill 
one now and then. A worse mishap, however, oc- 
curred to him on another occasion. He was return- 
ing from a successful expedition from the south (in 
the course of which, by-the-bye, he and his men 
killed and cooked several men of the enemy in Short- 
land Crescent, and forced three others to jump over a 
cliff, which is, I think, now called Soldier’s Point), 
when off the Mahurangi a smoke was seen rising from 
amongst the trees near the beach. They at once 
concluded that it came from the fires of people be- 
longing to that part of the country, and who they 
considered as game. They therefore waited till night, 
concealing their canoes behind some rocks, and when — 
it became dark landed; they then divided into two 
parties, took the supposed enemy completely by sur- 
prise, attacked, rushing upon them from two opposite 
directions at once. My rangatira, dashing furiously 
among them, and, as I can well suppose, those eyes 
of his flashing fire, had the happiness of once again 


. 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 149 


killing the first man, and being authorized to shout, 
“ Ki au te mataika!” A few more blows, the parties 
recognize each other: they are friends!—men of the 
same tribe! Who is the last mataika slain by this 
famous warrior? Quick, bring a flaming brand; here 
he lies dead! Ha! It is his father! 

Now an ancient knight of romance, under similar 
awkward circumstances, would probably have retired 
from public life, sought out some forest cave, where he 
would have hung up his armour, let his beard grow, 
flogged himself twice a day “regular,” and lived on 
‘‘pulse,” which, I suppose, means pea-soup, for the rest 
of his life. But my old rangatira and his companions 
had not a morsel of that sort of romance about them. 
The killing of my friend’s father was looked upon as 
a very clever exploit in itself, though a very unlucky 
one. So after having scolded one another for some 
time, one party telling the other they were served 
right for not keeping a better look out, and the other 
answering that they should have been sure who they 
were going to attack before making the onset, they 
all held a tang: or lamentation for the old warrior 
who had just received his mittimus; and then killing 
a prisoner, who they had brought in the canoes for 
fresh provisions, they had a good feast; after which 
they returned all together to their own country, 
taking the body of their lamented relative along with 
them. This happened many years before I came to 
the country, and when my rangatira was one of the 
most famous fighting men in his tribe. 

This Maori rangatira, who I am describing, had 


150 OLD NEW ZHLALAND. 


passed his whole life, with but little intermission, in a 
scene of battle, murder, and bloodthirsty atrocities of 
the most terrific description, mixed with actions of 
the most heroic courage, self-sacrifice, and chivalric 
daring, as leaves one perfectly astounded to find them 
the deeds of one and the same people—one day doing 
acts which had they been performed in ancient Greece 
would have immortalized the actors, and the next 
committing barbarities too horrible for relation, and 
almost incredible. 

The effect of a life of this kind was observable, 
plainly enough, in my friend. He was utterly devoid 
of what weak mortals call “‘ compassion.” He seemed 
to have no more feeling for the pain, tortures, or 
death of others than a stone. Should one of his 
family be dying or wounded, he merely felt it as the 
loss of one fighting man. As for the death of a 
woman or any non-combatant, he did not feel it at all, 
though the person might have suffered horrid tortures; 
indeed I have seen him scolding severely a fine young 
man, his near relative, when actually expiring, for 
being such a fool as to blow himself up by accident, 
and deprive his family of a fighting man. The last 
words the dying man heard were these : —‘“‘ It serves 


you right. There you are, looking very like a burnt ~ 


stick! It serves you right—a burnt stick! Serves 
you right!” It really was vexatious. A fine stout 
young fellow to be wasted in that way. As for fear, 
I saw one or two instances to prove he knew very 
little about it; and, indeed, to be killed in battle, 
seemed to him a natural death, and he was always 


ee 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 151 


erumbling that the young men thought of nothing 
but trading: and whenever he proposed to them to 
take him where he might have a final battle (he rir 
wakamutunga), where he might escape dying of old 
age, they always kept saying, “Wait till we. get 
more muskets,” or ‘more gunpowder,” or more 
something or another, “as if men could not be killed 
without muskets!” He was not cruel either; he 
was only unfeeling. He had been guilty, it is true, 
in his time, of what we would call terrific atrocities 
to his prisoners, which he calmly and calculatingly 
perpetrated as utw or retaliation for similar barbari- 
ties committed by them or their tribe. And here I 
must retract the word guilty, which I see I have 
written inadvertently, for according to the morals 
and principles of the people of whom he was one, and 
of the time to which he belonged, and the training he 
had received, so far from being guilty, he did a 
praiseworthy, glorious, and public-spirited action 
when he opened the jugular vein of a bound captive 
and sucked huge draughts of his blood. To say the 
truth he was a very nice old man, and I liked him 
very much. It would not, however, be advisable to 
put him ina passion; not much good would be likely 
to arise from it, as indeed I could show by one or 
two very striking instances which came under my 
notice, though to say the truth he was not easily put 
out of temper. He had one great moral rule,—it 
was indeed his rule of life,—he held that every man 
had a right to do everything and anything he chose, 
provided he was able and willing to stand the conse- 


152 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


quences, though he thought some men fools for try- 
Ing to do things which they could not carry out 
pleasantly, and which ended in getting them baked. 
I once hinted to him that, should every one reduce 
these principles to practice, he himself might find it 
awkward, particularly as he had so many mortal 
enemies. To which he replied, with a look which 
seemed to pity my ignorance, that every one did 
practise this rule to the best of their abilities, but 
that some were not so able as others; and that as for 
his enemies, he should take care they never surprised 
him; a surprise being, indeed, the only thing he 
seemed to have any fear at all of. In truth he had 
occasion to look out sharp; he never was known to 
sleep more than three or four nights in the same 
place, and often, when there were ill omens, he would 
not sleep in a house at all, or two nights following in 
one place, for a month together, and I never saw him 
without both spear and tomahawk, and ready to 
defend himself at a second’s notice, a state of prepa- 
ration perfectly necessary, for though in his own 
country and surrounded by his tribe, his death would 
have been such a triumph for hundreds, not of dis- 
tant enemies, but of people within a day’s journey, 
that none could tell at what moment some stout 
young fellow in search of utwu anda “ingoa toa” (a 
warlike reputation) might rush upon him, determined 
to have his head or leave his own. The old buck 
himself had, indeed, performed several exploits of 
this nature, the last of which occurred just at the 
time I came into the country, but before I had the 


OLD NEW ZHALAND. 153 


advantage of his acquaintance. His tribe were at 
war with some people at the distance of about a day’s 
journey. One of their villages was on the border of 
a dense forest. My rangatira, then a very old man, 
started off alone, and without saying a word to any 
one, took his way through the forest which extended 
the whole way between his village and the enemy, 
crept like a lizard into the enemy’s village, and then, 
shouting his war cry, dashed amongst a number of 
people he saw sitting together on the ground, and 
who little expected such a salute. In a minute he 
had run three men and one woman through the 
body, received five dangerous spear-wounds himself, 
and escaped to the forest, and finally got safe home 
to his own country and people. Truly my old ran- 
gatira was a man of a thousand,—a model rangatira. 
This exploit, if possible, added to his reputation, and 
every one said his mana would never decline. The 
enemy had been panic-stricken, thinking a whole 
tribe were upon them, and fled like a flock of sheep, 
except the three men who were killed. They all 
attacked my old chief at once, and were all disposed 
of in less'than a minute, after, as I have said, giving 
him five desperate wounds. The woman was just 
“stuck,” as a matter of course, as she came in his 
way. 

The natives are unanimous in affirming that they 
were much more numerous in former times than 
they are now, and I am convinced that such was the 
case, for the following reasons. The old hill forts 
are many of them so large that an amount of labour 


154 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


must have been expended in trenching, terracing, 
and fencing them, and all without iron tools, which 
increased the difficulty a hundred-fold, which must 
have required a vastly greater population to accom- 
plish than can be now found in the surrounding dis- 
tricts. These forts were also of such an extent that, 
taking into consideration the system of attack and 
defence used necessarily in those times, they would 
have been utterly untenable unless held by at least 
ten times the number of men the whole surrounding 
districts, for two or three days’ journey, can produce ; 
and yet, when we remember that in those times of 
constant war, being the two centuries preceding the 
arrival of the Europeans, the natives always, as a 
rule, slept in these hill forts with closed gates, 
bridges over trenches removed, and ladders of ter- 
races drawn up, we must come to the conclusion that 
the inhabitants of the fort, though so numerous, were 
merely the population of the country in the close 
vicinity. Now from the top of one of these pointed, 
trenched, and terraced hills, I have counted twenty 
others, all of equally large dimensions, and all within 
a distance, in every direction, of fifteen fo twenty 
miles; and native tradition affirms that each of these 
hills was the stronghold of a separate hapu or clan, - 
bearing its distinctive name. There is also the most 
unmistakeable evidence that vast tracts of country, 
which have lain wild time out of mind, were once 
fully cultivated. The ditches for draining the land 
are still traceable, and large pits are to be seen in 
hundreds, on the tops of the dry hills, all over the 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 155 


northern part of the North Island, in which the 
kumera were once stored; and these pits are, in the 
ereatest number, found in the centre of great open 
tracts of uncultivated country, where a rat in the 
present day would hardly find subsistence. The old 
drains, and the peculiar growth of the timber, mark 
clearly the extent of these ancient cultivations. It is 
also very observable that large tracts of very inferior 
land have been in cultivation, which would lead to 
the inference that either the population was pretty 
nearly proportioned to the extent of available land, 
or that the tracts of inferior land were cultivated 
merely because they were not too far removed from 
the fort; for the shape of the hill, and its capability 
of defence and facility of fortification, was of more 
consequence than the fertility of the surrounding 
country. These kumera pits, being dug generally in 
the stiff clay on the hill tops, have, in most cases, 
retained their shape perfectly, and many seem as 
fresh and new as if they had been dug but a few years. 
They are oblong in shape, with the sides regularly 
sloped. Many collections of these provision stores 
have outlived Maori tradition, and the natives can 
only conjecture who they belonged to. Out of the 
centre of one of them which I have seen, there is now 
growing a kauri tree one hundred and twenty feet 
high, and out of another a large totara. The outline 
of these pits is as perfect as the day they were dug, 
and the sides have not fallen in in the slightest de- 
gree, from which perhaps they have been preserved 
by the absence of frost, as well as by a beautiful 


156 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


coating of moss, by which they are everywhere 
covered. The pit in which the kauri grew, had been 
partially filled up by the scaling off of the bark of 
the tree, which falling off in patches, as it is con- 
stantly doing, had raised a mound of decaying bark 
round the root of the tree. 

Another evidence of a very large number of people 
having once inhabited these hill forts is the number 
of houses they contained. Every native house, it 
appears, in former times as in the present, had a fire- 
place composed of four flat stones or flags sunk on 
their edges into the ground, so as to form an oblong 
case or trunk, in which at night a fire to heat the 
house was made. Now, in two of the largest hill 
forts I have examined, though for ages no vestige of 
a house had been seen, there remained the fire-places 
—the four stones projecting like an oblong box 
slightly over the ground—and from their position 
and number denoting clearly that, large as the cir- 
cumference of the huge volcanic hill was which formed 
the fortress, the number of families inhabiting it 
necessitated the strictest economy of room. The 
houses had been arranged in streets, or double rows, 
with a path between them, except in places where 
there had been only room on a terrace for a single 
row. The distances between the fire-places proved 
that the houses in the rows must have been as close 
together as it was possible to build them, and every 
spot, from the foot to the hill top, not required and 
specially planned for defensive purposes, had been 
built on in this regular manner. Even the small 


: 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 157 


flat top, sixty yards long by forty wide,—the citadel, 
—on which the greatest care and labour had been 
bestowed to render it difficult of access, had been as 
full of houses as it could hold, leaving a small space 
all round the precipitous bank for the defenders to 
stand on. 

These little fire-places, and the scarped and terraced 
conical hills, are the only marks the Maori of ancient 
times have left of their existence. And I have rea- 
sons for believing that this country has been inha- 
bited from a more remote period by far than is 
generally supposed. These reasons I found upon the 
dialect of the Maori language spoken by the Maori of 
New Zealand, as well as on many other circumstances. 

We may easily imagine that a hill of this kind, 
covered from bottom to top with houses thatched 
and built of reeds, rushes, and raupo, would be a 
mere mass of combustible matter, and such indeed 
was the case. When an enemy attacked one of these 
places a common practice was to shower red-hot 
stones from slings into the place, which, sinking into 
the dry thatch of the houses, would cause a general 
conflagration. Should this once occur the place was 
sure to be taken, and this mode of attack was much 
feared; all hands not engaged at the outer defences, 
and all women and non-combatants, were employed 
guarding against this danger, and pouring water out 
of calabashes on every smoke that appeared. The 
natives also practised both mining and escalade in 
attacking a hill fort. 

The natives attribute their decrease in numbers, 


158 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


before the arrival of the Europeans, to war and sick- 
ness, disease possibly arising from the destruction of 
food and the forced neglect of cultivation caused by 
the constant and furious wars which devastated the 
country for a long period before the arrival of the 
Europeans, in such a manner that the natives at last 
believed that a constant state of warfare was the 
natural condition of life, and their sentiments, feelings, 


and maxims became gradually formed on this belief. 


Nothing was so valuable or respectable as strength 
and courage, and to acquire property by war and 
plunder was more honourable and also more desirable 
than by labour. Cannibalism was glorious. The 
island was a pandemonium. 


A rugged wight, the worst of brutes, was man; 
On his own wretched kind he ruthless prey’d. 
The strongest then the weakest overran, 
In every country mighty robbers sway’d, 
And guile and ruffian force was all their trade. 


Since the arrival of the Europeans the decrease of 
the natives has also been rapid. In that part of the 
country where I have had means of accurate obser- 
vation, they have decreased in number since my 
arrival rather more than one-third. I have, how- 
ever, observed that this decrease has for the last ten 
years been very considerably checked, though I do 
not believe this improvement is general through the 
country, or even permanent where I have observed it. 

The first grand cause of the decrease of the natives 
since the arrival of the Europeans is the musket. 
The nature of the ancient Maori weapons prompted 


Sere 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 159 


them to seek out vantage ground, and to take up 
positions on precipitous hill tops, and make those 
high, dry, airy situations their regular fixed resi- 
dences. Their ordinary course of life, when not 
engaged in warfare, was regular, and not necessarily 
unhealthy. Their labour, though constant in one 
shape or other, and compelled by necessity, was not 
too heavy. In the morning, but not early, they 
descended from the hill pa to the cultivations in the 
low ground; they went in a body, armed like men 
going to battle, the spear or club in one hand, and 
the agricultural instrument in the other. The women 
followed. Long before night (it was counted unlucky 
to work till dark) they returned to the hill with a 
reversed order, the women now, and slaves, and lads, 
bearing fuel and water for the night, in front; they 
also bore probably heavy loads of kumera or other 
provisions. In the time of year when the crops did 
not call for their attention, when they were planted 
and growing, then the whole tribe would remove to 
some fortified hill, at the side of some river, or on the 
coast, where they would pass months fishing, making 
nets, clubs, spears, and implements of various descrip- 
tions; the women, in all spare time, making mats for 
clothing, or baskets to carry the crop of kumera in, 
when fit to dig. There was very little idleness; 
and to be called “ lazy” was a great reproach. It is 
to be observed that for several months the crops 
could be left thus unguarded with perfect safety, for 
the Maori, as a general rule, never destroyed growing 
crops or attacked their owners in a regular manner 


160 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


until the crops were nearly at full perfection, so that 
they might afford subsistence to the invaders, and 
consequently the end of the summer all over the 
country was a time of universal preparation for 
battle, either offensive or defensive, the crops then 
being near maturity. 

Now when the natives became generally armed 
with the musket they at once abandoned the hills, 
and, to save themselves the great labour and incon- 
venience occasioned by the necessity of continually 
carrying provisions, fuel, and water to these precipi- 
tous hill-castles—which would be also, as a matter of 
necessity, at some inconvenient distance from at least 
some part of the extensive cultivations—descended 
to the low lands, and there, in the centre of the cul- 
tivations, erected a new kind of fortification adapted 
to the capabilities of the new weapon. This was their 
destruction. There in mere swamps they built their 
oven-like houses, where the water even in summer 
sprung with the pressure of the foot, and where in 
winter the houses were often completely flooded. 
There, lying on the spongy soil, on beds of rushes 
which rotted under them—in little, low dens of houses, 
or kennels, heated like ovens at night and dripping 
with damp in the day—full of noxious exhalations 
from the damp soil, and impossible to ventilate— 
they were cut off by disease in a manner absolutely 
frightful. No advice would they take; they could 
not see the enemy which killed them, and therefore 
could not believe the Europeans who pointed out the 
cause of their destruction. 


4 
: 
4 
‘ 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 16] 


This change of residence was universal and every- 
where followed by the same consequences, more or 
less marked; the strongest men were cut off and but 
few children were reared. And even now, after the 
dreadful experience they have had, and all the con- 
tinual remonstrances of their pakeha friends, they 
take but very little more precaution in choosing sites 
for their houses than at first; and when a native 
village or a native house happens to be in a dry, 
healthy situation, it is often more the effect of acci- 
dent than design. 

Twenty years ago a hapu,in number just forty 
persons, removed their kainga from a dry, healthy 
position, to the edge of a raupo swamp. I happened 
to be at the place a short time after the removal, and 
with me there was a medical gentleman who was 
travelling through the country. In creeping into 
one of the houses (the chief’s) through the low door, 
I was obliged to put both my hands to the ground; 
they both sunk mto the swampy soil, making holes 
which immediately filled with water. The chief and 
his family were lying on the ground on rushes, and a 
fire was burning, which made the little den, not in 
the. highest place more than five feet high, feel like 
an oven. I called the attention of my friend to the 
state of this place called a “house.” He merely 
said, ‘‘ men cannot live here.” Eight years from that 
day the whole hapu were extinct; but, as I remem- 
ber, two persons were shot for bewitching them and 
causing their deaths. 

Many other causes combined at the same time to 

M 


162 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


work the destruction of the natives. Next to the 
change of residence from the high and healthy hill 
forts to the low grounds, was the hardship, over- 
labour, exposure, and half-starvation, to which they 
submitted themselves—firstly, to procure these very 
muskets which enabled them to make the fatal 
change of residence, and afterwards to procure the 
highly and justly valued iron implements of the 
Europeans. When we reflect that a ton of cleaned 
flax was the price paid for two muskets, and at an 
earlier date for one musket, we can see at once the 
dreadful exertion necessary to obtain it. But sup- 
posing aman to get a musket for half a ton of flax, 
another half ton would be required for ammunition ; 
and in consequence, as every man in a native hapu, 
of say a hundred men, was absolutely forced on pain 
of death to procure a musket and ammunition at any 
cost, and at the earliest possible moment (for if they 
did not procure them extermination was their doom 
by the hands of those of their countrymen who had), 
the effect was that this small hapu, or clan, had to 
manufacture, spurred by the penalty of death, in the 
shortest possible time, one hundred tons of flax, 
scraped by hand with a shell, bit by bit, morsel by 
morsel, half-quarter of an ounce ata time. Now as. 
the natives, when undisturbed and labouring regu- 
larly at their cultivations, were never far removed 
from necessity or scarcity of food, we may easily 
imagine the distress and hardship caused by this 
enormous imposition of extra labour. They were 
obliged to neglect their crops in a very serious 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 163 


degree, and for many months in the year were in a 
half-starving condition, working hard all the time in 
the flax swamps. The insufficient food, over exer- 
tion, and unwholesome locality, killed them fast. As 
for the young children, they almost all died; and 
this state of things continued for many years: for it 
was long after being supplied with arms and ammu- 
nition before the natives could purchase, by similar 
exertion, the various agricultural implements, and 
other iron tools so necessary to them; and it must 
always be remembered, if we wish to understand the 
difficulties and over-labour the natives were subjected 
to, that while undergoing this immense extra toil, 
they were at the same time obliged to maintain 
themselves by cultivating the ground with sharpened 
sticks, not being able to afford to purchase iron im- 
plements in any useful quantity, till first the great, 
pressing, paramount want of muskets and gun- 
powder had been supplied. Thus continual excite- 
ment, over-work, and insufficient food, exposure, and 
unhealthy places of residence, together with a 
general breaking up of old habits of life, thinned 
their numbers. European diseases also assisted, but 
not to any very serious degree; till in the part of the 
country in which, as I have before stated, I have had 
means to observe with exactitude, the natives have 
decreased in numbers over one-third since I first saw 
them. That this rapid decrease has been checked in 
some districts, [ am sure, and the cause is not a mys- 
tery. The influx of Europeans has caused a compe- 
tition in trading, which enables them to get the 


164 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


highest value for the produce of their labour, and at 
the same time opened to them a hundred new lines 
of industry, and also afforded them other opportuni- 
ties of becoming possessed of property. They have 
not at all improved these advantages as they might 
have done; but are, nevertheless, as it were in spite 
of themselves, on the whole, richer —z.e., better 
clothed, fed, and in some degree lodged, than in past 
years; and I see the plough now running where I 
once saw the rude pointed stick poking the ground. 
I do not, however, believe that this improvement 
exists In more than one or two districts in any re- 
markable degree, nor do I think it will be permanent 
where it does exist, insomuch as I have said that the 
improvement is not the result of providence, economy, 
or industry, but of a train of temporary circumstances 
favourable to the natives; but which, if unimproved, 
as they most probably will be, will end in no perma- 
nent good result. 


CHAPTER XIV. 


Trading in the old times.—The native difficulty.—Virtue its 
own reward.—Rule Britannia.—Death of my chief.—His dying 
speech.—Rescue.—How the world goes round. 


¢~ ROM the years 1822 to 1826, the vessels 
trading for flax had, when at anchor, 
boarding nettings up to the tops. All 


rule, not more than five natives, on any 
pretence, allowed on board at one time. Trading for 
flax in those days was to be undertaken by a man 
who had his wits about him; and an old flax trader 
of those days, with his 150 ton schooner “ out of 
Sydney,” cruising all round the coast of New Zea- 
land, picking up his five tons at one port, ten at 
another, twenty at another, and so on, had questions, 
commercial, diplomatic, and military, to solve every 
day, that would drive all the “ native department,” 
with the minister at their head, clean out of their 
senses. Talk to me of the “native difficulty ”— 
pooh! I think it was in 1822 that an old friend of 
mine bought, at Kawhia, a woman who was just 
going to be baked. He gave a cartridge-box full of 


166 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


cartridges for her, which was a great deal more than 
she was really worth; but humanity does not stick 
at trifles. He took her back to her friends at Tara- 
naki, from whence she had been taken, and her 
friends there gave him at once two tons of flax and 
eighteen pigs, and asked him to remain a few days 
longer till they should collect a still larger present in 
return for his kindness; but, as he found out their 
intention was to take the schooner, and knock him- 
self and crew on the head, he made off in the night. 
But he maintains to this day that “ virtue is its own 
reward ’—“‘at least ’tis so at Taranaki.” Virtue, 
however, must have been on a visit to some other 
country, (she does go out sometimes,) when I saw 
and heard a British subject, a slave to some natives 
on the West Coast, begging hard for somebody to 
buy him. The price asked was one musket, but the 
only person on board the vessel possessing those 
articles preferred to invest in a different commodity. 
The consequence was, that the above-mentioned unit 
of the great British nation lived, and (“Rule Bri- 
tannia” to the contrary notwithstanding) died a slave; 
but whether he was buried, deponent sayeth not. 

My old rangatira at last began to show signs that 
his time to leave this world of care was approaching. — 
He had arrived at a great age, and a rapid and gene- 
ral breaking up of his strength became plainly ob- 
servable. He often grumbled that men should grow 
old, and oftener that no great war broke out in 
which he might make a final display, and die with 
éclat. The last two years of his life were spent 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 167 


almost entirely at my house, which, however, he 
never entered. He would sit whole days on a 
fallen puriri near the house, with his spear sticking 
up beside him, and speaking to no one, but some- 
times humming in a low droning tone some old 
ditty which no one knew the meaning of but him- 
self, and at night he would disappear to some of 
the numerous nests or little sheds he had around 
the place. In summer he would roll himself in 
his blanket and sleep anywhere, but no one could 
tell exactly where. In the hot days of summer, 
when his blood I suppose got a little warm, he 
would sometimes become talkative, and recount the 
exploits of his youth. As he warmed to the sub- 
ject he would seize his spear and go through all 
the incidents of some famous combat, repeating every 
thrust, blow, and parry as they actually occurred, 
and going through as much exertion as if he was 
really and truly fighting for his life. He used to go 
through these pantomimic labours as a duty when- 
ever he had an assemblage of the young men of the 
tribe around him, to whom, as well as to myself, he 
was most anxious to communicate that which he 
_considered the most valuable of all knowledge, a 
correct idea of the uses of the spear, a weapon he 
really used in a most graceful and scientific manner ; 
but he would ignore the fact that ‘‘ Young New Zea- 
land” had laid down the weapon for ever, and already 
matured a new system of warfare adapted to their 
new weapons, and only listened to his lectures out 
of respect to himself and not for his science. At 


168 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


last this old lion was taken seriously ill and removed 
permanently to the village, and one evening a smart 
handsome lad, of about twelve years of age, came to 
tell me that his twpuwna was dying, and had said he 
would ‘‘ go” to-morrow, and had sent for me to see 
him before he died. The boy also added that the 
tribe were ka poto, or assembled, to the last man 
around the dying chief. J must here mention that, 
though this old rangatira was not the head of his 
tribe, he had been for about half a century the re- 
cognized war chief of almost all the sections or hapu 
of a very numerous and warlike zz or tribe, who had 
now assembled from all their distant villages and pas 
to see him die. I could not, of course, neglect the 
invitation, so at daylight next morning I started on 
foot for the native village, which I, on my arrival 
about mid-day, found crowded by a great assemblage 
of natives. I was saluted by the usual haere maz! 
and a volley of musketry, and I at once perceived 
that, out of respect to my old owner, the whole tribe 
from far and near, hundreds of whom I had never 
seen, considered it necessary to make much of me,— 
at least for that day,—and I found myself conse- 
quently at once in the position of a ‘ personage.” 
“Here comes the pakeha!—Ais pakeha!—make way 
for the pakeha!—kill those dogs that are barking at 
the pakeha!” Bang! bang! Here a double barrel 
nearly blew my cap off by way of salute. I did for 
a moment think my head was off. I, however, 
being quite au fait in Maori etiquette by this time, 
thanks to the instructions and example of my old 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 169 


friend, fixed my eyes with a vacant expression looking 
only straight before me, recognized nobody, and took 
notice of nothing, not even the muskets fired under 
my nose or close to my back at every step, and each, 
from having four or five charges of powder, making a 
report like acannon. On I stalked, looking neither 
to the right or the left, with my spear walking-staff 
in my hand, to where I saw a great crowd, and where 
I of course knew the dying man was. I walked 
straight on, not even pretending to see the crowd, as 
was ‘‘correct”’ under the circumstances; I being 
supposed to be entranced by the one absorbing 
thought of seeing “mataora,” or once more in life 
my rangatira. The crowd divided as I came up, 
and closed again behind me as I stood in the front 
rank before the old chief, motionless, and, as in duty 
bound, trying to look the image of mute despair, 
which I flatter myself I did to the satisfaction of all 
parties. The old man I saw at once was at his last 
hour. He had dwindled to a mere skeleton. No 
food of any kind had been prepared for or offered to 
him for three days; as he was dying it was of course 
considered unnecessary. At his right side lay his 
spear, tomahawk, and musket. (I never saw him 
with the musket in his hand all the time I knew him.) 
Over him was hanging his greenstone mere, and at 
his left side, close, and touching him, sat a stout, 
athletic savage, with a countenance disgustingly ex- 
pressive of cunning and ferocity, and who, as he 
stealthily marked me from the corner of his eye, 
I recognized as one of those limbs of Satan, a Maori 


170 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


tohunga. The old man was propped up in a reclining 
position, his face towards the assembled tribe, who 
were all there waiting to catch his last words. I 
stood before him, and I thought I perceived he 
recognized me. Still all was silence, and for a full 
half hour we all stood there, waiting patiently for 
the closing scene. Once or twice the tohunga said 
to him in a very loud voice, ‘‘ The tribe are assembled, 
you won't die silent?” At last, after about half an 
hour, he became restless, his eyes rolled from side to 
side, and he tried to speak, but failed. The circle 
of men closed nearer, and there was evidence of 
anxiety and expectation amongst them, but a dead 
silence was maintained. At last, suddenly, without 
any apparent effort, and in a manner which startled 
me, the old man spoke clearly out, in the ringing 
metallic tone of voice for which he had been formerly 
so remarkable, particularly when excited. He spoke. 
‘“‘ Hide my bones quickly where the enemy may not 
find them: hide them at once.” He spoke again— 
‘‘Oh my tribe, be brave! be brave that you may 
live. Listen to the words of my pakeha; he will 
untold the designs of his tribe.” This was in allusion 
to a very general belief amongst the natives at the 
time, that the Europeans designed sooner or later to 
exterminate them and take the country, a thing the 
old fellow had cross-questioned me about a thousand 
times; and the only way I could find to ease his 
mind was to tell him that if ever I heard any such 
proposal I would let him know, protesting at the same 
time that no such intention existed. This notion of 


— rr 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 171 


the natives has since that time done much harm, and 
will do more, for it is not yet quite given up. He 
continued—“ I give my mere to my pakeha,’”’—‘ my 
two old wives will hang themselves,”—(here a howl 
of assent from the two old women in the rear rank) 
—*T am going; be brave, after lam gone.” Here 
he began to rave; he fancied himself in some des- 
perate battle, for he began to call to celebrated com- 
rades who had been dead forty or fifty years. I 
remember every word—‘‘ Charge!” shouted he— 
“Charge! Wata, charge! Tara, charge! charge!” 
Then after a short pause—‘ Rescue! rescue! to my 
rescue! ahau! ahau! rescue!” The last ery for 
‘‘ rescue” was in such a piercing tone of anguish and 
utter desperation, that involuntarily I advanced a foot 
and hand, as if starting to his assistance ; a movement, 
as I found afterwards, not unnoticed by the super- 
stitious tribe. At the same instant that he gave the 
last despairing and most agonizing cry for “ rescue,” 
I saw his eyes actually blaze, his square jaw locked, 
he set his teeth, and rose nearly to a sitting position, 
and then fell back dying. He only murmured— 
“How sweet is man’s flesh,’ and then the gasping 
breath and upturned eye announced the last mo- 
ment. The tohunga now bending close to the 
dying man’s ear, roared out “ Kai kotahi ki te ao! 
Kia kotahi ki te ao! Kia kotaht ki te po!” The poor 
savage was now, as I believe, past hearing, and 
gasping his last. “ Kat kotahi ki te ao!”—shouted 
the devil priest again in his ear, and shaking his 
shoulder roughly with his hand—“ Kia kotahi ki te 


172 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


ao!—Kai kotaht ki te po!” Then giving a significant 
look to the surrounding hundreds of natives, a roar 
of musketry burst forth. Kaz kotahi ki teao! Thus 
in a din like pandemonium, guns firmg, women 
screaming, and the accursed tohunga shouting in 
his ear, died ‘‘ Lizard Skin,” as good a fighting man 
as ever worshipped force or trusted in the spear. 
His death on the whole was thought happy, for his 
last words were full of good omen:—‘ How sweet is 
man’s flesh.” | 

Next morning the body had disappeared. This 
was contrary to ordinary custom, but in accordance 
with the request of the old warrior. No one, even 
of his own tribe, knows where his body is concealed, 
but the two men who carried it off in the night. All 
I know is that it les in a cave, with the spear and 
tomahawk beside it. 

The two old wives were hanging by the neck from 
a scaffold at a short distance, which had been made to 
place potatoes on out of the reachofrats. The shrivelled 
old creatures were quite dead. I was for a moment 
forgetful of the “correct” thing, and called to an 
old chief, who was near, to cut them down. He said, 
in answer to my hurried call, “‘ by-and-bye; it is too 
soon yet; they might recover.” “Oh,” said I, at once 
recalled to my sense of propriety, ‘I thought they 
had been hanging all night,” and thus escaped the 
great risk of being thought a mere meddling pakeha. 
I now perceived the old chief was employed making 
a stretcher, or kauhoa, to carry the bodies on. At a 
short distance also were five old creatures of women, 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 173 


sitting in a row, crying, with their eyes fixed on the 
hanging objects, and everything was evidently going 
on selon le régles. I walked on. ‘ E tika ana,’ said 
I, to myself. ‘It’s all right, I dare say.” 

The two young wives had also made a desperate 
attempt in the night to hang themselves, but had 
been prevented by two young men, who, by some 
unaccountable accident, had come upon them just as 
they were stringing themselves up, and who, seeing 
that they were not actually “ ordered for execution,” 
by great exertion, and with the assistance of several 
female relations, who they called to their assistance, 
prevented them from killing themselves out of respect 
for their old lord. Perhaps it was to revenge them- 
selves for this meddling interference that these two 
young women married the two young men before the 
year was out, and in consequence of which, and as a 
matter of course, they were robbed by the tribe 
of everything they had in the world, (which was 
not much,) except their arms. They also had to 
fight some half dozen duels each with spears, in 
which, however, no one was killed, and no more 
blood drawn than could be well spared. All this 
they went through with commendable resignation; 
and so, due respect having been paid to the memory 
of the old chief, and the appropriators of his widows 
duly punished according to law, further proceedings 
were stayed, and everything went on comfortably. 
And so the world goes round. 


CHAPTER XV. 


Mana.—Young New Zealand.—The law of England.—“ Pop 
goes the weasel.”—Right if we have might.—God save the 
Queen.—Good advice. 


Sie 


, USN the afternoon [ went home musing on 
SK v3 


S 
e: G aN what I had heard and seen. ‘“ Surely,” 
| 


OY wer 
> } thought I, “if one half of the world 


| @)\ does not know how the other half live, 
neither do they know how they die.” 

Some days after this a deputation arrived to deliver 
up my old friend’s mere. It was a weapon of great 
mana, and was delivered with some little ceremony. 
I perceive now I have written this word mana several 
times, and think I may as well explain what it means. 
I think this the more necessary as the word has 
been bandied about a good deal of late years, and 
meanings often attached to it by Europeans which 
are incorrect, but which the natives sometimes accept 
because it suits their purpose. This same word mana 
has several different meanings, and the difference 
between these diverse meanings is sometimes very 
great, and sometimes only a mere shade of meaning, 
though one very necessary to observe; and it is, 


ile 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 175 


therefore, quite impossible to find any one single 
word in English, or in any other language that I have 
any acquaintance with, which will give the meaning 
of mana. And, moreover, though I myself do know 
all the meanings and different shades of meaning 
properly belonging to the word, I find a great diffi- 
culty in explaining them; but as I have begun, the 
thing must be done. It will also be a tough word 
disposed of to my hand, when I come to write my 
Maori dictionary, in a hundred volumes, which, if I 
begin soon, I hope to have finished before the Maori 
is a dead language. 

Now then for mana. Virtus, prestige, authority, 
good fortune, influence, sanctity, luck, are all words 
which, under certain conditions, give something near 
the meaning of mana, though not one of them give it 
exactly; but before I am done, the reader shall have 
a reasonable notion (for a pakeha) of what it is. 

Mana sometimes means a more than natural virtue 
or power attaching to some person or thing, dif- 
ferent from and independent of the ordinary na- 
tural conditions of either, and capable of either 
increase or diminution, both from known and un- 
known causes. The mana of a priest or tohunga 
is proved by the truth of his predictions, as well as 
the success of his incantations, which same incantations, 
performed by another person, of inferior mana, would 
have no effect. Consequently, this description of 
mana is a virtue, or more than natural or ordinary 
condition attaching to the priest himself, and which 


176 OLD NEW ZEALAND. 


he may become possessed of and also lose without 
any volition of his own. When 


* Apollo from his shrine, 
No longer could divine, 
The hollow steep of Delphos sadly leaving,”— 


Then the oracle had lost its mana. 

Then there is the doctor’s mana. The Maori 
doctors in the old times did not deal much in “ sim- 
ples,” but they administered large doses of mana. 
Now when most of a doctor’s patients recovered, his 
mana was supposed to be in full feather; but if, as 
will happen sometimes to the best practitioners, a 
number of patients should slip through his fingers 
seriatim, then his mana was suspected to be getting 
weak, and he would not be liable to be ‘“ knocked 
up” as frequently as formerly. 

Mana in another sense is the accompaniment of 
power, but not the power itself; nor is it even in 
this sense exactly ‘‘ authority,” according to the strict 
meaning of that word, though it comes very near it. 
This is the chief’s mana. Let him lose the power, 
and the mana is gone; but mind you do not translate 
mana as power; that won’t do: they are two different 
things entirely. Of this nature also is the mana of a 
tribe; but this is not considered to be the super- 
deel kind of mana. 

Then comes the mana of a warrior. Uninterrupted 
success in war proves it. It has a slight touch of the 
supernatural, but not much. Good fortune comes 
near the meaning, but is just a little too weak. The 


OLD NEW ZEALAND. 177 


warrior’s mana is just a little something more than 
bare good fortune; a severe defeat would shake it 
terribly; two or three in succession would show that 
it was gone: but before leaving him, some superna- 
turally ominous occurrence might be expected to 
take place, such as are said to have happened before 
the deaths of Julius Cesar, Marcus Antonius, or 
Brutus. Let not any one smile at my, even in the 
most distant way, comparing the old Maori warriors 
with these illustrious Romans, for if they do, I shall 
answer that some of the old Maori 7oa were thought 
as much of in thew world, as any Greek or Roman 
of old was in his; and, moreover, that it is my pri- 
vate opinion, that if the best of them could only have 
met my friend “ Lizard Skin,” in his best days, and 
would take off his armour and fight fair, that the 
aforesaid “ Lizard Skin” would have tickled him to 
his heart’s content with the point of his spear. 

A fortress often assailed but never taken has a 
mana, and one of a high description too. The name 
of the fortress becomes a pepeha, a war boast or 
motto, and a war cry of encouragement or defiance, 
like the slogan of the ancient Highlanders in Scotland. 

A spear, a club, or a mere, may have a mana, which 
in most cases means that it is a lucky weapon which 
good fortune attends, if the bearer minds what he is 
about; but some weapons of the old times had a 
stronger mana than this, like the mana of the en- 
chanted weapons we read of in old romances or fairy 
tales. Let any one who likes give an English word 
for this kind of mana. I have done with it. 

N 


178 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


I had once a tame pig, which, before heavy rain, 
would always cut extraordinary capers and squeak 
like mad. Every pakeha said he was “ weather- 
wise;” but all the Maori said it was a “ poaka what 
manda,” a pig possessed of mana; wz had more than 
natural powers and could foretell rain. 

If ever this talk about the good old times be 
printed and published, and every one buy it, and 
read it, and quote it, and believe every word in it, as 
they ought, seeing that every word is true, then it 
will be a puka puka what mana, a book of mana; and 
I shall have a high opinion of the good sense and 
good taste of the New Zealand public. 

When the law of England is the law of New Zea- 
land, and the Queen’s writ will run, then both the 
Queen and the law will have great mana; but I don’t 
think either will ever happen, and so neither will 
have any mana of consequence. 

If the reader has not some faint notion of mana by 
this time, I can’t help it; I can’t do any better for 
him. I must confess I have not pleased myself. 
Any European language can be translated easily 
enough into any other; but to translate Maori into 


English is much harder to do than is supposed by 


those who do it every day with ease, but who do not _ 
know their own language or any other but Maori 


perfectly. | 

I am always blowing up “ Young New Zealand,” 
and calling them “reading, riting, rethmatiking” 
vagabonds, who will never equal their fathers; but I 
mean it all for their own good—(poor things !)—like 
a father scolding his children. But one does get 


i 


OLD NHW ZHALAND. 179 


vexed sometimes. Their grandfathers, if they had 
no backs, had at least good legs, but the grandsons 
can’t walk a day’s journey to save their lives; they 
must ride. The other day I saw a young chap ona 
good horse; he had a black hat and polished Wel- 
lingtons; his hat was cocked knowingly to one side; 
he was jogging along, with one hand jingling the 
money in his pocket; and may I never see another 
war dance, if the hardened villain was not whistling 
‘“‘Pop goes the weasel!” What will all this end in? 

My only hope is in a handy way (to give them 
their due) which they have with a tupara; and this 
is why I don’t think the law will have much mana 
here in my time,—I mean the pakeha law; for to say 
the worst of them, they are not yet so far demoralized 
as to stand any nonsense of that kind, which is a com- 
fort to think of. I am a loyal subject to Queen 
Victoria, but I am also a member of a Maori tribe; 
and I hope I may never see this country so enslaved 
and tamed that a single rascally policeman, with 
nothing but a bit of paper in his hand, can come 
and take a rangatira away from the middle of his 
hapu, and have him hanged for something of no con- 
sequence at all, except that it is against the law. 
What would old “Lizard Skin” say to it? His 
grandson certainly is now a magistrate, and if any- 
thing is stolen from a:‘pakeha, he will get it back, #7 
he can, and won’t stick to it, because he gets a salary 
in lieu thereof; but he has told me certain matters in 
confidence, and which I therefore cannot disclose. I 
can only hint there was something said about the 
law, and driving the pakeha into the sea. 


180 OLD NEW ZHALAND. 


I must not trust myself to write on these matters. 
I get so confused, I feel just as if I was two different 
persons at the same time. Sometimes I find myself 
thinking on the Maori side, and then just afterwards 
wondering if ‘* we” can lick the Maori, and set the 
law upon its legs, which is the only way to do it. I 
therefore hope the reader will make allowance for 
any little apparent inconsistency in my ideas, as I 
really cannot help it. 

I belong to both parties, and I don’t care a straw 
which wins; but I am sure we shall have fighting. 
Men must fight; or else what are they made for? 
Twenty years ago, when I heard military men talking 
of ‘‘marching through New Zealand with fifty men,” 
I was called a fool because I said they could not do 
it with five hundred. NowTI am also thought foolish 
by civilians, because I say we can conquer New 
Zealand with our present available means, if we set 
the right way about it (which we won’t). So hurrah 
again for the Maori! We shall drive the pakeha 
into the sea, and send the law after them! If we 
can do it, we are right; and if the pakeha beat us, 
they will be right too. God save the Queen! 

So now, my Maori tribe, and also my pakeha coun- 
‘trymen, I shall conclude this book with good advice ; 
and be sure you take notice; it is given to both par- 
ties. It is a sentence from the last speech of old 
“ Lizard Skin.” It is to you both. ‘Be brave, that 
you may live.” 


VERBUM SAPIENTI. 


HISTORY OF THE WAR IN THE NORTH 
OF NEW ZEALAND AGAINST 
THE CHIEF HEKE, 


IN THE YEAR 1845; 
TOLD BY AN OLD CHIEF OF THE 


NGAPUHI TRIBE. 


ca 
g 


PREFACE. 
oo. little tale is an endeavour to call back some shadows 


from the past: a picture of things which have left no 
record but this imperfect sketch. The old settlers of New 
Zealand—my fellow pioneers—will, I hope, recognize the like- 
ness. To those who have more recently sought these shores, I 


hope it may be interesting. To all it is respectfully presented. 


HISTORY OF THE WAR IN THE NORTH 
OF NEW ZEALAND AGAINST 
THE CHIEF HEKE. 


(ANY years ago, Hongi Ika, the great 
&) warrior chief of New Zealand, was 
4(@ dying. His relations, friends, and 
Se tribe were collected around him, and 
he then spoke to them in these words: “ Children 
and friends, pay attention to my last words. After 
I am gone, be kind to the missionaries, be kind also 
to the other Europeans; welcome them to the shore, 
trade with them, protect them, and live with them as 
one people; but if ever there should land on this 
shore a people who wear red garments, who do no 
work, who neither buy nor sell, and who always have 
arms in their hands, then be aware that these are a 
people called soldiers, a dangerous people, whose only 
occupation is war. When you see them, make war 


1 Hongi was shot through the body at Mangamuka, in Ho- 
kianga, of which wound he died, after lingering some years, 
The speech here given was not spoken on the day of his death, 
but some time before, when he saw he could not recover. 


184 HEEIS WAR IN - THE 


against them. Then, O my children, be brave! then, 
O friends, be strong! Be brave that you may not be 
enslaved, and that your country may not become the 
possession of strangers.” And having said these 
words, he died. 

After this, years passed away, and the pakeha 
increased in numbers, and were spread over the 
whole country, and traded with the Maori, and lived 
with them, and the Maori were pleased with them, 
for they got from them plenty of gunpowder, and 
tomahawks, and blankets, and all the wealth of the 
pakeha became theirs, and there was no fighting 
between them, but all lived together as friends. 

More years passed away, and then came a chief of 
the pakeha who we heard was called a Governor. 
We were very glad of his arrival, because we heard 
he was a great chief, and we thought, he being a 
great chief, would have more blankets and tobacco 
and muskets than any of the other pakeha people, 
and that he would often give us plenty of these things 
for nothing. The reason we thought so was because 
all the other pakeha often made us presents of things 
of great value, besides what we got from them by 
trading. Who would not have thought as we did? 

The next thing we heard was, that the Governor 
was travelling all over the country with a large piece 
of paper, asking all the chiefs to write their names or 
make marks on it. We heard, also, that the Nga- 
puhi chiefs, who had made marks or written on that 
paper, had been given tobacco, and flour, and sugar, 
and many other things, for having done so. 


NORTH OF NEW ZHALAND. 185 


We all tried to find out the reason why the 
Governor was so anxious to get us to make these 
marks. Some of us thought the Governor wanted to 
bewitch all the chiefs,’ but our pakeha friends laughed 
at this, and told us that the people of Europe did not 
know how to bewitch people. Some told us one 
thing, some another. Some said the Governor only 
wanted our consent to remain, to be a chief over the 
pakeha people; others said he wanted to be chief 
over both pakeha and Maori. We did not know 
what to think, but were all anxious he might come to 
us soon; for we were afraid that all his blankets, 
and tobacco, and other things would be gone before 
he came to our part of the country, and that he would 
have nothing left to pay us for making our marks on 
his paper. 

Well, it was not long before the Governor came, 
and with him came other pakeha chiefs, and also 
people who could speak Maori; so we all gathered 
together, chiefs and slaves, women and children, and 
went to meet him; and when we met the Governor, 
the speaker of Maori told us that if we put our names, 


The Governor made some presents of no great value to 
some of the natives who signed the Treaty of Waitangi, and a 
report in consequence got about, as is related here, that he was 
paying a high price for signatures. Many suppositions and 
guesses were made by the ignorant natives of the part of the 
country alluded to in the story, as to what could be the reason 
he was so desirous to get these names written on his paper, and 
many sugcested that he had some sinister design, probably that 
of bewitching them. 


186 HHEWVS WAH IN THH 


or even made any sort of a mark, on that paper, the 
Governor would then protect us, and prevent us from 
being robbed of our cultivated land, and our timber 
land, and everything else which belonged to us. 
Some of the people were very much alarmed when 
they heard this, for they thought that perhaps a great 
war expedition was coming against us from some 
distant country, to destroy us all; others said he was 
only trying to frighten us. The speaker of Maori 
then went on to tell us certain things, but the mean- 
ing of what he said was so closely concealed we never 
have found it out.t| One thing we understood well, 
however; for he told us plainly that if we wrote on 
the Governor’s paper, one of the consequences would 
be that great numbers of pakeha would come to this 
country to trade with us, that we should have abun- 
dance of valuable goods, and that before long there 
would be great towns, as large as Kororareka, in 
every harbour in the whole island. We were very 
glad to hear this; for we never could up to this time 
get half muskets or gunpowder enough, or blankets, 


1 When a native says anything for which he thinks he may 
at some future time be called to account, he so wraps his ideas 
up in figurative and ambiguous terms as to leave him perfectly 


free, should he think fit, to give a directly contrary meaning to ~ 


that which is most obvious at the time he speaks. Some natives 
are very clever at this, but it often happens that a fellow makes 
such a bungle of the business as to leave no meaning at all of 
any sort. This is what the narrator of the story means when 
he says, “the meaning of what the speaker of Maori said was 
closely concealed,” which is a polite Maori way of saying that 
he was talking nonsense. 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 187 


or tobacco, or axes, or anything. We also believed 
what the speaker of Maori told us, because we saw 
that our old pakeha friends who came with us to see 
the Governor believed it. 

After the speaker of Maori had ceased, then Te 
Tao Nui and some other chiefs came forward and 
wrote on the Governor’s paper; and Te Tao Nui 
went up to the Governor, and took the Governor’s 
hand in his and licked it! We did not much lke 
this; we all thought it so undignified. We were very 
much surprised that a chief such as Te Tao Nui 
should do so; but Te Tao Nui is a man who knows a 
great deal about the customs of the pakeha; he has 
been to Port Jackson in a ship, and he, seeing our 
surprise, told us that when the great pakeha chiefs go 
to see the King or Queen of England they do the 
same, so we saw then that it was a straight proceed- 
ing. But after Te Tao Nui and other chiefs had made 
marks and written on the Governor’s paper, the 
Governor did not give them anything. We did not 
like this, so some other chiefs went forward, and said 
to the Governor, “Pay us first, and we will write 
afterwards.” A chief from Omanaia said, ‘“ Put 
money in my left hand, and I will write my name 
with my right,’ and so he held out his hand to the 
Governor for the money; but the Governor shook his 
head and seemed displeased, and said he would not 
pay them for writing on the paper. 

Now, when all the people saw this they were very 
much vexed, and began to say one to another, “It is 
wasting our labour coming here to see this Governor,” 


188 HEKE’S WAR IN THE 


and the chiefs began to get up and make speeches. 
One said, “ Come here, Governor; go back to Eng- 
Jand ;” and another said, ‘ I am Governor in my own 
country, there shall be no other ;” and Paapahia said, 
‘“ Remain here and be Governor of this island, and I 
will go to England and be King of England, and if 
the people of England accept me for their King it will 
be quite just; otherwise you do not remain here.” 
Then many other chiefs began to speak, and there was 
a great noise and confusion, and the people began to 
go away, and the paper was lying there, but there was 
no one to write on it. The Governor looked vexed, 
and his face was very red. At this time some pakehas 
went amongst the crowd, and said to them, ‘‘ You 
are foolish; the Governor intends to pay you when all 
the writing is done, but it is not proper that he should 
promise to do so; it would be said you only wrote 
your names for pay; this, according to our ideas, 
would be a very wrong thing.” When we heard this 
we all began to write as fast as we could, for we were 
all very hungry with listening and talking so long, 
and we wanted to go to get something to eat, and we 
were also in a hurry to see what the Governor was 
going to give us; and all the slaves wanted to write 
their names, so that the Governor might think they ~ 
were chiefs, and pay them; but the chiefs would not 
let them, for they wanted all the payment for them- 
selves. I and all my family made our marks, and we 
then went to get something to eat; but we found our 
food not half done, for the women and slaves who 
should have looked after the cooking were all mad 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 189 


about the Governor, so when I saw that the food was 
not sufficiently done, I was aware that something bad 
would come of this business.’ 

Next morning the things came with which the 
Governor intended to pay us for writing our names, 
but there was not much tobacco, and only few blan- 
kets ;? and when they were divided some of the chiefs 
had nothing, others got only a few figs of tobacco, 
some one blanket, others two. I got for myself and 
all my sons, and my two brothers, and my three 
wives, only two blankets. I thought it was too little, 
and was going to return them, but my brother per- 
suaded me to keep them; so we got into our canoe to 
go home, and on the way home we began to say, 
‘Who shall have the blankets?” And so we began 
to quarrel about them. One of my brothers then 
said, ‘“‘ Let us cut them in pieces, and give every one 
a piece.” I saw there was going to be a dispute 
about them, and said, “‘ Let us send them back.” So 
we went ashore at the house of a pakeha, and got a 
pen and some paper, and my son, who could write, 
wrote a letter for us all to the Governor, telling him 
to take back the blankets, and to cut our names out 


1 This is a common native superstition. The natives believe 
in omens of a thousand different kinds, and amongst others 
think it a very bad omen if, on an occasion when any business 
of importance is on hand, the food happens to be served under- 
done ; or before a battle it is a particularly bad omen. 

2 These presents were given to the natives, and, in their 
matter-of-fact manner, understood to be payment for signing the 
treaty. 


190 HEKH’S WAR IN THE 


of the paper, and then my two brothers and my sons 
went back and found the Governor in a boat about to 
go away. He would not take back the blankets, but 
he took the letter. I do not know to this day whether 
he took our names out of the paper. It is, however, 
no matter; what is there in a few black marks? Who 
cares anything about them? 

Well, after this, the Governor died; he was be- 
witched, as I have heard, by a tohunga at the South, 
where he had gone to get names to his paper; for this 
was his chief delight, to get plenty of names and 
marks on his paper. He may not have been be- 
witched, as I have heard, but he certainly died, and 
the paper with all the names was either buried with 
him, or else his relations may have kept it to lament 
over, and as a remembrance of him. I don’t know. 
You, who are a pakeha, know best what became of it; 
but if it is gone to England, it will not be right to let 
it be kept in any place where food is cooked, or where 
there are pots or kettles, because there are so many 
chiefs’ names in it; it is a very sacred piece of paper ; 
it is very good if it has been buried with the 
Governor.* 

After the first Governor came the second Governor, 
but the towns and numerous pakeha traders we ex- 
pected did not come. We heard of a town at Waita- 
mata having been built,? and others farther South; 
but in our part of the country there was no new 


—— oe 


1 The Treaty of Waitangi. 
® Auckland, the capital of New Zealand. 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 191 


towns, and the pakeha did not increase in numbers, 
but, on the contrary, began to go away to the town at 
Waitamata, to be near their chief the Governor, who 
lived there, and many of us had no one left to sell 
anything to as formerly. Tobacco began to be scarce 
and dear; the ships began to leave off coming to 
Tokerau, Hokianga, and Mangonui. We inquired the 
reason of this, but the few pakeha traders left amongst 
us told us different stories. Some said that the 
reason tobacco was scarce and dear was, because the 
Governor would not let it be brought on shore until 
he was paid a large price for it, besides what was 
paid to the people of the ship, who were the right 
owners of it. This we at first did not believe, because 
you all said you were not slaves, not one of you, but 
all free men. Others said that the reason ships did 
not come as frequently as formerly, was because the 
Governor made them pay for coming to anchor in the 
ports. Some said all the evil was by reason of the 
flagstaff which the Governor had caused to be erected 
at Maiki, above Kororareka, as a rahui, and that as 
long as it remained there things would be no better; 
others again told us the flagstaff was put there to 
show the ships the way into the harbour; others, that 
it was intended to keep them out; and others said 
that it was put up as a sign that this island had been 
taken by the Queen of England, and that the nobility 
and independence of the Maori was no more. But 
this one thing at least was true, we had less tobacco 
and fewer blankets and other European goods than 
formerly, and we saw that the first Governor had not 


Bi 


192 HEKE’S WAR IN THE 


spoken the truth, for he told us we should have a 
great deal more. The hearts of the Maori were sad, 
and our old pakeha friends looked melancholy, because 
so few ships came to bring them goods to trade with. 
At last we began to think the flagstaff must have 
something to do with it, and so Heke went and cut it 
down. 

When the flagstaff was cut down, there was a great 
deal of talk about it, and we expected there would be 
fighting; but it all ended quietly. The Governor, 
however, left off taking money from the people,’ and 
tobacco became cheap, and ships began to come as 
before, and all our old pakeha friends were glad, be- 
cause they had ‘plenty of goods to sell us, and so we 
all thought Heke was a man of great understanding. 
But the Governor put up the flagstaff again, and when 
Heke heard this he came and cut it down again; so 
this was twice that he cut it down. 

Now, when the Governor heard that Heke had cut 
down the flagstaff a second time, he became very 
angry, because he thought he could never get any 
more money from the people, or the ships,* so he sent 


1 After the flagstaff had been cut down, the customs-duties 
were repealed, and, in consequence, tobacco and other articles on 
which duties had been levied became cheaper. This fully con- 
vinced the natives that there was some mysterious connection 
between the dearness of different goods and the existence of the 
flagstaff, which they now thought was the source of all evils, and 
which will account for their determined persistence in cutting it 
down so often, at all risks. 

2 This was really the belief of the natives at the time; I have 
heard it said not once but fifty times. To tell the contrary was 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 193 


to England, and to Port Jackson, and everywhere, for 
soldiers to come to guard the flagstaff, and to fight 
with Heke. 

It was not long before the soldiers came, and the 
flagstaff was put up again; it was made larger and 
stronger than before, and pieces of iron were fastened 
to it, to prevent its being cut down easily, and a 
house was built under it for the soldiers, and the 
Governor told those soldiers to remain there always 
to guard that flagstaff. There were other soldiers at 
Kororareka and other places. I don’t know how 
many, but a great many. This was the first time 
that Heke began to think of the last words of Hongi 
Ika, his relative, when he died at Mawhe. Heke 
began to think much on these words, for Heke was 
now a chief amongst the Ngapuhi, and he thought to 
stand in the place of Hongi, as, indeed, he had a right 
to do. 

Now, these soldiers had red garments; they did not 
work, or buy and sell, like the other pakeha people; 
they practised every day with their weapons, and 
some of them were constantly watching as if they ex- 
pected to be attacked every moment. They were a 
very suspicious people, and they had stiff, hard things 
round their necks to keep their heads up, lest they 
should forget, and look too much downwards, and 


perfectly useless; the flagstaff, and nothing but the flagstaff, 
was “the cause of all the evil’—and there were not wanting 
ill-disposed Europeans who encouraged this belief, as I think 
with the purpose to bring on a war. 


O 


194 HEKEH’S WAR IN THE 


not keep their eyes continually rolling about in search 
of an enemy. 

Great, indeed, was the fear of the Maori when they 
heard of these soldiers, for all the pakeha agreed in 
saying that they would attack any one their chief 
ordered them to attack, no matter whether there was 
any just cause or not; that they would fight furiously 
till the last man was killed, and that nothing could 
make them run away. Fear came like a cold fog on 
all the Ngapuhi, and no chief but Heke had any 
courage left. But Heke called together his people, 
and spoke to them saying, “‘I will fight these soldiers, 
I will cut down the flagstaff, I will fulfil the last 
words of Hongi Ika. Be not afraid of these soldiers, 
‘all men are men.’* The soldiers are not gods; lead 
will kill them; and if we are beaten at last, we shall 
be beaten by a brave and noble people, and need not 
be ashamed.” 

So Heke sent runners to all the divisions of the 
Ngapuhi, saying, ‘“ Come, stand at my back; the red 
garment is on the shore. Let us fight for our country. 
Remember the last words of Hongi Ika—Kez hea 
koutou kia toa.” 

But the chiefs of the Ngapuhi hapu said amongst 
themselves, ‘‘ How long will the fire of the Maori burn ~ 
before it is extinguished?” 


1 This is a native saying or proverb, meaning that in fact one 
man is as good as another, or that the best or bravest man is but 
a man, and therefore not to be too much feared. The speech is 
a literal verbatim translation. 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 195 


So the Ngapuhi chiefs would not join Heke for fear 
of the soldiers, but said, ‘‘ We will wait till a battle 
has been fought, and if he is successful, then we will 
join him.” So Heke, therefore, went with his own 
family and people, and those of his elder relation 
Kawiti, and the Kapotae, and some others, altogether 
about 400 men. He went to fight with the soldiers 
at Kororareka, and to cut down his old enemy the 
flagstaff. 

Heke and Kawiti having arrived at Tokerau, and 
having fixed upon the day of attack, they agreed that 
Kawitishould attack the town of Kororareka, to draw 
off the attention of the soldiers who guarded the flag- 
staff on the hill of Maiki, so that Heke should have an 
opportunity to cut it down, for Heke had said that he 
would cut down the flagstaff, and he was resolved to 
make his word true. When they had formed this 
plan, and night was come, the priests of the war party 
threw darts to divine the event.* They threw one for 
Heke, and one for the soldiers, and one for the flag- 
staff: and the dart for Heke went straight, and fair, 
and fortunate; but the dart for the soldiers turned to 


1 Before a war or any other important matter, the natives 
used to have recourse to divination, by means of little miniature 
darts made of rushes or reeds, or often of the leaf of the cooper’s 
flag (raupo). This was very much believed in, but of course 
the chiefs and priests or tohunga (such of them as did not de- 
ceive themselves) could make the result favourable or otherwise 
as they liked. There is an allusion to a custom of this kind 
(divining by darts) in the Bible. 


196 HERES WAR IN THLE 


one side, and fell with the wrong side up; so did that 
for the flagstaff. When this was told the people they 
were very glad, and had no longer any fear. Then 
Kawiti, who is himself a tohunga, threw a rakau for 
his own path—he threw one for himself and people, 
and one for the soldiers, and one for the town. The 
dart for Kawiti went straight and fair, but it turned 
wrong side up, which is the omen of death; and so 
also did the dart for the soldiers go fair and straight, 
but also turned wrong side up. And when Kawiti 
saw this, he said, “It is good. Here have I two darts 
ominous of success, and bravery, and death—our 
enemy will prove very strong and brave, they will 
suffer much from us, and so will we from them. I 
am not displeased, for this is war and not play.” Then 
Heke and Kawiti stood up in the night, and spoke 
long and with great spirit to their men, to give them 
courage; and when they had done speaking, Kawiti 
remained where he was near the sea, not far from 
the town; but Heke went inland, and before morn- 
ing he lay with his men in a hollow close to the flag- 
staff. 

Heke lay on the ground with his war party—close 
at hand were the sleeping soldiers. Amongst those 


soldiers there was not one tohunga, not a man at all 


experienced in omens, or they must have had some 
warning that great danger and defeat was near; but 
there they lay sleeping between the open jaws of 
war, and knew of no danger. This is the only 
foolishness I see about the pakeha—they are quite 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 197 


ignorant and inexperienced in omens, and, indeed, 
care nothing at all about them.’ 

In the morning, before it was light, Kawiti rushed 
upon Kororareka. The young men did not look for 
the light of this world; their only thought was who 
should kill the first man, and elevate his name. But 
the soldiers met them in the path, and the fight 
began. Pumuka then gained a name; he killed the 
first man of the battle, but had not long to rejoice, 
for he himself fell a matazka for the pakeha.* Then 
the Maori charged to revenge Pumuka; the soldiers 
met them; the sailors charged sword in hand; a 
keen breeze of war was blowing then on Kororareka! 
The best men of both sides were in front; the sword 
met the tomahawk, and many fell; but of all the 
braves (toa) there, the chief of the sailors was the 
bravest; no man could stand up before his sword, 
and had he not been struck by a shot, the Maori 
would have been defeated—four men like him would 
have killed Kawiti and all his war party. This is 
what I have been told by Kawiti’s people who were 


_ 1 Tt astonished the natives greatly that the soldiers paid no 
attention to omens, and also to see them every five minutes 
doing something or another monstrously “unlucky.” 

* The first man killed in a battle is called the mataika. To 
kill the mataika is thought a great distinction, and young men 
will risk themselves to the utmost to obtain it. Many quarrels 
arise sometimes after a fight, in consequence of different indivi- 
duals claiming the honour of having killed the first man. The 
writer knows a man who in different battles has killed eleven 
mataika. 


s 


198 HEEES “WAR IN THR 


in the fight. I did not see it myself, but was at 
every other fight in the war. 

When Kawiti attacked Kororareka, the soldiers at 
the flagstaff on the top of Maiki heard the firing, and 
left the flagstaff, and went straggling about the hill- 
side, trying to see what was going on below. They 
did not think of Heke or his words when he said he 
would cut down the flagstaff, neither did they re- 
member the orders of the Governor. They were very 
foolish; for while they were trying to see the fight 
between Kawiti and the soldiers and sailors, and 
thinking, perhaps, that the Maori did not know how 
to conduct an ambush, Heke started from the ground, 
and before they could turn round the flagstaff and 
their fort was taken. Some of them were killed, 
others ran away, and then the axes went to work, 
and the flagstaff was cut down. So this was the 
third time it fell, and there it les now. 

During this time, the fighting was still going on at 
Kororareka; but at last the Maori drew back, and 
the pakeha remained in the town. The Maori were 
not beaten, neither were the soldiers. Pumuka had 
been killed, and many others of Kawiti’s people were 
killed and wounded; several, also, of the pakeha had 
been killed, and their great toa, the chief of the 
sailors, was almost dead. So the words of Kawiti 
proved true: both he and his enemy had done 
bravely, and had equal success, and both had suf- 
fered much. 

In the afternoon the Maori began to perceive that 
the pakeha were leaving the town, and going on 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 199 


board the ships, so they returned to the town and 
began to plunder, and the people of the town plun- 
dered also, so both parties quietly plundered the 
town of Kororareka, and did not quarrel with one 
another. At last, all the town people and soldiers 
went on board the ships, and then the ship of war 
fired at the Maori people who were plundering in the 
town. The noise of the firing of the ship guns was 
very great, and some of Kawiti’s people were near 
being hit by the lumps ofiron. This was not right, 
for the fight was over, and the people were only 
quietly plundering the town which had been left for 
them, and which they had given fair payment for; 
but, I suppose, the sailors thought their chief was 
dying, and fired a volley (wazpu) for his sake. So 
the sailors may have an argument in their favour; 
but the Maori did not at the time think of this, so 
in revenge they burnt Kororareka, and there was 
nothing left but ashes; and this was the beginning 
of the war. 

Well, you pakeha are a noble-minded people; it 
was very generous of you to give up Kororareka to 
be plundered and burnt for wtw for the Maori. If 
you had been beaten you could not have helped it; 
but as you were not beaten, I say it was very noble 
of you to give up the town. You are always giving 
us something, so you gave Kawiti and Heke a town 
full of blankets, and tobacco, and money, and all 
sorts of property, and rum! It was very good of 
you. [ wish I had been there. 

When Kororareka was burnt, and all the Euro- 


200 HEKE’S WAR IN THE 


peans had sailed to the town at Waitamata, which we 
now began to hear was called Auckland, then Heke 
went to stop at Ahuahu, and the news of the battle 
was heard all over the country, and then many men 
came to join Heke, but no whole hapu came, for most 
of the Ngapuhi chiefs said, ‘‘ Now tens of thousands 
of soldiers will come to fight with Heke, and he will 
be utterly destroyed.” But when all Heke’s people 
were together they were about 700 men. 

Now, when Thomas Walker Nene heard that the 
war had actually begun, and that Kororareka had 
fallen, he called together his family and all his friends, 
and said he would fight against Heke, and seek 
revenge for his friends the pakeha people. Walker 
had been always a friend and protector to the Euro- 
peans; and also Hongi Ika, Heke’s relation, had 
killed in former times Te Tihi, at Hokianga, and 
swallowed his eyes, and Te Tihi was a matua (elder 
relation) to Walker. 

And Te Tao Nui came to join Walker, and brought 
with him all his family and relations, many fighting 
men; only one man of his family did not come—that 
man went to help Heke. Te Tao Nui had always, 
like Walker, been a good friend to the Europeans, 
and he was also an ancient enemy of Hongi Ika. 

And the tribe of Ngati Pou came to help Walker. 
Formerly they had been a great tribe, but Hongi 
Ika had driven them from their country and slain 
most of their warriors; but they in return wounded 
Hongi, and he died of that wound some years after- 
wards. They came to help Walker, in search of 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 201 


revenge against Hongi Ika, for Heke and Hongi are 
the same. This tribe of Ngati Pou brought forty 
men to help Walker, which was all left alive by 
Hongi, but they fought well, for their hatred to 
_Hongi was great; they fought through the whole 
war, and never were absent from any fight. The 
first man killed in the war between Walker and 
Heke was killed by a Ngati Pou, and the first man 
who fell on our side was a Ngati Pou, and the last 
man who fell in the war was also a Ngati Pou; their 
chief, Hakaraia, was wounded, and several others of 
the forty men were killed. 

And all the young men of the Hikutu came to 
help Walker; they came to practise war, and elevate 
their names; but their handsome and brave young 
chief, Hauraki, fell at Waikare, for such is the ap- 
pearance of war; and many young men came from 
different tribes (hapu) to jom Walker, and to perfect 
themselves in the practice of war. 

And I, your friend, went also with my two younger 
brothers, my four sons, and my daughter’s husband, 
and nine cousins (tema keke), and three slaves— 
twenty men of us, all tino tangata, who had seen war.* 
I went because when the ancestors of Heke fought 
against mine, the ancestors of Walker came to help 


1 This is a very good example of the manner in which a native 
chief raises men for a war party; they are all his relations with 
their different connections, and it is this which causes the natives 
to be so careful to remember all who are, however remotely, re- 
lated to them. Ina word, to be “a man of many cousins”’ is to 
be a great chief. 


202 HEKE’S WAR IN THH 


my forefathers, because they were related to each 
other; so I and Walker are relations; but I don’t 
know exactly what the relationship is, for eleven 
generations have passed since that ancient war; but 
Walker and I are aware that we are related, and 
always come to each other’s help in war. 

When Walker had got all his men together, they 
were in number about 500, and he went with them 
to Okaihau and built a pa, and Heke was at Te 
Ahuahu with his men. Te Ahuahv is not far from 
Okaihau, and there was fighting between them every 
day. Several of Walker’s relations were killed, and 
the brother of Te Tao Nui was also killed, and his 
son badly wounded; but in every fight Heke lost 
most men, and had the worst of the battle. So Heke 
sent a messenger to Walker, saying, “ If you go on 
this way, when the soldiers return there will be no 
one to fight them. Who will there be to fight with 
you, and who to fight the red garment?” But 
Walker said, in answer, ‘‘I will fight on till I arrive 
at the end.” 

Then the messenger answered Walker, saying, 
‘“‘ Behold the soothsayers foretell your death.” 

Then arose quickly Karere Horo, our priest, who 
answered in a loud voice, saying, ‘‘ Your soothsayers 
speak falsely. What sin has Walker committed that 
he should die in this war? I myself who now address 
you shall die, and many others, but Walker shall live.” 

Then Heke’s messenger, having saluted the people, 
took his gun and departed. 

Up to this time, no news had been heard from the 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 203 


Governor at Auckland, and a pakeha came to the 
camp at Okaihau, and said to Walker’s people, ‘‘This 
is a bad thing you are doing, coming here to fight 
with Heke. The Governor when he hears of “it will 
be angry, and so will the Queen. You are only 
wasting your powder, and getting killed for nothing. 
The Governor will not give you any more gunpowder, 
and you will get no pay. Moreover, you are not 
fighting at all for the pakeha, or the Queen, you are 
fighting to revenge Te Tihi.” Then another pakeha 
who was in the camp, an old friend of Walker, arose 
and spoke to the people, and said, “‘ Pay no attention 
to what has been said by this man. Both the Go- 
vernor and the Queen will be well pleased to hear of 
your opposing Heke, and so will all the pakeha people. 
You will be ever after this looked on as true friends, 
and the Governor will give you plenty of gunpowder 
to replace what you have expended. Neither is this 
a war for Te Tihi, but for Kororareka; but if you 
remember Te Tihi also, how can you help it?” When 
we heard this speech we were encouraged, for we had 
begun to doubt whether we were doing right when 
we heard the speech of the first pakeha. 

On this same night the moon was eaten into by a 
star (eclipsed), and the light of the moon was quite 
obscured, and we all thought this an omen of great 
disaster to one party or the other in the battle to take 
place next morning. The fight, however, in the 
morning was no great matter; of Heke’s people there 
were three killed and twenty wounded; and eleven 
of our men were wounded, but none killed. 


204 HEKE’S WAR IN THE 


Walker’s old pakeha friends gave him gunpowder, 
and rifles, and other things, to enable him to fight 
Heke; and some of them came and stayed at the 
camp, and fought amongst his men, to show him that 
he was right in what he was doing, for Walker had 
not yet had any word from the Governor, and was 
only fighting on his own thought. 

Shortly after this, a letter came from the Governor, 
and with it the Governor sent gunpowder, and lead, 
and blankets, and flour, and sugar, and tobacco; so 
we saw then clearly that we were doing right. But 
there was only one letter for both Walker and Te 
Tao Nui; so Te Tao Nui was angry at this, for he 

thought there should have been a letter entirely for 
mal and he said he would leave the camp with 
all his men. He had more men, at that time, than 
Walker; but, however, he remained, and helped 
Walker to the last. After this, news came fre- 
quently from Auckland, and before long we heard 
that the soldiers were coming. ’ 

When Heke’s people heard that the soldiers were 
coming, most of them left him, and there remained 
but 200 men. Then Heke left Te Ahuahu, and came 
and built a pa not far from Taumata Tutu, on the 


clear ground by the lake; for he said he would fight. 


the soldiers on the spot where the last words of 
Hongi Ika had been spoken. The name of this pa of 
Heke’s was Te Kahika. | 
Now, when this new fort of Heke’s was finished, 
the spirit of the Ngakahi entered into the atua wera, 
who is the greatest tohunga in all the country of the 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 205 


Ngapuhi. So the Ngakahi spoke in the night to 
Heke-and his people, by the mouth of the atua wera, 
‘“‘ Be brave, and strong, and patient. Fear not the 
soldiers, they will not be able to take this fort— 
neither be you afraid of all those different kinds of 
big guns you have heard so much talk of. I will 
turn aside the shot, and they shall do you no harm; 
but this pa and its defenders must be made sacred 
(tapu). You must particularly observe all the sacred 
rites and customs of your ancestors; if you neglect 
this in the smallest particular, evil will befall you, 
and I also shall desert you. You who pray to the 
God of the missionaries, continue to do so, and in 
your praying see you make no mistakes. Fight and 
pray. Touch not the spoils of the slain, abstain 
from human flesh, lest the European God should be 
angry, and be careful not to offend the Maori gods 
It is good to have more than one God to trust to. 
This war party must be strictly sacred. Be brave, 
be strong, be patient.” * 

So Heke waited there at his fort at Mawhe, near 
Taumata Tutu, for the coming of the soldiers; and 
before long they arrived at Walker’s camp at Okai- 
hau, which was but a short distance from where 
Heke was. When these soldiers arrived they were 
very much fatigued, and quite without provisions, 


1 This is word for word a literal translation of the speech of 
the atwa wera to Heke’s men. He was, however, supposed only 
to speak the words of the Ngakahi by whom he was at the 
moment inspired. 


206 HEKE’S WAR IN THE 


and not at all fit to go to fight. They had been two 
nights on the road, one of which nights they lay out 
in the rain, and they had but a small quantity of 
ammunition. They had come by a long, bad road, 
up and down hill, though there was a good road open 
to them; and they were quite worn out, and not fit 
to fight at all. What could be the reason that the 
pakeha who knew the country did not tell the soldiers — 
to come up the Keri Keri in boats, and then along 
the cart road to the turn-off to Okaihau? If they 
had done this, they could have brought big guns in 
the boats, and provisions, and put. them in carts at 
the Keri Keri, and come along the cart road till they 
were not far from Walker’s camp. If they had done 
this, the big guns would have knocked down the pa, 
for it was a very weak one, and it would have been 
taken, and the war would have ended; for it was 
because this very weak pa was not taken that the 
Maori kept on fighting, and caused so many men 
afterwards to be killed on both sides. Heke certainly 
had many friends amongst the Europeans, as why 
should he not? 

But the soldiers had with them a light gun, called 
a rocket, and this gun had a great name: it was said 
that it would go into the pa, and. twist and turn 
about in pursuit of the people until it had killed them 
every one. When we heard this we were sorry for 
Heke and his people, and were in great fear for our- 
selves lest it should turn round upon us also. 

When the soldiers had rested one night at Okaihau, 
they prepared to attack Heke’s pa; but early in the 


“y 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 207 


morning, when they were getting something to eat, 
we observed many of them eating standing up; this 
gave us a good deal of uneasiness, for it has an un- 
lucky look to see warriors before going to battle 
eating their food standing. They should sit down 
and eat quietly, as if nothing was going to happen 
out of common; but, as I have said before, the 
soldiers are very inexperienced in these matters. 
When they had done eating, they formed to march to 
attack Heke. What a fine-looking people these 
soldiers are! Fine, tall, handsome people; they all 
look like chiefs; and their advance is like the advance 
of a flight of curlew in the air, so orderly and straight. 
And along with the soldiers came the sailors; they 
are of a different family, and not at all related to the 


soldiers,’ but they are a brave people, and they came 


1 That the sailors were quite a different hapu, though belong- 
ing to the wi of England, and in no way “related” to the 
soldiers, I have heard often stated by the natives, as well as by 
the narrator of this story. Neither will we wonder at their 
having jumped at this conclusion, after having compared “Jack,” 
let loose for a run on shore, with the orderly soldiers. I will 
here take occasion to state that I shall not hold myself account- 
able for the many mistakes and misapprehensions of my old 
friend the Ngapuhi chief, when he speaks of us, our manners, 
customs, and motives of action; when he merely recounts the 
events and incidents of the war, he is to be fully depended on, 
being both correct and minutely particular in his relation, after 
the native manner of telling a story, to omit nothing. I have 
had, indeed, to leave out a whole volume of minute particulars, 
such as this for instance: where a pakeha would simply say, 
“we started in the morning after breakfast,” &c., the native 
would say, “in the morning the ovens were heated, and the food 


208 HEEKE’S WAR IN. VHE 


to seek revenge for the relations they had lost in the 
fight at Kororareka. They had different clothes 
from the soldiers, and short guns, and long heavy 
swords; they were a people who talked and laughed 
more than the soldiers, and they flourished their guns 
about as they advanced, and ate tobacco. 

So the soldiers, sailors, and other Europeans ad- 
vanced to the attack of Heke’s pa, and with them 


was put in and covered up; when it was cooked it was taken 
out, and we eat it, and finished eating, then we got up and 
started,” &c. In the course of the narration I have translated, 
I have had to listen to the above formula about fifty times; the 
lighting of a pipe and the smoking it, or the seeing a wild pig 
(describing size and colour, &.), is never omitted, no matter if 
it is five seconds before commencing a battle. This is the true 
native way of telling a story, and it is even now a wonder to 
them to see how soon a Huropean tells the story of a journey, or 
voyage, or any event whatever. If a native goes on a journey 
of three days’ duration, during which nothing whatever of any 
consequence may have occurred, it will take him at least one 
whole day to tell all about it, and he is greatly annoyed at the 
impatient pakeha who wants to get the upshot of the whole 
story by impertinently saying, “ Did you get what you went for?” 
_ To tell that too soon would be out of all rule; every foot of the 
way must be gone over with every incident, however trivial, 
before the end is arrived at. They are beginning now to find 
that in talking to Europeans they must leave out one half at 
least of a story to save time, but the old men can’t help making 
the most of a chance of talking. To cut a story short seems to 
them a waste of words by not speaking them, while we think it a 
decided waste of words to speak them. In old times the natives 
had so few subjects for conversation that they made the most of 
what they had, which accounts for their verbosity in trifling 
matters. 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 209 


came also Walker and his men; but before we had 
gone far, we observed the soldiers carrying on their 
shoulders certain things made of cloth and wood; 
these things were rolled up, and we did not know 
the use of them, so we asked what they were, and 
were told they were kauhoa on which to carry the 
dead or wounded! This was the worst of all; there 
were those soldiers going to battle, and actually 
carrying on their shoulders things to put themselves 
on when they were dead! So we began to say one 
to another, “ Those soldiers walking there are all 
dead men. It only wants a few guns to be fired, 
and they will be all killed.” So some of the chiefs 
told some of the chiefs of the soldiers what a dread- 
fully unlucky thing they were doing, but they all 
laughed, and said that they came there to fight, and 
that whenever people fought some one was sure to 
be killed or wounded, and that it was right to have 
something to carry them on. But our people said 
it was time enough to think of carrying a man when 
he could not stand, and that by what they were 
doing they were calling for death and destruction; 
and they tried hard to get the soldiers to throw away 
these things, but the soldiers would not listen to 
them. So we all said, ‘‘ This is not a war party here 
marching on this plain, but a mate (a funeral proces- 
sion); so all the Maori left the soldiers, and went 
and sat on the top of the hill called Taumata Kaka- 
ramu, except about forty men, Walker’s relations, 
who would not leave him. We felt sorry for the 
soldiers; but we said, “ Let them fight their own 
P 


2 


210 HEKE’S WAR IN THE 


battle to-day, and if they are successful we will help 
them in every other fight.” But no one could believe 
they would be successful. 

At last the soldiers and sailors got before Heke’s 
pa; the main body of the soldiers remained opposite 
to it, at the side next to Walker’s camp—the rest, 
about one hundred men, sailors and soldiers, went 
round by the shore of the lake, which was on the 
right of the pa, and so got behind it; and on 
that side there was but one slight fence, and no 
pekerangt.. The soldiers had told us in the morning 
that they would rush on both sides of the pa at once, 
and that it would be taken in a moment, and that 
then they would come home to breakfast. 

So now the soldiers were in front of the pa, and 
also behind it; and on the right was the lake, and on 
the left was Walker with about forty men, and be- 
hind Walker there was a wood—he was between the 
wood and the pa. 

Then the soldiers who had the rocket gun went a 


1 Heke’s pa at the lake, the first we ever attacked, was the 
weakest ever built by the natives in the war. Had it not been 
for Kawiti’s appearance just at the moment the storming party 
were about to advance, and thus making a diversion, it would 
most certainly have been taken, and as certain all its defenders 
killed or taken prisoners; for if the soldiers had entered then, 
the friendly natives, who were outside in great numbers, would 
have prevented any escaping. As it turned out, however, the 
place was not taken, and this gave the natives courage to con- 
tinue the war, in the course of which they acquired so much 
confidence, that now they think less of fighting Huropeans, and 
are less afraid of them, than of their own countrymen. 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 211 


little to the left front of the pa, and set the gun upon 
its legs, and pointed it straight at the pa. Then all 
the people on the top of Taumata Kakaramu fixed 
their eyes on this gun. We watched it closely, and 
held our breath, and had great fear for the people in 
the pa—for they were, although against us, all Nga- 
puhi, the same zw? as ourselves, and many of them 
our near relations—and we never expected to see 
them more by reason of this gun, we had heard so 
much of it. At last,a great smoke was seen to issue 
from one end of the gun, and the rocket came out of 
the other. At first it did not go very fast, but it had 
not gone far before it began to flame, and roar, and 
dart straight towards the pa. It had a supernatural 
appearance, and rushed upon the pa like a falling 
star; but just as it was about to enter the pa it 
swerved from its course, touched the ground outside, 
and then rose and flew away over the pa, without 
doing any harm, and no one could tell where that 
first rocket went to, for it was the Ngakahi, the 
familiar spirit of the atua wera, who had blown upon 
it with his breath and turned it away, according to 
his word when he spoke by the mouth of the tohunga ; 
for up to this time Heke and his people had kept 
strictly all the sacred customs, and infringed none of 
them. So the Ngakahi remained guarding them from 
all danger. 

When we saw that the first rocket had gone by 
the pa and done no harm, we all gave a great sigh, 
and our minds were eased; a second rocket was 
fired, and a third, and so till they were all gone, but 


212 HEKE’S WAR IN THH 


not one did any harm, for the Ngakahi had turned 
them all away—not one entered the pa. 

Now, before the first rocket was fired, Heke came 
out of the front gate of the pa to watch the effect of 
the rocket, and he stood outside praying a Maori 
prayer, and holding with one hand to a post of the 
fence. Then the first rocket was fired; it came very 
near him, and passed away without doing any harm. 
Then another was fired, and missed also; so when 
Heke saw this, he cried out in a loud voice, ‘‘ What 
prize can be won by such a gun?”’ and this has be- 
come a saying amongst us from that day; for when- 
ever we hear a man boasting of what he can do, we 
think of the rocket, and cry, ‘‘ What prize can be 
won by such a gun ?” 

When the first rocket was fired it frightened all 
the dogs in the pa, and they ran barking away over 
the plain; and also one slave ran out of the pa. He 
was very much frightened, and he ran away by a 
path which went between the hundred soldiers and 
sailors who were behind the-pa, and Walker’s people, 
who were at the left side of it; and this slave never 
stopped running till he came to a place called Kai 
Namu, where Kawiti, who had marched all night to 
relieve Heke, had just arrived. And this slave 
ran up to Kawiti and his people, and began to cry 


1 «7 aha te kat e pahurei aia.” My translation is not very 
literal; a literal translation would not give the sense to the 
reader not acquainted with the Maori language; my free trans- 
lation gives it exactly. 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND, 213 


out, “ Oh, the soldiers have a frightful gun; it 
comes roaring and flaming.’ Here Kawiti stopped 
him, and said, ‘“‘ I know all about all sorts of guns; 


-all guns will kill, and all guns will also miss; this is 


the nature (ahua) of guns; but if you say one word 
more, I will split your head with my tomahawk.” 
So the slave became more afraid of Kawiti than he 
was of the rocket, and he ran away back to Heke, 
and told him that Kawiti with help was close at hand. 

When all the rockets had been fired, then the hun- 
dred men, soldiers and sailors, who were at the back 
of the pa, arose out of an old Maori pare pare, where 
they had been sheltered, and giving a great shout, 
turned to rush against the pa. Then Heke shouted 
to his men, ‘‘ Now let every man defend the spot he 
stands on, and think of no other; and I, on my side, 
will look to the great fish which lies extended on our 
front.”* And as Heke was saying this, the soldiers 


1 The natives often call a line or column of mena fish, and 
this term is just as well understood as our “column,” “com- 
pany,” “battalion,” &c. I will here say that though the native 
language is, as might be supposed, extremely deficient in terms 
of art or science in general, yet it is quite copious in terms re- 
lating to the art of war. There is a Maori word for almost 
every infantry movement and formation. I have also been very 
much surprised to find that a native can, in terms well under- 
stood, and without any hesitation, give a description of a fortifi- 
cation of a very complicated and scientific kind, having set 
technical terms for every part of the whole—“ curtain, bastion, 
trench, hollow way, traverse, outworks, citadel,” &c. &c., being 
all well-known Maori words, which every boy knows the full 
meaning of. 


214 HEKE’S WAR IN THH 


and sailors had begun to move towards the pa, when 
suddenly Kawiti with one hundred and forty men ap- 
peared close upon their right, and fired upon them. 
Then the soldiers turned quickly to the right and 
attacked Kawiti; they were close to each other, and 
some fought hand to hand. The soldiers, then, were 
pressed back, and forced to give way before the rush 
of Kawiti and his men; but soon they rallied to the 
call of their chiefs, and charged with the bayonet, and 
then a close fight ensued, in which twenty of Kawiti’s 
_ men were slain, and many wounded. Several of them 
were chiefs, and among them was one of Kawiti’s 
sons, being the second son he had lost in the war; the 
other fell at Kororareka. [Kawiti’s men then retreated, — 
and the soldiers chased them as far as the path in the 
hollow, which leads to Ahuahu, and there the last 
Maori was killed by the foremost soldier. There is a 
stone placed there where that Maori fell, and close to 
that stone by the side of the path the soldier is also 
buried, for a shot from the pa struck him, and he fell 
there. He was a great toa, that soldier; in this fight 
whenever he pointed his gun a man fell, and he ran so 
fast in pursuit that there was no escape from him; but 
he fell there—for such is the appearance of war. The 
musket is a bad weapon, the worst of all weapons; for 
let a man be as brave as he may, he cannot stand up 
before it long. Great chiefs are killed from a distance 
by no one knows who, and the strength of a warrior 
is useless against it. | 

As the soldiers chased Kawiti, the pa fired on them 
from the left, so that they had Kawiti in front and — 


“ 
> 
’ 
| 
yt 
a 
+ 
‘ke 
: 
oa 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 215 


the pa on the left, both firing, and therefore lost many 
men; but having beaten Kawiti off, they returned 
and took shelter in the Maori breastwork, and began 
again to fire at the pa. So they fired, and the pa re- 
turned the fire, and the main body of the soldiers 
who were at the front of the pa fired. Lead whistled 
through the air in all directions, the whole country 
seemed on fire, and brave men worked their work. 
Then Tupori, a chief who was in the pa with Heke, 
saw that Kawiti had elevated his name, for he had 
fought the soldiers hand to hand twice—once at 
Kororareka, and once on this day; and seeing this, 
Tupori wished also to do something to make his name 
heard; he therefore cried out for only twenty men to 
follow him, and he would charge the soldiers. Then 
twenty men rushed out of the pa with Tupori; they 
ran straight up the hill to the breastwork, the soldiers 
firing on them all the time, but without hitting one 
man. So Tupori and his twenty men came quite up 
to the breastwork, and stood upon the top of the 
bank, and fired their double-barrel guns in the sol- 
diers’ faces, and drove them out of the breastwork. 
The soldiers retreated a short distance, and Tupori 
and his people began collecting the bundles of car- 
tridges which the soldiers had left behind; and while 
they were doing this, the soldiers suddenly came 
rushing upon them. Their charge was very grand, 
and terrible to look at. They came rushing on in 
creat anger, shouting and cursing at the Maori. So 
Tupori and his men ran away to the pa, and as they 
ran the soldiers fired at their backs, and killed two 


216 HEKE’S WAR IN THE 


men, and wounded Tupori in the leg. The rest got 
safe into the pa, and took Tupori and the two dead 
men along with them. Great is the courage of 
Tupori! he has made his name heard as that of a toa. 
But it was not right for the soldiers to curse the 
Maori, for up to this time nothing wrong had been 
done on either side, and so the Maori were much 
surprised to hear the soldiers cursing and swearing at 
them. 

After this the soldiers fired at the pa all day, but 
only killed three men, besides the two men killed in 
the charge of Tupori; these five men were all killed 
belonging to the pa that day. When it was near 
night, the soldiers went back to Walker’s camp at 
Okaihau, taking with them their wounded, and also 
two or three dead; but about ten dead were left be- 
hind at Taumata Tutu, where they fell in the fight 
with Kawiti. 

So Heke remained in possession of the battle plain 
(te papa), and his pa was not taken, and he buried 
the dead of the soldiers. But one soldier who had 
been wounded, and left behind by the side of the lake, 
was found next morning by two slaves, and they pre- 
tended they were friends, and got his gun from him, 
ind then they took him to the lake and held his head 
under water till he was dead. 

Next morning after the battle the soldiers returned 
to the Keri Keri, and Walker went with his people to 
help them to carry the wounded. And Hauraki, the 
young chief of the Hikutu, went also with thirteen of 
his people to assist in carrying the wounded soldiers; 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 217 


but the rest of his tribe, being one hundred men, re- 
mained behind at Okaihau, for it was not expected 
there would be any more fighting for some days. But 
when the soldiers and Walker’s people came to the 
Keri Keri, the Maori chiefs of Walker’s party talked 
of attacking the Kapotai at Waikare, in the Bay of 
Islands, because they were allies of Kawiti; so they 
went and told their minds to the chiefs of the sol- 
diers, who agreed to do so, for they were angry at not 
having been able to take Heke’s pa at Taumata Tutu. 

So when the soldiers and Walker’s people came to 
the Bay of Islands, they each separated a party to 
attack the Kapotai. They went up the Waikare river 
in the night in canoes and boats, with great precau- 
tion, hoping to surprise the Kapotai, and so to revenge 
their dead who had fallen at Taumata Tutu; but 
before they got near to the pa, the wild ducks in the 
river started up and flew over the pa, which alarmed 
the Kapotai, and caused them to suspect that an 
enemy was coming up the river, so they took arms 
and watched for the approach of the war party. And 
soon the soldiers were near, but it was not yet day- 
light. Then the men of the Kapotai called out, “If 
you are Maori warriors who come in the night, come 
on, we will give you battle; but if you are soldiers, 
here is our pa, we give it you.” They soon discovered 
the soldiers, and then they went out at the back of 
the pa, and left it for the soldiers to plunder, as pay- 
ment for Kororareka, which was very right. So the 
soldiers and Walker’s Maori plundered the pa of the 
Kapotai, and killed all the pigs. 


218 HEKE’S WAR IN THE 


After the Kapotai pa had been plundered and burnt, 
Walker and his men went in pursuit of the Kapotai, 
who had retreated into the forest, but the soldiers re- 
mained behind on the clear ground near the pa. 
Walker, Mohi, and Repa went into the woods with 
three hundred men, followed the Kapotai, and over- 
took them. When the Kapotai perceived they were 
followed, their anger was very great, so they turned, 
and fought with great courage against Walker. 
Walker was not able to beat them, so they remained 
a long time fighting in the forest. But Hauraki, the 
young Hikutu chief, had, with his thirteen men, taken 
another path, and he met the young chief of the 
Kopatai, who had with him sixty men, and they were 
both young men and fighting for a name, so a despe- 
rate fight commenced. Hauraki and his thirteen men 
thought not of the light of the sun or the number of 
the enemy; their only thought was of war, and to 
elevate their names. It was a close fight, and when- 
ever the rifle of Hauraki was heard a man fell, and 
soon he had killed or wounded several of the Kapotai, 
who began to fall back. Then Hauraki cried out to 
the retreating Kapotai, “ Fly away on the wings of 
the wood-pigeon, and feed on the berries of the wood, 
for I have taken your land.” Then a certain slave of. 
the Kapotai said, ‘‘That is Hauraki, a very noble 
born man. He is a chief of Te Hikutu, and of Te 
Rarawa, and of Te Ngati Kuri.” Now when Hari 
the young Kapotai chief heard this, he cried aloud to 
Hauraki, saying, “ Swim you away on the backs of 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 219 


the fish of the sea,’ there is no land for you here.” 
Then these two young warriors drew nearer to each 
other. Hauraki had just loaded his rifle, but the caps 
which he had were too small, and he was a long time 
trying to put on the cap. While he was doing this, 
Hari fired at him, and the ball struck him on the 
breast and passed out at his back; but so great was 
his strength and courage that he did not fall, but took 
another cap and fixed it, and then fired at the 
Kapotai chief, and the ball struck him on the side under 
the arm-pit, and went out at the other arm-pit. So 
Hari staggered and felldead. When Hauraki saw this, 
he said, “I die not unrevenged,” and then sank gentlyto - 
the ground. His people then seeing this, two of them led 
him away towards the rear. The Kapotai also carried 
away their chief, and then, enraged at his death, 
rushed upon the Hikutu, who were now only eight in 
number, the rest having been killed or wounded. 
These eight were tno tangata (practised warriors), 
but were too few in number, and had lost their 
chief; so when the Kapotai rushed upon them they 
lost heart and fled, and the Kapotai chased them, and 
soon the foremost of the flying Hikutu overtook 
Hauraki and the two men who were leading him off. 
Then Hauraki said, ‘‘ Do not remain with me to die, 
but hide me in the fern and escape yourselves, and go 
to my relation Walker, and tell him to muster all his 
people, and come and carry me off.” So they all 


1 Tn allusion to the fact of the war party having come by water. 


220 HEKE’S WAR IN THH 


pressed their noses to the nose of Hauraki, one after 
another. And tears fell fast, and the balls from the 
guns of the Kapotai whistled round their heads, so 
while some returned the fire of the enemy, others hid 
Hauraki in the long fern. When this was done, they 
all fled, and escaped with great difficulty; for while 
they were hiding Hauraki the Kapotai had surrounded 
them, and they would never have escaped at all but 
for the great courage of Kaipo and Te Pake, 
Hauraki’s cousins, who broke through the Kapotai, 
and opened a way for the rest. 

Now, when Hauraki’s eight men got on the clear 
ground, they found that the soldiers were getting 
into the boats to go away, and Walker, Mohi, and 
Repa had just come out of the forest from fighting 
with the Kapotai, and Hauraki’s cousins ran to 
Walker, and said “ Our friend’? is left behind 
wounded in the forest, and likely to be taken by the 
Kapotai.” Then Walker was very much dismayed 
when he heard this, and he and Mohi ran to the 
chiefs of the soldiers and desired them to remain for 
a short time till he should rescue Hauraki, but the 
soldiers could not understand what Walker meant, 
for the speaker of Maori (the interpreter to the force) 
had already gone away in one of the boats, and there 


1 The natives when speaking to each other seldom mention 
their chief except as “our friend,” or, if he be an old man, as 
“our leader.” Speaking to Europeans, however, they often say 
our rangatira, that having become the only word in use among 
the Europeans to signify the chief of a tribe, though it may also 
mean many other ranks, according as it is applied. 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 221 


was a great confusion, every one trying to get away, 
and Walker’s men were also getting into their canoes 
and going away, and boats and canoes were running 
foul of each other, and the creek was choked with 
them. Then came the Kapotai in great force with 
their allies out of the forest, and commenced firing 
on the departing tawa from a distance of about two 
hundred fathoms, so the soldiers and Walker got 
away and returned to Kororareka, and left Hauraki 
lying alone in the forest, for their bellies were full of 
fighting. So he lay there till midnight, and the 
night was cold and wet, and he kept continually 
thinking what a disgrace it would be to his family if 
he should be taken alive.* And as he lay thus, he 
saw” the spirit of the greatest warrior of all his an- 
cestors, who said to him, “ Arise! Shall my de- 
scendant be taken alive?” Then Hauraki said, “* I 
am a mere man, not like unto my ancestors, half god 


1 That weakness is crime with the natives is a fact, and in 
consequence the disgrace of being taken prisoner of war degrades 
a native as much as with us it would degrade a man to be con- 
victed of felony. I have heard two natives quarrelling when 
one called the other “slave,” because his great-grandfather had 
been once made prisoner of war. The other could not deny the 
traditional fact, and looked amazingly chop-fallen. He, however, 
tried to soften the blow by stating that even if his ancestor had 
been made prisoner, it was by a section of his own tribe, and 
consequently by his own relations he was defeated. Thus en- 
deavouring to make a “ family affair” of it. 

2 Poor Hauraki was no doubt delirious from the effects of his 
wound, and no doubt thought he saw the’ vision he recounted 
when his people found him. 


222 HEKE’S WAR IN THE 


and half man.”? Then the spirit said, “ In the mind 


is the strength of the body. Arise!” So Hauraki 
arose, and travelled a long way in the night till he 
found a small canoe by the river side; then he pulled 
down the river towards the Bay of Islands till the 
canoe upset; then he swam on shore, and when he 
got to the shore he was almost dead; but near to 
where he landed was the house of a pakeha, and the 
mother of this pakeha was Hauraki’s cousin, so that 
pakeha took him and concealed him in the house, and 
took care.of him, and before the middle of the day a 
party of Walker’s men arrived therein search of him. 
So they took him to the Bay of Islands, and the doctors 
of the soldiers did what they could to cure him, but 
without success. So his tribe, who had arrived at 
Okaihau, carried him home to his own place at 
Hokianga, where he died. 

When Hauraki died, and his body lay at Wirinake 
to be seen for the last time by his relations, there 
was a great gathering of the Rarawa and Ngapuhi, 


1 One of the ancestors of Hauraki, according to a tradition of 
the Rarawa, hearing, even in the Reinga (the Maori Hades), of 
the warlike renown of one of his sons, became jealous of his 
fame, and returned to this world. Emerging from amongst the | 
waves at Ahipara, on the west coast, where his son lived, he 
challenged him to single combat. At the first onset the son had 
the worst. Then the father said, ‘Had you been equal to your 
ancestors I would have remained here as your companion in 
arms; but you are degenerate and a mere man. I return to 
the Reinga, to be with the heroes of the olden time.” He then 
disappeared in the waves. 


— 
ny 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 223 


to fulfil the last rights due to a chief. And when 
the pihe had been sung,’ then the chiefs arose one 
after another to speak in praise of the dead. This 
was the speech of Te Anu, he who is known as having 
been in his youth the best spearman of all the Nega- 
puhi tribes. Bounding too and fro before the corpse, 
with his famous spear in hand, he spoke as follows: 
‘Farewell, Hauraki! go, taking with you your kind- 
ness and hospitality, your generosity and valour, and 
leave none behind who can fill your place. Your 
death was noble; you revenged yourself with your 
own hand; you saved yourself without the help of 
any man. Your life was short; but so it is with 
heroes. Farewell, O Hauraki, farewell.” At this 
time it was night, and the sister and also the 
young wife of Hauraki went in the dark and sat 
beside the river. They sat weeping silently, and 
spinning a cord wherewith to strangle themselves. 
The flax was wet with their tears. And as they did 
this the moon arose. So when the sister of Hauraki 
saw the rising moon, she broke silence, and lamented 


1 The pihe is a funeral chant sung standing before the dead. 
It is a very curious composition, and of great antiquity, having 
been composed long before the natives came to this country. 
Part of the language is obsolete. It has allusions which point 
in a remarkable manner to the origin of the natives, and from 
whence they have come. They do not themselves understand 
these allusions, but they are clear enough to any person who 
has taken the trouble to trace the race from which they are de- 
rived through the Pacific Islands, far into north latitude, next 
into Asia, and to observe the gradual modifications of language 
and tradition occasioned by time and change of abode. 


224 HEKEH’S WAR IN THE 


aloud, and this was her lament—the part I remember 
of it :— 
It is well with thee,O moon! You return from death, 
Spreading your light on the little waves. Men say, 
“‘ Behold the moon re-appears ;”’ 
But the dead of this world return no more. 
Grief and pain spring up in my heart as from a fountain. 
I hasten to death for relief. 
Oh, that I might eat those numerous soothsayers 
Who could not foretell his death. 
Oh, that I might eat the Governor, 
For his was the war! 


At this time men came who were in search of 
these women, and prevented the sister of Hauraki 
from killing herself at that time. They watched her 
for several days, but she died of grief. But the wife 
of Hauraki consented to live that she might rear her 
son, so that he might fight with the Kapotai on a 
future day. So she called his name Maiki, which is 
the name of the hill on which stood the flagstaff, the 
cutting down of which was the cause of the war. He 
was, therefore, called by this name, that he might 
always be reminded of his father’s death. | 

The lament of the sister of Hauraki was sung by 
all the divisions of all the Ngapuhi, from the west 


coast to Tokerau. And when Walker heard it he - 


was displeased, and said, ‘‘ It is wrong to sing about 
eating the Governor, for soon people who do not 
know the song well will make mistakes, and sing, 
‘Oh, that I might eat Heke,’ which would be the 
worst of all. As for the priests or soothsayers, it 
is no matter; they are all a set of fools.” So now 


i — 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 225 


when people sing that lament, they only say, ‘“ Oh, 
that I might eat the numerous priests” (tin? to- 
hunga). 

So Hauraki was taken to Te Ramaroa, a cave in 
the mountains, behind Wirinake, where his ancestors 
are buried, and then three hundred men of Te Hikutu, 
Natikuri, Te Rarawa, and Walker’s people armed, and 
entered the country of the Kapotai, to fire powder in 
remembrance of Hauraki* (paura mamae.) They de- 
stroyed the cultivations, and got much plunder; but 
the Kapotai retired to the forest, and would not fight, 
for they knew this was a war party of the tribe of 
Hauraki, who came bearing the weapons of grief 
(patu mamae), and, therefore, they would not fight. 
So the taua came to the spot where Hauraki had fallen, 
and there fired many volleys of musketry in honour 
of the dead, and then returned unmolested to. their 
own country. The behaviour of the Kapotai in this 
matter was correct. We all know that it was not 
fear that prevented them from attacking us; they 
respected the grief of the people and relations of 
Hauraki, and made way before them, which was a 
noble thought (whakaaro rangatira). 


1 Tt is a native custom, when any chief of importance has 
been killed in fair fight, for his friends to form a party and 
enter even the enemy’s country, should he have fallen there, and 
fire some volleys in his honour on the spot where he fell. This 
they call paura mamae—powder of pain or grief. They, of 
course, do it at the risk of being attacked, but the natives often 
allow the custom to be fulfilled without molesting the party, 
although a party of this kind always plunder and ravage all 
before them. 


Q 


226 HHKE’S WAR IN THE 
When Heke heard of the death of Hauraki, he 


said, ‘‘ Now, if I am slain in this war, it matters 
not, for there is no greater Ngapuhi Chief than Hau- 
raki.” What Heke said was true; but he said it 
to please Te Hikutu, for Heke is a man of many 
thoughts. 

At this same time, Te Tao Nui, who was at Okai- 
hau, heard that most of Heke’s men had gone from 
Te Ahuahu to Ohaeawae to kill cattle for food; for by 
this time Heke had abandoned his pa, near Taumaia 
Tutu, which the soldiers had attacked, and gone to 
another fort of his at Te Ahuahu, to be near the 
cultivations. So Te Tao Nui took sixty men, and went 
on a dark rainy night and took the pa at the Ahuahu 
by surprise, and the people in it only fired two shots 
and fled. So Te Tao Nui remained in possession of 
Heke’s fort at the Ahuahu, and all Heke’s provision 
fell into his hands, and also the road to Ohaeawae 
was opened, for this fort was on the path. Then 
Walker abandoned his camp at Okaihau and joined Te 
Tao Nui in Heke’s pa, and as they found there plenty 
of provisions, they determined to remain there till the 
soldiers should return again from Auckland. 

But Heke was very much enraged to see his fort 


and provisions thus snatched from him, and he deter-. 


mined to retake it before the soldiers should return 
from Auckland to help Walker. So he sent messen- 
gers to all parts of the country where he had friends, 
and to the old chiefs who were still alive who had 
been companions of the great Hongi in the old wars. 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 227 


And they came, and with them came Te Kahakaha, 
he who had been Hongi’s chosen friend. He had 
seen more battles than any man now alive, and was a 
very brave and experienced leader. He came to 
assist Heke, and to show him how his fathers had 
fought. 

When Heke’s war party had assembled, they were, 
in number, about eight hundred men; and, after 
having rested a few days at Ohaeawae, they marched 
before daylight to attack Walker and Te Tao Nui at 
Te Ahuahu, and to retake Heke’s pa. Walker, Tao 
Nui, Moses, and Wi Repa, with his two brothers, 
were the principal chiefs of Walker’s party at this 
time, and they had with them only about three hun- 
dred men, for many of Walker’s friends had returned 
to Hokianga, to fetch pork and other provisions, for 
they did not expect to be attacked so soon. 

Now in the morning before daylight, an old slave 
woman went out from the pa of Walker to pick up 
sticks for firewood. And there was a thick fog lying 
close to the ground; and before the old woman had 
gone far she saw a black line of something coming 
out of a cloud of fog, and as she was wondering what 
this might be, she suddenly perceived that it was a 
taua of armed men, and they had got within fifty 
fathoms of the pa,’ so she cried aloud the cry of 
alarm—Te Whakaarikt e! Te Whakaariki e!—and 


a a 


1 The natives estimate distances by fathoms and tens of 
fathoms. <A kume is ten fathoms. 


228 HEKE’S WAR IN -THE 


instantly the people in the pa were alarmed, started 
from sleep, and with their arms in their hands rushed 
hurriedly to defend the gates. Then Walker called 
out to Te Tao Nui, “ Remain you here and defend 
our pa, and I will go out and fight.” Then Walker 
and his people rushed against the enemy. And when 
they were doing this, another party of the enemy 
appeared at the opposite side of the pa. Of this 
party the old chief Te Kahakaha was the leader. 
Then, when Te Tao Nui saw this division and their 
numbers, which were great, he said—‘t Now we have 
the enemy in full view; there are no more of them 
in concealment.” So he opened the gates on his side 
of the pa, and rushed out with his people, and called 
out to charge. So Walker charged at one side of the 
pa, and Tao Nui and his people on the other. Walker 
being opposed to Heke, and Tao Nui to Te Kaha- 
kaha, the fight began, and this was the greatest 
battle in the war. The best men of both parties 
were there, and Heke was very desirous to destroy 
Walker in one great fight before the soldiers should 
return; and Walker, on his side, wished to show that 
he could fight Heke without the aid of the soldiers. 
So now Walker charged Heke, and Heke fired like 
thunder against Walker. I, your friend, was there! 
and as we rushed on, Karere Horo was killed (he was 
our mad priest); and Taketu was killed, and Te Turi, 
and Hangarau, and about nine others; and Takare 
had both his eyes shot out, and Wi Repa and his 
brother, and Hakaraia, the chief of the Ngati Pou, 
and a ‘great many others, were wounded. By the 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 229 


time all these people were killed or wounded, we 
were close up to Heke’s people, and began to fire. 
Heke’s men being so near, and standing too close 
together, we did not miss them; we had revenge for 
our friends who had fallen. We pressed Heke hard. 
Not one of us remembered the light of this world, 
nor thought of life. Then the enemy began to fall 
back, and we followed them close till we came to a 
hill side, where they turned and charged us. But 
we fell back a little then, and got behind the stone 
wall of a kumera field, and fired at them from behind 
the low wall, and drove them back, having killed and 
wounded several. They then returned to the hill- 
side, and began firing at us from about fifty fathoms’ 
distance; but we were sheltered by the low stone 
wall. Then we heard Heke shouting out to charge 
us again, and so down they came upon us again. 
They greatly outnumbered us, and the sound of their 
feet as they rushed on was like the noise of a water- 
fall. We fully expected this time they would finish 
us, but Walker cried out, “Stand firm! let them 
come close; waste no powder.” So we stood firm, 
and took aim over the stone fence, and let them come 
so close that the smoke of our guns would pass by 
their foremost men. Then we fired, and some of our 
toa jumped over the wall and ran at them with the 
tomahawk, upon which they fled away to the hill- 
side again, leaving their dead and wounded in our 
hands. Then some of our young men, being hot 
with the fight, cried out to eat them raw at once; 
but this was a foolish proposal, for although we were 


230 HUKEH’S WAR IN THE 


fighting against Heke, we were all Ngapuhi together, 
and more or less related to each other. Had we been 
fighting Waikato or Ngatiawa of the south, it would 
have been quite correct. So Walker and the other 
chiefs would not allow it. 

While this was going on on Walker’s side, Te Tao 
Nui and his family were fighting against the division 
of Te Kahakaha and the Wharepapa at the other 
side of the pa; but Te Kahakaha knew by the sound 
of the firing that Heke had lost ground and was 
falling back, so he fell back also slowly, intending to 
join the right of his division to Heke’s left, so as to 
fill up the opening which had been made by Heke 
falling back, and then to renew the battle. But, in 
falling back, his men lost heart, and Te Tao Nui 
pressed him hard; so, to encourage his men, he 
advanced to the front, calling loudly, “‘ Whakahokai!” 
and, as he ran forward, his men followed. He was 
quite naked, and only armed with a light spear. He 
came on lightly, like a young man, seeking a man 
for his spear; and he rushed upon one of the warriors 
of the Ngati Pou, but before he got close enough to 
strike, a shot struck him on the breast, and came out 
at his back, which turned him quite round. Then 
another shot struck him on the back, and went out 
at his breast. Then he sank to the ground, saying— 
“ Fight bravely, O my family and friends! for this 
is my last battle.” So he lay quiet there, but did 
not immediately die, for he lingered to see once more 
the young man Heke, who was the representative of 
Hongi, his old companion in many wars. 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 231 


When Te Kahakaha had fallen, the battle would 
have been quickly lost but for the Wharepapa, the 
old chief of the Ihutai. He was a brave old warrior, 
and had also fought in the wars of Hongi Ika. He 
came forward laughing, and calling on his tribe to 
stand firm, for he wanted to save the body of Te 
Kahakaha. So the Ihutai stood firm, and for a time 
the fight became stationary in that place. 

At this moment a boy came running to Heke, 
where he stood opposed to Walker on the extreme 
right of the battle. The boy ran up to Heke and 
cried, ‘‘ The old man has fallen.” Then Heke said, 
““What old man?” The boy answered, “Te Kaha- 
kaha.” Then Heke said, “Is he quite dead ?” and 
the boy answered again, and said, “* He is quite dead, 
and the people are falling back, and his body will be 
taken by the enemy.” When Heke heard this his 
heart rolled about in the hollow of his breast. He 
threw away his cloak and gun, and ran naked and 
unarmed all along the front of the battle until he 
came to the place where the old man was lying. 
And here he met many men who were running away, 
and he quickly drove them back to the fight, for they 
were terrified by his look—his appearance was hardly 
that of aman. Then he came to where the old man 
lay, and having knelt down, pressed his nose to the 
nose of the dying man, and said, ‘‘ Father, are you 
slain?” And the old man said, “‘Son, I am slain; but 
in whose battle should I die if not in yours? It is 
good that I should die thus.” Then Heke ran 
amongst the people and called out to charge; but 


232 HEKE’S WAR IN THE 


many had fled. The tribe of [hutai alone remained, 
and some few others. They, however, charged 
desperately, and drove back Te Tao Nui a short 
distance. Then Heke tore a cartridge-box from the 
body of a dead man, and cried out to the Ihutai to 
hold back the enemy a short time while he should 
get away the body of the old man. Then he ran 
away to where he had seen Te Atua Wera standing 
on the path trying to rally those who were flying, 
and to collect them on that spot to fight again. This 
Atua Wera, you already have heard, is the wisest 
priest and prophet of all the Ngapuhi, and he stood 
there in the path stopping the flying people with 
his club. But who can bind a flowing river? Tall 
men with long tattooed faces ran by like a stream, 
and were deaf to his call, but he had about twenty 
men who stood firm. Then Heke came running up 
and cried out, ‘Advance at once and carry off 
the old man while it can be done.” Then Te 
Atua Wera said, ‘‘Give me a gun and some cart- 
ridges; I have only a club.” Then Heke held out 
the cartridge-box, and said, “Take a gun from one 
of the people,” and being mad with haste, and rage, 
and grief, he began to buckle the cartridge-box round 
the waist of the priest. But Te Atua Wera perceived _ 
that there was blood on the cartridge-box, so he 
started back and said, ‘‘ Where did you get this ?” 
Then Heke cried out, ‘‘ Where should I get it? is 
not this war?” So then the priest saw that Heke 
himself, the chief of the war, had been the first him- 
self to transgress the sacred rules, and had touched 


i 


NORTH OF NEW ZHALAND. 233 


the bloody spoils of the slain. So he said to Heke, 
‘‘The Maori Atua are arrayed against us, the spirits 
of the dead are now angry; we are lost; and you, 
Heke, are now no longer invulnerable.’ Go not to the 
front, or you will meet with misfortune. Leave the 
old man where he is, it cannot now be helped; ” and 
having said this, Te Atua Wera took the cartridge- 
box on the end of his club, and threw it away, club 
and all, into the high fern.” Then Heke roared out, 
“What care I for either men or spirits? I fear not. 
Let the fellow in heaven look to it. Have I not 
prayed to him for years? It is for him to look to 
me this day.’ I will carry off the old man alone.” 


1 The priest had promised Heke that he should be himself 
personally invulnerable so long as the old superstitious war 
customs were observed, but which Heke had in this instance 
broken. 

2 This whole scene between Heke and Te Atua Wera is de- 
scribed exactly as it occurred. I have heard it described by 
several eye-witnesses, one of whom was the Atua Wera himself, 
and they all gave the same account. The native priests pre- 
scribe many rules and observances to the people, and prophecy 
good fortune, provided none of these rules be broken, well know- 
ing that some of them will to a certainty be broken by the care- 
less and incorrigible Maori. In case of the failure of any of 
their predictions, they have the excuse that some sacred rule 
had been broken. In this particular instance the Atua Wera, 
seeing the batile going against Heke, took advantage of his 
having handled the bloody cartridge-box; the people having 
been forbidden to touch anything having the blood of the enemy 
on it, until certain ceremonies of purification had been performed 
after the battle, to render plunder or spoil lawfully tangible. 

3 Heke had been for years a Christian, according to the Maori 
notion of Christianity, which was then, if not now, a mere jumble 


234 HERES WAn IN THE 


And Heke’s eyes rolled towards heaven, and he 
ground his teeth. Then he ran forward to carry off 
Te Kahakaha, but ten of the men who were with 
Te Atua Wera followed him, for they were ashamed 
to see the chief go alone and unarmed to carry off 
his ancient friend, but Te Atua Wera remained where 
he was. 

All this which I have told took but little time, for 
in battle when men’s eyes shine there is no listless- 
ness. But by this time Heke’s men to the right were 
quite defeated by Walker, and running away; but 
Waker pursued them slowly and with caution, for 
the ground was covered with brushwood, and rocks, 
and high fern, and the enemy though defeated were 


of superstition and native barbarism. Here Heke says, that 
because he prayed to the “fellow in heaven”—by which he 
means that at stated periods he had for some years made use of 
certain words which were supposed to gain the favour of “the 
European God”—that in consequence that God should favour 
him now if he was able. The word karakia which Heke made 
use of does not mean prayer as we understand that word. Ka- 
rakia properly signifies a formula of words or incantation, which 
words are supposed to contain a power, and to have a positive 
effect on the spirit to whom they are addressed, totally irrespec- 
tive of the conduct or actions, good or bad, of the person using 
them. ‘The fact is that the Maori has, perhaps, the lowest reli- 
gious character of any human being ; his mental formation seems 
to have the minimum of religious tendency. The idea of a 
supreme being has never occurred to him, and the word which 
the missionaries use for God (Atua) means indifferently, a dead 
body, a sickness, a ghost, or a malevolent spirit. Maui, the 
Atua, who they say fished up the island from the sea, is sup- 
posed to have died long ago by some, and all agree that he no 
longer exists. 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 235 


still more numerous than we were, and we followed 
slowly lest we might fall into an ambush. 

So Te Atua Wera sat on a stone beside the path 
~ waiting for the return of Heke, and soon he saw that 
the battle was lost, for people came running past in 
great numbers, and among them came the men who 
had gone with Heke, and they brought with them 
the body of the old man, Te Kahakaha, which Heke 
had gone with them to bring away. The fire of Te 
Tao Nui now began to come closer, and the bullets 
were cutting down the fern all round them, and the 
Atua cried out to the bearers of the body to inquire 
for Heke, and they said he was close behind them. 
So Te Atua waited some time longer, but Heke did 
not come, and the enemy were getting near, and his 
mind was disturbed, for he had a presentiment of 
evil. At this moment Hoao, a very noted Ngapuhi 
warrior, came jumping over the fern, and seeing the 
Atua Wera, he shouted, “ Turn—face the enemy, 
for Heke has fallen, and unless quickly rescued will 
be taken.” Te Atua said, ‘‘ Where is he?” The 
man said, ‘‘ Here in the hollow, where I have hid him 
in the high fern, but could not carry him off myself.” 
Te Tao Nui had now got close, and some of his men 
had actually passed where Heke lay, but had not 
discovered him. So now Te Atua Wera saw it was 
his time to do his part, so he called out ‘ Come, fol- 
low me to die for Pokaia.t. Three men started for- 


1 In the agitation caused by hearing that Heke had fallen, the 
Atua Wera called Heke by the name of Pokaia. This was the 


256)" HEKE’S WAR IN THE 


ward at this call; they ran to where Hekewas, and bore 
him off. In doing so they were more than once 
surrounded by the enemy, but the fern and brush- 
wood were so thick that they got off unperceived. 
The fern and brushwood would not, however, have 
saved them had it not been for the Atua Wera, who, 
by his continual karakia (incantations) rendered the 
bearers of Heke invisible to the enemy. The three 
men who carried off Heke were all from Hokianga; 
they were all elderly men, and practised warriors. 
Their names were Ta Pura, Hoao, and Te Ngawe. 

So Heke lost in this battle many of his best old 
war chiefs, he was himself badly wounded and 
defeated, and escaped with difficulty to the fort at 
Ohaeawae, to which place he was chased by Walker 
and Te Tao Nui. These misfortunes would not 
have happened had not Heke been so thoughtless as 
to handle the bloody spoils of the dead, before the 
proper ceremonies had rendered them common. But 
there is nothing in this world so deaf to reason or so 
disobedient as a warrior—when he is enraged he only 
listens to his own courage, and, being led away by 
it, dies. 

After this battle Heke remained some time at 


Ohaeawae, and Walker stayed at Te Ahuahu, the 


name of Heke’s father, a celebrated cannibal warrior and des- 
perate savage. His closing scene took place in the country of 
the Ngatiwhatua, where, having gone in a war expedition, he 
and his 800 men were killed and eaten, almost to a man, by the 
Ngatiwhatua, who in their turn were all but exterminated by 
Hongi Ika in revenge for Pokaia. 


j 
Z 
x 


—' _ 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 237 


fort which Te Tao Nui had taken. Walker buried 
Heke’s dead which had been left on the field, and 
there was a great lamentation at both forts, for the 
number of killed on both sides was great. 

Heke, and Kawiti, who had again joined him, now 
enlarged, and strengthened, and completely finished 
the pa at Ohaeawae, where they were stopping. It 
was originally but small, and belonged to Pene Taui, 
but they now completely finished it, and made it a 
perfect Maori fort in everyrespect. Theinside fence 
was made of a very hard wood which does not splinter 
much; the posts of this fence were about one fathom 
in the ground, and the fence over ground was about 
four fathoms high. The posts were stout, and some 
of them would require thirty men with ropes to raise 
them. Inside this fence was the trench in which the 
men stood to fire; their faces only reached the level 
of the ground outside the fort. The loop-holes, 
through which the men fired, were also only level 
with the ground outside, so that in firing the men 
were very slightly exposed. Outside of all was the 
pekerangi, which is a lighter sort of fence put up to 
deaden the force of shot before it strikes the inner 
one, and also intended to delay a storming party, so 
that while they would be pulling it down, the men 
behind the inner fence might have time to shoot 
them. This pekerangi was nearly as high as the 
inner fence, and stood little more than half a fathom 
outside of it; it was made of a strong framework, 
and was padded thickly with green flax to deaden the 
force of shot. It was also elevated about a foot from 


238 HEKE’S WAR IN THE 


the ground, so that the men behind the inner fence, 
standing in the ditch, could shoot through the loop- 
holes in the inner fence under this outside fence; also 
at different distances along the kawe (curtain) there 
were kok (flanking) angles, capable of containing 
many men, so that a storming party would be ex- 
posed to a fire both in front and flank, and in these 
angles were put large ship guns. The men inside, 
in the inner trench, were also protected from a 
flanking fire by pakeaka (traverses), which crossed the 
trench at intervals; also inside the place were many 
excavations under ground covered over with large 
logs of timber, and over the timber earth. In these 
pits the men could sleep safe from the shot of the 
big guns of the soldiers. There were also high 
platforms at the corners of the mner fence, from 
whence could be seen all that an enemy might be 
doing outside. 

When this fort was completely finished and pro- 
visioned, the priests (tohunga) took, according to 
ancient custom, the chips of the posts, and with them 
performed the usual ceremonies, and when they had 
done so they declared that this would be a fortunate 
fortress; so it was made sacred (tapu,) as were all 
the men who were to defend it. | 

This fortress being now quite finished and ready 
for war, the soldiers came from Auckland to attack 
it, and also came the sailors and Pakeha Maori 
(Militia). They landed at the Bay of Islands, 
came up the Keri Keri in boats, and from thence to 
the Waimate along the cart road. They brought 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 259 


with them two very small brass guns, and two very 
short iron ones (mortars). The short iron guns 
looked like potato pots, and we laughed at them, and 
thought of Heke’s saying of ‘‘ What prize can be 
won bysuch a gun?” We however, notwithstanding 
our laughing, thought they must have some use, or 
the soldiers would not have brought them. 

At last, after remaining several days at the Wai- 
mate, the tawa advanced against Ohaeawae. The 
soldiers, sailors, and other pakeha might be in num- 
ber about eight hundred, and we Maori were four 
hundred. The enemy did not attempt to oppose our 
advance, which was very good; for the soldiers were 
so heavy loaded with cloths, and tied up with belts, 
_and had such heavy cartridge-boxes and also little 
water casks, hanging to their sides, and packs on 
their backs, besides the musket and bayonet, that we 
all said that if we Maori were loaded in that way, we 
should neither be able to fight nor to run away. 
Great is the patience of the soldiers! 

At this time Heke was very ill, and expected to 
die from his wound which he had received at the 
great fight at Te Whatuteri. So his people took 
him away to his own place at Tautora, and Te Atua 
Wera and sixty men remained there with him. 
Many, also, of the men who had been at the fight 
with Walker at Te Whatuteri had returned home, so 
there remained at the pa at Ohaeawae only Kawiti, 
Pene Taui, and one hundred men. 

So the soldiers encamped before the pa at the 
distance of about two hundred fathoms. There was 


24.0 HEKE’S WAR IN THE 


a little hill on their right, rather advanced towards 
the pa. Walker took possession of this hill, and 
encamped upon it with about sixty men. This hill 
overlooked both the pa and the camp of the soldiers, 
and from it everything could be seen that was going 
on. The rest of the Maori encamped at a short dis- 
tance behind the soldiers; and on the left of the 
soldiers, and a little advanced, were placed the four 
little big guns, two of brass and two of iron. 

So now both parties being face to face and close to 
each other, they were very watchful. Some of the 
soldiers stood all night watching between the camp 
and the pa, and the people in the pa watched also, 
and the watch-cry resounded among the hills. This 
was the cry of the pa: ‘Come on, soldiers, for re- 
venge; come on! Stiff your dead are lying on 
Taumata tutu. Come on! Come on!”* Then in 
answer was heard the watch-cry of Walker: “‘ Come 
on, O Ngapuhi, for your revenge, come on! We 
have slain you in heaps on the battle-field. Come 
on! Come on!” So passed the first night before 
Ohaeawae. 

Next morning the four little big guns began to 
fire at the pa, but they did no damage. Some of 
the shots stuck fast in the large posts, but did not 
go through; others went between the posts, making 
a mark on each side, but leaving the posts standing 
as strong as ever. As for the men in the pa, they 


1 « Whai mai e te hoia, ki tetahi utu maua akato wharoro ana 
koe, kei Taumata tutu—whai mai! whai mai!—The watch-cry. 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 241 


‘were all in the trenches, and the shots which came 
through the fence went over their heads, and did 
them no harm. After the guns had fired a few 
times, the people in the pa began firing at them with 
muskets, and soon killed one sailor, and wounded 
some others. So the men left the guns for the rest 
of that day, but in the night they took them away, 
and placed two of them on the hill where Walker had 
encamped, and the other two on the level ground 
between that hill and the soldiers’ camp. They also 
made banks of earth to shelter them, so that the men 
who fired them were safer than they had been the 
day before, when they had only a little green flax to 
cover them, which was of no use. 

Next day the guns began to fire again, and con- 
tinued until night; and also a great number of sol- 
diers, sailors, and Maori scattered themselves about the 
pa, and fired at it with muskets, but could do no 
harm; and this went on for several days, but the 
fences of the pa remained standing, and not much 
injured. I think, however, that although the guns 
were smaller than they should have been, if they had 
been continually fired at one place, an opening in the 
fence would have been made at last; but instead of 
doing this, when they had been fired for half a day 
at one part of the fence, then the soldiers would 
begin firing at some other part of the pa, and then 
the people would come out of the trenches and repair 
any damage which had been done at the place at 
which the guns had been fired at first. We Maori 
did not think the soldiers did wisely in this respect, 

R 


242 HEKE’S WAR IN THE 


but they may have had some reason for it which 
we could not understand, for we don’t know much 
about big guns; as was also seen at Ohaeawae, for 
there were four big guns in the pa, larger than those 
of the soldiers, and they were fired at us very often, 
but they never hit any one. My idea is, that big 
guns are no use to knock down a pa, unless they are 
very big indeed. But the Maori say that in future 
wars they will build forts where it will be hard, and 
take a long time, to bring big guns; and when the 
soldiers after much pains get them there, they will 
leave the pa at once, and go somewhere else where it 
will take a long time to follow them, and so on till 
the soldiers are tired of dragging big guns about the 
country, after which both parties will be armed with 
muskets only, and the Maori can use these arms as 
well as the soldiers. This is what I have heard say, 
and I think it a very correct thought. 

So the firing of big guns and muskets went on day 
after day, but no opening was made in the face of 
the pa; but the chief of the soldiers* did not care 
much for this, for he wanted every day to send his 
men to rush up to the pa, to pull down the fence with 
their hands, or pull it down with ropes, and so get 


in. But Walker and the other chiefs always pre- 


vented this, as they knew that all the soldiers would 
be killed before they could get in in this way. 
Every one of the Maori were of this opinion, and 
also some of our old pakeha friends who were with 


1 Colonel Despard. 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 243 


us, and who knew the appearance of the Maori in 
war. Nevertheless, the chief of the soldiers wished 
every day to send his men to rush up to the pa; and 
so, at last, we heard so much of this that we began 
to be very melancholy, and Walker told me that he 
felt sick in the stomach when the chief of the soldiers 
spoke to him about it, it seemed so great a waste of 
men’s lives. We all became, as I have said, very 
melancholy, for we all began to see that it would be 
done at last, and we grieved, therefore, for our friends 
the soldiers, who we knew would be all killed. But 
what vexed us most was, that so fine a war party as 
ours should be beaten by such a small number of 
people as were in the pa, only because the chief of the 
soldiers was a foolish, inexperienced person.* 

At last the chief of the soldiers thought of sending 
for a very large gun from a ship of war at the Bay 
of Islands, which would be large enough to break 
down the fence. If he had done this at first an open- 
ing would soon have been made, and the fort taken 
without many men being killed; but as it was, this 
gun when it came was of no use, for the chief of the 
soldiers did not wait till it had broken down the 
fence, but attempted to take the pa without this 
having been done. 

This gun was placed at the foot of the hill where 


1 The pa at Ohaeawae was attacked against the advice of the 
friendly native chiefs, who well knew its strength, and the cer- 
tain repulse to be expected. They called Colonel Despard any- 
thing but a soldier, and the term “ foolish and inexperienced” is 
the mildest they applied to him. 


24.4 HEKE’S WAR IN THE 


Walker had his camp, and it was not fired many 
times before it became apparent that should it keep 
on firing till next evening, a large opening would be 
made in the fence; so we began to think that the 
chief of the soldiers would have patience, and wait till 
this should be done. 

Now on this same day, when this big gun began to 
fire, thirty men came out of the pa unperceived, and 
coming through a wood in the rear of Walker’s camp, 
at a time when Walker and most of his men were 
absent, they rushed in and plundered it, killing one 
soldier who was there, and also one Maori, and 
wounded also a pakeha, the son of a missionary. 
They pulled down Walker’s flag and took it away, 
and having fired a volley at the camp of the soldiers, 
ran off to their pa, leaving one man killed, who was 
killed by Tara Patiki, and not by the soldiers, as [I 
have heard say. I am sure of this, for I saw Tara 
Patiki shoot him. They were close upon us before 
we saw them, and we had great difficulty to escape, 
but we both jumped into the fern, and ran down the 
hill as hard as we could. I fired my gun right into 
the middle of them, but as only one man was killed, 
I suppose my shot missed. 


When the soldiers saw that Walker’s pa was taken, 


they came out of their camp, and charged up the 
hill; but when they came to the top, they found that 
the enemy were gone, and had taken away everything 
valuable they could find; they found the soldier who 
had been killed. He had been sent there by the 
chief of the soldiers to take care of one of the little 


. 
2 
fi 
3 
i 
& 
; 
i 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 245 


big guns which had been removed up to that place, 
so he was killed there; but I have heard that the 
chief of the soldiers when he wrote his letter to 
Auckland, to tell the Governor about this matter, 
said that this soldier was killed in charging up the 
hill; but this is not true, for I and many others got 
to the top of the hill before the soldiers, and when 
we got there the enemy were gone, and the dead 
soldier was lying there where he had been killed, 
close to the small big gun. | 
This affair, however, made the chief of the soldiers 
quite mad, so that same evening he ordered all his 
men to rush upon the pa and pull it down with ropes, 
or climb over it with ladders, or any way they could; 
he also sent to Walker to tell him what he was about 
to do. Walker spoke against it, as he had done 
before, and advised to wait one day more, till the big 
eun had made an opening for the soldiers to rush 
through quickly; otherwise, he said they would be 
all killed, and not get in atall. But the chief of the 
soldiers would not wait. So when Walker saw the 
attack would be made he offered to attack also at 
another face of the pa, and also twenty young men, 
cousins of Hauraki, the young chief of Te Hikutu, 
who was killed at Waikare, came and asked leave to 
go with the soldiers; but the chief of the soldiers 
would not let them go; neither would he consent to 
Walker’s making an attack, lest meeting the soldiers 
in the pa, his men might be mistaken for the enemy. 
When we saw that the attack was determined upon, 
and just going to take place, we were all in a great 


246 HEKH’S WAR IN THE 


state of agitation, and knew not what to think. Most 
said all the soldiers would be killed; but then we 
thought, on the other hand, that perhaps these 
European warriors could do things above the under- 
standing of us Maori, and so perhaps they might 
take the pa. But all thought the chief of the soldiers 
very wrong to attempt the thing before an opening 
had been made for the soldiers to enter by. Also, 
Toby (Lieutenant Philpots), who was chief of the 
sailors, and a very brave gentleman, had walked close 
up to the fence of the pa, and along it, and, after 
having examined it, he returned, and told the chief 
of the soldiers that the place could not be taken 
by storm, unless it was first breached. When Lieu- 
tenant Philpots went up to the pa, the people were 
firing at every one who showed himself, and at first 
they fired at him; but he walked straight on, not 
caring about the shots which were fired at him. So, 
when the people in the pa saw that it was Philpots 
who had done this, they ceased firing at him, and told 
him to go back, as they did not wish to hurt him. 
So having examined the fence closely, he returned, 
but the soldier chief did not mind what he said, and 
was angry, and spoke rudely to him for having given 
his opinion on the matter. 


So now the chief of the soldiers mustered his men ~ 


and divided them into parties. One party he stationed 


on the hill which was Walker’s camp, and with all 


the rest he went to the attack. And first came a 
small party with a young chief leading them; these 
were all toa who had consented to die, so that those 


Se a ee ee Te ee ee ee ee ee 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 247 


who followed might succeed. After them came a 
party of about eighty men, and after these came the 
main body of the soldiers; and with them also ad- 
vanced the sailors, and the pakeha Maori, carrying 
ladders. The sailors advanced without their chief, 
for as yet he (Philpots) remained to fire some last 
shots from the big gun. But there was with them 
a young chief called Pena (Mr. Spain). So the whole 
attack moved on. We soon saw with great surprise 
that the soldiers were not going to attack that part 
of the pa which for so many days had been battered 
by the big guns, and where there might have been 
some small chance of their getting in, for in that 
direction the fence had been damaged in some degree, 
particularly by the large ship gun. The soldiers, 
however, advanced as they had been ordered against 
that part of the pa which had been built stronger 
than, any other, and which had not been fired at at 
all by the big guns. The reason why this part of 
the pa was the strongest was, because it was the part 
which had been originally built by Pene Taui as a pa 
for himself. He had begun it at the beginning of the 
war, and built it at his leisure, and made it very 
strong. And also that part of the pa was the nearest 
to the forest; so all the largest and heaviest timber, 
which was difficult to move, was put there. But 
when Heke and Kawiti fell back to Ohaeawae, this 
original pa was found too small to hold their people ; 
so they enlarged it very much; but, being in a great 
hurry, expecting the soldiers back from Auckland, 
they could not take time to make the new part so 


248 HEKE’S WAR IN THE 


strong as that which had been first built by Taui; 
but, nevertheless, by working hard day and night, 
they made it very strong. 

So the soldiers marched on silently and in good 
order, in full view of the pa, till they came opposite 
to the part they were about to attack, and then they 
halted in a little hollow to prepare for the great rush. 
But all this was done quietly, and in an orderly 
manner. ‘The chiefs did not make speeches, or jump, 
or stamp about as we Maori do to encourage the 
men, but all was quiet, and silent, and orderly, as if 
nothing uncommon was about to take place. I took 
great notice of this, and did not know what to think; 
for, when we Maori have determined to do a despe- 
rate thing like this, we are all like mad men, and 
make a great clamour, rushing towards the world of 
darkness (¢e po) with great noise and fury. 

While the soldiers were advancing, Walker and all 
the people went and took up a position behind the 
pa, so that in case the soldiers got in, the retreat of 
the enemy would be cut off, in case they attempted 
to escape in that direction. 

Now the defenders of the pa perceived that the 
time of battle was come, and all went to their sta- 
tions, and the chiefs stood up and made speeches, 
each to his own family. This was the speech of 
Haupokeha 


‘‘ Have great patience this day, O chil- 
dren and friends; we have said ‘ Let us fight the 
soldiers,’ and behold the rage of the soldier is at 
hand; be brave and enduring this day; be victo- 
rious; the parent who maintains us is the land— 


> = 


-* Se 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 249 


die for the land!—die for the land!” Other 
chiefs spoke to the people, and some of the 
young men left the trenches, and called to the old 
men to lead them out to fight the soldiers in the 
open plain before the pa; but Haupokeha, in great 
anger, said, “‘ No; this shall not be done: return to 
your stations, and you shall see the enemy walk 
alive into the oven: they are coming only to their 
own destruction.” At this moment the bugle 
sounded, and the soldiers came charging on, shouting 
after the manner of European warriors, and those 
who were on Walker’s hill shouted also; and we 
Maori behind the pa shouted also; and the whole 
valley resounded with the anger of the pakeha! 
Soon the soldiers were within twenty fathoms of the 
fort; and then the fire darted from under the 
pekerangi; the noise of guns was heard, and the 
foremost soldiers fell headlong to the ground. But 
the soldiers are very brave: they charged right on, 
and came up to the pekerangi, which is the outer 
fence, and began to tear it to pieces with their hands. 
Then Philpots, when he saw the sailors charge, left 
the big gun and ran across the plain, and joined 
them; and he, being a toa, shouted to his men to be 
resolute, and destroy the fence; and then, with one 
pull, the sailors brought down about five fathoms of 
the pekerangi; and then they were before the true 
fence, which being made of whole trees placed up- 
right and fixed deeply in the ground, could not be 
pulled down at all. All this time the fire from 
inside through the loopholes continued unceasingly, 


250 HEKE’S WAR IN THE 


at the distance of one arm’s length from where the 
soldiers were standing, and also a heavy fire came 
from a flanking angle at a distance of ten fathoms; 
and in this angle there was a big gun; it was heavily 
loaded with powder, and for shot there was put into 
it a long bullock chain, and this was fired into the 
midst of the soldiers, doing great damage. So the 
soldiers fell there, one on the other, in great num- 
bers; but not one thought of running away. And 
Philpots did all a man could do to break down the 
inside fence, but it could not be done at all; so he 
ran along this fence till he saw a small opening 
which had been made to fire a big gun through, and 
he tried to get through this opening, at the same 
time calling to his men to follow. Then the people 
in the pa saw him, and about ten men fired at him, 
but all missed, and he almost got into the midst of 
the place, still calling on his men to follow, when a 
young lad fired at him, and killed him dead at once. 
So he lay there dead with his sword in his hand, 
like a toa as he was; but the noise and smoke, 
shouting and confusion, were so great as to prevent 
his men from perceiving that he was killed, and 
bearing off his body, for such is the appearance of 


war. Also, a chief of the soldiers was killed ~ j 


(Captain Grant), and another died of his wounds, 
and there was a long line of dead and wounded men 
lying along the outside of the fence, and soon all 
would have been killed, but the chief of the soldiers, 
seeing this, sounded a call on the tetere (bugle) for 
them to retreat. And then, but not before, the 


NORTH OF NEW ZHALAND. 251 


soldiers began to run back, taking with them most 
of the wounded; but about forty dead were left 
behind, under the wall of the pa. This battle did 
not take up near so long a time as I am telling of it, 
and in it about one hundred and ten Europeans were 
killed or wounded. 

Great is the courage of the soldiers! They will 
walk quietly at the command of their chiefs to 
certain death; there is no people to be compared to 
them; but they were obliged to retreat. The 
number of men in the fort was about one hundred 
and seventy, and the part attacked was defended by 
the hapu of Pene Taui, in number just forty men. 
So the war runners ran through all the north, 
saying—“ One wing of England is broken, and 
hangs dangling on the ground.” 

Before saying any more of this fight, I must tell 
you of two slaves—one called Peter, who belonged 
to Kaetoke, and the other called Tarata, who belongs 
to Ti Kahuka. Many years ago Tarata went to 
England in a large ship, and having gone ashore to 
see what he could see, he lost his way in the great 
town called London. So, in the night, the police 
found him wandering about, and took him prisoner, 
and put him in the whareherehere (watch-house), for 
they thought he had stolen a bundle of clothes 

<which he was carrying. In the morning they 
brought him before the chief and accused him, but 
Tarata had not been able to learn to speak English, 
so he could not defend himself, or say from whence 
he came; so he thought he was going to be killed, 


252 HEKE’S WARIN THH 


and began to cry. Just then a ship captain came 
into the house, and seeing Tarata he knew he was a 
Maori, and spoke to him in Maori, and told him not 
to be afraid, and then he turned to the chief of the 
police and made a speech to him, and to all the 
people who were assembled there to see Tarata 
killed, as he believed; but when the ship captain had 
done speaking, the chief of the police was no longer 
angry, and said, ‘‘ Poor fellow, poor fellow ;” and then 
all the people present gave each a small piece of 
money to Tarata. Some gave sixpence, some a 
shilling, and some a few coppers; the chief of the 
police gave Tarata five shillings. When all the 
money was together there was more than ever 
Tarata had seen before, so he was very glad 
indeed ; and a policeman went with him and 
showed him the way to his ship, and took care of - 
him, lest he should be robbed of his money. After 
this Tarata returned to New Zealand, and many ~ 
years after he came with his chief to the war to help 
Walker. So at Ohaeawae, when he saw the soldiers 
going to the attack, he thought of the goodness of 
the people of England, and so he said, “I will go 
and die along with these soldiers.” Then, when 
Peter, the slave of Kaetoke, heard this, he said, “ I 
also am a pakeha; I have been reared since a child 
by the Europeans; they have made me a man, and 
all the flesh on my bones belongs to them.” So these 
two slaves ran quickly and took their place with the 
wakaka (forlorn-hope, or leading party) of the soldiers, 
but when the chief of that party saw them, he ordered 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 253 


them to return; but they persisted in going on, so 
the soldier ran at them and cut at them with his 
sword, and his soldiers were shouting and running 
on. So the two slaves stood to one side, but would 
not return, and when the soldiers had passed, they 
followed them up to the fence of the pa, and stood 
there firing into it till the soldiers fell back, and 
afterwards, when the soldiers retreated, they carried 
off one wounded soldier who had been left behind. 

After the fight, the chief of the soldiers sent some 
people with a white flag to the pa, to ask permission 
to take away the dead soldiers who lay beside the 
fence. They were told that they might come and 
take them next day. Soon after the flag had returned 
it was night, and then many near friends of Heke 
came from Kaikohe and entered the pa, for they had 
heard that the soldiers had been beaten off, and this 
gave them courage to come, which they had _ not 
before, and then late in the night they joining with 
the men of the pa danced the war dance which is ap- 
propriate to victory, and sang the song of triumph as 
they danced, and the song sounded among the hills in 
the night like thunder. This was the song— 


E tama te uaua, O youth of sinewy force, 

K taima te maroro, O men of martial strength, 
Ina hoki ra te tohu ! Behold the sign of power! 

O te uaua. In my hand I hold the scalp, 
Kei taku ringa,emauana. Of the Kawau Tatakiha. 

Te upoko. 


O te Kawau Tatakiha! 


And often in the night the watch-cry of the pa was 


254: HEKE’S WAR IN THE 


heard, and this was the cry of the pa—* Come on! 
come on! soldiers, for revenge, come on! Stiff lie 
your dead by the fence of my pa—come on, come 
on!” And also a great shouting and screaming was 
heard, which the soldiers thought was'the cry of one 
of their men being tortured; but the noise was the 
voice of a priest who was then possessed of a spirit. 
But, nevertheless, the body of one soldier was burned 
that night, for as the people were mending the fence 
by torchlight there was a dead soldier lying near, and 
they put a torch of kauri resin on the body to light 
their work, which burnt the body very much, and 
caused the report to be spread afterwards, when the 
body was found by the soldiers, that the man had 
been tortured; but this was not true, for the man was 
dead before the fire was thrown on the body. 

During the night a report arose amongst the Maori 
of Walker’s camp—I don’t know how or from what 
cause—that the soldiers were about to decamp under 
cover of darkness, and that the chief of the soldiers 
had proposed to shoot all his wounded men to pre- 
vent them falling alive into the hands of the enemy. 
When we heard this we got into a state of commo- 
tion and great alarm, and did not know what to do. 


I ran off to a hut where an old pakeha friend of mine ~ 


slept, and having aroused him, I told him what I had 
heard, and asked him if such things ever had been 
done by his countrymen, and also what he thought 
would be best for us to do. My friend said nothing 
for some time, but lit his pipe and smoked a little, and 
at last he said, “‘Such a thing has never yet been 


iq 


—- 


PO ee ee eT TT ene 


NORTH OF NEW ZHALAND. 25 


Or 


done by English soldiers, and be assured will not be 
done to-night; but, nevertheless, go you to all your 
relations and those who will listen to your words, and 
make them watch with their arms in their hands till 
daylight. I will do the same with my friends, for, 
perhaps, the soldiers might go to-night to take away 
the wounded to the Waimate and then return: who 
knows? And in the morning, perhaps, the enemy 
may think they are gone away entirely, and may 
come out of the pa; so, in that case, you and I will 
elevate our names by fighting them ourselves, without 
the soldiers.’ So I and my pakeha friend watched 
all night with the people, until the sun rose. But 
the soldiers did not go away that night, so I suppose 
the report was false, but it alarmed us much at the 
time, and some of us were very near running away 
that night.’ 

When the morning came, a party went to bring 
away the bodies of the dead. The people of the pa 
had drawn them to a distance from the fence, and 
left them to be taken away, so they were taken and 
buried near the camp; and when this was done, the 
soldiers began to fire on the pa, and the war began 
again. But the body of the soldier chief who had 
been killed was not given up, for much of the flesh 
had been cut off. This was done by the advice of the 
tohunga, so that the soldiers having been dried for 


1 This report actually was really spread in the camp the night 
after the attack. It struck the natives with consternation, and 
there are those who still believe that there was some foundation 
for it, and that a retreat had been talked of. 


256 HEKE’S WAR IN THH 


food they might lose their mana (prestige, good for- 
tune), and be in consequence less feared. 

And the scalp had been taken from the head of 
Philpots to be used by the tohunga in divination to 
discover the event of the war. This was not done 
from revenge or ill-will to him, but because, as he 
was a toa and a chief, his scalp was more desirable for 
this purpose than that of an ordinary person. 

So the foliage of the battle-field was taken to the 
Atua Wera that he might perform the usual cere- 
monies, and cause the people to be fortunate in 
the war.’ 

When the people in the pa saw that, although the 
soldiers had lost so many men, they were not dis- 
mayed, and seeing also that the inner fence was 
beginning to give way before the fire of the big gun, 
they made up their minds to leave the pa in the 
night, so that the soldiers should not have an oppor- 
tunity to revenge themselves. So in the night they 
all left, and went to Kaikohe, without it having been 
perceived that they were gone. 

However, before they had been gone very long, 
Walker’s people began to suspect what had taken 


1 Amongst other superstitious native customs, when a battle — 


has been fought, the victorious party send to their priest, no 
matter how far he may be off, a collection of the herbage actually 
growing on the field of battle; he takes it and performs with it 
certain ceremonies, and sends back the messenger with his ad- 
vice, &c., &c. This is called sending the rahu rahu of the battle 
field. Rahu rahu is the name of the fern which is the most 
common plant in the North Island. 


ae ae 


: 

: 

; 

. 

i 

. 
‘ 
“i 
" 
. 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 257 


place, for the dogs in the deserted pa were howling, 
and the watch-cry was no longer heard. So a man 
called Tamahue entered it cautiously, and found it 
deserted. He crept on softly, and in entering a house 
he put his hand on a woman who had been left behind 
asleep, so he kept quiet to see if the sleeping person 
would awake; and he began to believe that the 
people had not left the pa, and was about to kill the 
sleeping person for utu for himself, for he did not 
expect to escape alive, there being so many pits and 
trenches which he could not see in the dark. He, 
however, thought it would be best first to examine 
the other houses. This he did, and perceived that 
the place was deserted, for all the other houses were 
empty. The only weapon Tamahue had was a toma- 
hawk, for he had lost his left arm at a great battle at 
Hokianga some years before, and was therefore unable 
to useagun. So he returned to the sleeping person, 
and jumped upon her, and raised his hand to strike, 
for he did not know it was a woman who was sleeping 
there, but thought it was a warrior. But though he 
had but one arm he did not call to his brother, who 
was close outside the pa, for he intended to strike the 
first blow in the inside of this fortress himself. You 
must know that we Maori think this a great thing, 
even though the blow be struck only against a post 
or a stone. But Tamahue being naked, as all good 
warriors should be when on a dangerous adventure, 
his bare knees pressed against the breast of the sleep- 
ing person, and then he perceived it was a woman, so 
he struck his tomahawk into the ground only, and 
s 


258 HOKE’S WAR IN THLE 


having taken her prisoner, he called his brother, and 
they returned to the camp, and gave information that 
the pa was deserted. 

Then all at once there arose a. great confusion. 
All the Maori and most of the soldiers ran off to the 
pa in the dark, and they tumbled by tens into the pits 
and trenches, which were in the inside of the place. 
The soldiers ran about searching for plunder, and 
quarrellng with the Maori for ducks and geese. 
There was a great noise, every one shouting at once, 
and as much uproar as if the place had been taken by 
storm; and so this was how Ohaeawae was taken. 

In the morning the soldiers dug up the dead of 
the enemy, nine in number, being in search of the 
body of the soldier chief who had been killed in the 
attack. They found the body and also that of the 
soldier which had been burned; and besides the nine 
bodies of the enemy’s men which the soldiers dug 
up, there was also found the body of a woman lying 
in the pa, which made ten the people of the pa 
had lost. 

While the soldiers were doing this, all the Maori 
went in pursuit of the enemy as far as Kaikohe; and 
when they got there a certain pakeha met them, and 
spoke angrily to the chiefs for pursuing Heke’s 


people, and told us that our souls would be roasted — 


in the other world for making war on Sunday—for 
it was on Sunday this happened. So the chiefs 
thought that perhaps it might be unlucky to fight on 
the ratapu; they, therefore, only set fire to Heke’s 
house at Kaikohe, and returned to the camp at 


| 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 259 


Ohaeawae. But before the war was over, we all 
found that the soldiers did not mind Sunday at all 
when any harm could be done on it; but when 
there was nothing else to do they always went to 
prayers. 

After this the soldiers burned the pa, and went 
back to the Waimate, where they built a fort, and 
stayed some time, and there they buried Philpots; 
and we Maori still remember Philpots, for he was a 
generous, brave, and good-natured man. But now 
years have gone by, and his ship has sailed away— 
no one knows where—and he is left by his people; 
but sometimes a pakeha traveller may be seen 
standing by his grave. But the Europeans do not 
lament so loudly as we do; they have perhaps the 
same thought as some of us, who say that the best 
lamentation for a toa is a blow struck against the 
enemy. 

While the soldiers were staying at Waimate, 
Kawiti left Kaikohe, and went to his own place at 
the Ruapekapeka, and fortified it, making it very 
strong; but Hexe remained at Tautora, not yet 
cured of his wound. There was a pa near Waimate, 
belonging to Te Aratua, and the soldiers went to 
attack it; but when Te Aratua heard they were 
coming, he left it, and so the soldiers took it, and 
burned it, without any opposition. 

Some time after this the soldiers left Waimate, and 
went to the Bay of Islands, where others joined 
them. The sailors came also in the ships of war, 
and with them came also the pakeha Maori; and 


260 HEKE’S WAR IN THLE 


there was a great gathering, for the soldiers had 
heard that the fort of Kawiti at the Ruapekapeka 
was completely finished and ready for war, and 
therefore they prepared ‘to attack it. Walker also, 
and the other chiefs with their people, joined the 
soldiers as before; and when we were all together 
we formed a grand war party—the greatest that had 
been seen during the war. The soldiers forgot 
nothing this time. They brought with them all 
their arms of every kind. They brought long and 
short big guns, and rockets, and guns the shot of 
which bursts with a great noise. Nothing was left 
behind. We were glad of this, for we wished to see 
the full strength of the soldiers put forth, that we 
might see what the utmost of their power was.’ 

So this great war party left the Bay of Islands, 
and went up the river to attack Kawiti at the Ruape- 
kapeka. They went in boats and canoes, and having 
arrived at the pa of Tamati Pukututu, they landed 
the guns, and powder, and provisions, and began 
making a road to the Ruapekapeka. And after many 
days, the road being completed, the tawa advanced, 
and encamped before the Ruapekapeka. 

During the first two days there was not much 


done, but when all had been got ready, the soldiers © 


began to fire in earnest—rockets, mortars, ship guns, 


1 The friendly natives never lost sight of the possibility that 
they themselves might some day have to fight us. They there- 
fore scrutinized closely all our military proceedings, and were 
anxious to see us do our very best, or rather, our worst, so that 
they might know what they would have to contend against. 


. ’ ; 5 ‘ 
ae ye ee ee ne ee re 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 261 


long brass guns—all burst out firing at once. We 
were almost deaf with the noise, and the air was full 
of cannon balls. The fence of the pa began to disap- 
pear like a bank of fog before the morning breeze. 
So now we saw that the soldiers had at last found 
out how to knock down a pa. But before the fence 
was completely broken down, the chief of the soldiers 
ordered his men to rush up to the pa as they had 
done before at Ohaeawae. The soldiers were about 
to do so, for they are a very obedient people, when 
Moses, with much difficulty, persuaded the chief of 
the soldiers not to let them go, by telling him that he 
was only going to waste all his men’s lives, and 
advising him to wait till the fence was entirely gone 
before he made the attack. We all disliked this 
soldier very much, and saw that he was a very foolish, 
inexperienced person, and also that he cared nothing 
for the lives of his soldiers; but we thought it a great 
pity to waste such fine well-grown men as the soldiers 
were, without any chance of revenge. 

So the guns fired away, and after a few days the 
fence was completely down in many places, for the 
shot came like a shower of hail; but not many were 
killed in the pa, for they had plenty of houses under 
ground which the shot could not reach; but they 
were out of all patience, by reason of the pot guns 
(mortars). These guns had shot which were hollow 
exactly like a calabash, and they were full of gun- 
powder, and they came tumbling into the pa, one 
after another, and they would hardly be on the 
ground before they would burst with a great noise; 


262 HUKE’S WARK IN THE 


and no sooner would one burst than another would 
burst; and so they came one after another so fast that 
the people in the pa could get no rest, and were 
getting quite deaf. These guns, however, never 
killed any one. They are a very vexatious invention 
for making people deaf, and preventing them from 
getting any sleep. One good thing about them is, 
that, whenever one of the shots does not burst, a 
considerable number of charges of powder for a 
musket can be got out of it; and whenever one 
dropped close to any of the men in the pa, he would 
pull out the weckz (fuse), and then get out the powder. 
A good deal of powder was procured in this way. 
The pot guns are to make people deaf, and keep 
them from sleeping; the rockets are to kill people 
and burn their houses. A rocket knocked off the 
head of a woman in the pa, but did not hurt a child 
she had on her back at the time. Another took off 
the head of a young man of the Kapotai; another 
took out the stomach of a slave called Hi; he be- 
longed to the Wharepapa chief of the Ihutai. This 
slave lived till night, crying for some one to shoot 
him, and then died. One man was killed by a 
cannon ball which came through the fence and 


knocked his leg off as easily as if it had been a boiled — 


potato. The man was a warrior of the Ngati Kahu- 
nunu, from the south; when he saw his leg was off 
above the. knee, he cried out, ‘‘ Look here, the iron 
has run away with my leg; what playful creatures 
these cannon balls are!” When he said this, he fell 
back and died, smiling, as brave warriors do. 


| 
1 
: 
7 
; 
4 
| 
4 
; 
5 
: 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 263 


There was not many killed in the pa, for the people 
kept under ground; neither did the soldiers lose 
many men, for they kept at a distance, and let the 
big guns and rockets do all the work. One evening 
a strong party rushed out of the pa and attacked 
Walker’s men, and a pretty smart fight ensued. 
Now, this party were for the most part of the Kapotai 
tribe, who had killed Hauraki at Waikare, and among 
Walker’s men were several young men, cousins of 
Hauraki, who had come to seek revenge; and these 
young men fought with great spirit, and one of them 
killed Ripiro, a Kapotai, and took his name.* Some 
others of the Kapotai were killed, and others wounded, 
but none of Walker’s men were killed, and only a few 
wounded. Amongst the wounded, however, was 
that brave warrior Wi Repa, who had three fingers of 
his left hand shot off, being the second time he had 
been wounded during the war. 

By this time the fences of the pa were broken 
down very much, but the people waited patiently, in 
expectation that the soldiers would come on to the 
attack, for they thought that, though the soldiers 
would take the place, they would be able to kill many 
of them, and then escape into the forest behind the 
pa. But the guns and rockets kept firing on, and the 
people began to be quite tired of hearing the shells 
bursting all about them continually, when Heke, who 


1 Jt is a common practice when a native has killed a man of 
any note in battle, for the party who killed the other to com- 
-memorate the exploit by taking the name of the dead man. 


264 HEKE’S WAR IN THE 


had recovered from his wound, arrived with seventy 
men. As soon as Heke had observed the state of the 
pa, and how things were, he said, “‘ You are foolish 
to remain in this pa to be pounded by cannon balls. 
Let us leave it. Let the soldiers have it, and we 
will retire into the forest and draw them after us, 
where they cannot bring the big guns. The soldiers 
cannot fight amongst the kareao; they will be as 
easily killed amongst the canes as if they were wood- 
pigeons.” So all the people left the pa except 
Kawiti, who lingered behind with a few men, being 
unwilling to leave his fort without fighting at least 
one battle for it. 

The next day after Heke’s arrival was Sunday. 
Most of the soldiers had gone to prayers; many of 
Heke’s people were at prayers also, and no one was in 
the pa but Kawiti, and a few men who were in the 
trenches asleep, not expecting to be attacked that 
day. But William Walker Turau (Walker’s brother) 
thought he perceived that the pa was not well 
manned, so he crept carefully up to the place and 
looked in, and saw no one; but Kawiti with eleven 
men were sleeping in the trenches. Turau then 
waved his hand to Walker, who was waiting for a 
signal, and then stepped noiselessly into the fort. 
Then Walker and Tao Nui with both their tribes 
came rushing on. The soldiers seeing this left 
prayers, and with the sailors came rushing into the 
pa in a great crowd—sailors, soldiers, and Maori all 
mixed up without any order whatever. When the 
pa was entered the soldiers set up a great shout, 


‘5 
— se ee ee eS Ss ee ee ee 


_—— ee 


oS ee ee OG en ee eT ee ee ee 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 265 


which awakening Kawiti, he started up with his 
eleven men, and saw his pa was taken. How could 
it be helped? So he and his men fired a volley, and 
then loaded again, and fired a second volley, which 
was as much as he could do. Then they ran away 
and joined Heke at the rear of the pa, where he . 
called aloud to the Ngapuhi to fight, and not allow 
his pa to be taken without a battle.’ 

Then the Ngapuhi returned to attack their own 
pa, which was full of soldiers, and creeping up behind 
rocks and trees they began to fire, and called out in 
English, “‘ Never mind the soldiers! Never mind 
the soldiers!” They did this hoping to enrage the 
soldiers, and cause them to leave the pa, and follow 
them into the forest; but most of the soldiers re- 
mained in the pa firing through loopholes, for the 
back of the pa which was now attacked by the Nga- 
-puhi was yet entire, not having been so much broken 
down by the big guns as the front side had been. A 
few sailors and soldiers, however, went out at a little 
gate at the back of the pa, but were no sooner out 


1 Kawiti seeing that all the other forts had made so good a 
defence wished not to abandon his without standing an assault. 
Heke, however, who was the best general, saw the place would 
soon become quite untenable from the fire of the artillery, and 
advised an immediate retreat to the border of the forest; he, 
however, had great difficulty to get Kawiti, who had a good 
deal of the bulldog in him, to retreat. The old chief, however, 
did fire a volley in the inside of the place when the soldiers 
entered, which he considered saved his honour, as it could not 
be said he left his fort without fighting. 


266 HEKE’S WA. IN. THE 


than they were shot by the people behind the trees. 
At last some forty or fifty soldiers got out, and a 
fight began outside. But Heke and the main body 
of his men remained at a distance beside the thick 
forest, in hopes that the party who were fighting the 
soldiers would soon fall back, and so lead the soldiers 
to follow them into the forest, where Heke had his 
ambush prepared for them. But these people did 
not retire as they should have done, for a report was 
heard that Kawiti had been killed or taken, and this 
enraged them so much that they would not retreat, 
and they remained there trying to retake the pa. But 
they lost many men, for hundreds were firing at them 
from loopholes in the pa, besides the soldiers who 
were close to them outside. Many soldiers were 
killed or wounded who might have escaped being 
hurt if they had got behind trees; but these men did 
not care about covering themselves when they might 
have done so. The Maori at one time charged, and 
there was among them a young half-caste; he had in 
his hand a broad, sharp tomahawk with a long 
handle, and he rushed upon asailor, and using both 
hands he struck him on the neck, and the head fell 
over the man’s shoulders nearly cut off. This was 
the only man killed by stroke of hand in this fight. 
At last Heke sent a man to tell the people to fall 
back; but they said they would not do so, but would 
all die there, for Kawiti had been taken. Then the 
messenger told them that Kawiti was safe and well 
with Heke, and that he had just seen him; so when 
they heard this they fell back at once, but the soldiers 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 267 


did not follow, being restrained by their different 
chiefs. So the fight ended, and the Ruapekapeka 
was taken, and this was the last fight of the war. 

There were killed in this fight of Heke’s people 
twenty-three men, and Heke wrote their names in a 
book, and also the names of all others who had fallen 
in the war. 

How many men the soldiers had killed in the 
fight I do not know, but I don’t think they lost quite 
so many as the Maori, for most of them were firing 
through the loopholes of the pa and out of the 
trenches, and so were well sheltered. One soldier, as 
I have heard say, was shot by another, because he 
was going to run away. I don’t think it right to do 
this. When a man feels afraid who is ordinarily of 
good courage, it is a sign that he will be killed, and 
he ought to be allowed to go away. It is bad to 
disregard omens. When a man feels courageous let 
him fight, and he will be fortunate. 

Next day, Heke, Kawiti, and all the people began 
to consult as to what should be done; for the fort 
was taken, and they had no provisions, and there 
was none at any of their other places—all having 
been consumed or wasted during the war, and but 
little had been planted. And the people told the 
chiefs that they could not live on fern root and fight 
the soldiers at the same time. They began to say to 
the chiefs, ‘‘ Can shadows carry muskets?” They 
were much perplexed, and some proposed to break 
up into small parties, and go and live with different 
tribes who had not taken part in the war, but 


268 HEKE’S WAR IN THE 


amongst whom they had friends or distant relations. 
After talking over this plan for some time it was 
found it would not do, for already some chiefs of 
distant tribes had said they would give up any one 
who came to them to the Governor, rather than bring 
a war against themselves. At last it was proposed 
to write to the Governor to ask him to make peace. 
So the letter was written and sent, but no one ex- 
pected the Governor would make peace so quickly. 
He, however, consented at once to make peace, and 
so peace was made, and Heke’s people were very glad 
indeed. But the chiefs who had been on the side of 
the soldiers were very sorry, for had the war been 
continued a little longer, Heke’s people would have 
been starved and scattered, and Walker’s people could 
have taken their land in various places; and, also, 
after they had been obliged to scatter about the 
country to obtain subsistence, many would have been 
taken prisoners, and they never would have had 
courage to fight again. 

When Heke saw that peace was sure to be made, 
he went away to Tautoro, and said he did not want 
peace to be made, but that if the Governor came to 
him and asked for peace he would consent. Heke is 


a man of many thoughts. So Heke kept at a distance | 


at his own place, and never made peace with the 
Governor or Walker, until Walker at last came to 
him, and then Heke said that as Walker had come to 
him there should be peace, but that until the Go- 
venor came also and asked for peace, he would not 
consider it fully made. 


een eS Ue Py oe een a 


‘ 
‘ 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 269 


Well, no one thought that the Governor would go 
to see Heke, for we think that whoever goes first to 
the other, is the party who asks for peace. But the 
Governor did go to see Heke, and shook hands with 
him, but Heke has never gone to see the Governor; 
and now the war is over, and Heke is the greatest 
man in this Island, and will be Kine by-and-by. All 
the Europeans are afraid of him, and give him any- 
thing he asks for, or if they refuse he takes it, and no 
one dare say anything to him. 

Great is the courage of the Maori people! You 
have now heard how they made war against the 
noble people of England, and were not quite exter- 
minated, as many expected they would be. But 
Heke, their chief, is a very knowing man; he is 
learned even in European knowledge. I will tell 
you how he has become possessed of this knowledge, 
which enabled him to make war successfully against 
the soldiers. He has a European friend who has 
been a very great warrior —a very experienced 
warrior indeed. It was he who overcame the great 
soldier of France, Buonaparte, and afterwards in a 
great sea-fight he defeated and killed the great war- 
chief of England, Wellington.. Besides, he gained 
many other battles by sea and land, and he wrote all 
his wars in two books. Now, he lent Heke the first 
of these books to show him how to fight with the 
soldiers, which is the reason he has been so successful, 
but if he had had the second book he would have 
taken Auckland, and been King of New Zealand long 
ago; but he will get it by-and-by. I never saw this 


270 HEKDS WAL" iN Pas 


book, and Heke never shows it to any one, for he 
wants to keep all the knowledge to himself. Now, 
what are you laughing at? It is no use to tell me 
that Wellington is alive yet. Heke’s pakeha killed 
him long ago—before you were born, perhaps. You 
are only a young man; what do you know about it? 
The Wellington you mean is some other Wellington; 
but the great soldier Wellington, of England, was 
killed long ago by Heke’s pakeha. The Governor is 
not near so great a man as this friend of Heke’s, and 
is afraid of him.* 

This has been a great talk. What payment are 
you going to give me? Give me that bottle of rum. 
I am so thirsty with talking. Doi’t shake your 
head; I must haveit. Oh, how sweet rum is! There 
is nothing in the whole world so good. I know a 
pakeha, who says, if I will get him a big pot, and 
some old gun-barrels, he will show me how to make 
rum out of corn. Don’t take that bottle away. 
Come, give it me. You are a chief. Give me the 


' Hundreds of natives believed firmly in this absurd story 
before and during the war. In the present day (1861), when 
these notes are written, “ Young New Zealand” would only 
laugh at it. But formerly this and other equally ridiculous tales 


were not only believed but had very serious effects. Heke was - 


not the author of the story, but he found it to his hand, added 
the “‘ books” to it, and turned it to his account. His “ pakeha 
friend” is still extant, as well as the other “ pakeha” who en- 
deavoured to prevent Walker’s people from taking our part in 
the war, but they are not by any means such “ great men” as in 
the days when it was believed that one of them was the con- 
queror of both Wellington and Buonaparte! 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 271 


bottle. You are not afraid of the law. I ama great 
chief; J am not afraid of the law. I will make 
plenty of rum, and sell it to the pakeha, and get all 
their money, and I will have a house, and tables, and 
chairs, and all those sort of things for people to look 
at; and when the Governor comes to see me, I will 
scatter money all about the floor, so that when the 
Governor sees how much more money I have than he 
has, he will be quite ashamed, and think himself not 
near so great a chief as I am. I will have fifty 
pakeha servants, and they shall all work for me one 
day, and I will make them drunk the next for pay- 
ment, and the next day they shall work, and the next 
get drunk, and there shall not be a watch-house in 
the whole land.’ 

The bottle is empty, get me another. Do now. 
You are my friend. Give me the key! I will get it 
myself. You won’t! I will break open the door. I 
will tell the magistrate you have been giving me rum. 


1 This convivial scene with my friend the chief is no fiction, 
but a faithful relation, like everything else in this book, of what 
actually was said and done. It certainly does not come into the 
‘“‘ History of the War,” but is inserted just to give some idea of 
the state of things in the country districts, and the terms on 
which tho country settlers manage to exist with their native 
“friends.” The chief’s speculation in the distilling line is faith- 
fully given word for word, as he explained it to me. But it 
has never come to anything, for although he actually got the 
*‘ pakeha” to come to his place for the purpose of making “rum” 
out of corn, when he got him there he plucked him to such an 
extent, not leaving him even a blanket on his bed, that he ran 
for it, and the distillery in consequence came to naught. 


272 HEKH’S WAR IN THH 


You are a slave. You are all slaves. Your grand- 
fathers have all been put in the watch-house. You 
are afraid of the magistrate, the magistrate is afraid 
of the Governor, and the Governor is afraid of Heke. 
You want to rob us of our country, and to hang us 
up like dried sharks. You can’t. You are not able. 
You are cowards. You are a coward! Kapai Heke !* 
(Here exit Ngapuhi chief head-foremost on to the 
grass-plat before the door, and so ends the history of 
the war with Heke.) 


CONCLUSION. 


Next morning my friend the chief got up, and 
shook himself into shape, and begged a shirt and a 
pound of tobacco, neither of which I dare refuse him, 
and he then took himself off quietly. I have not 
seen him since, but received a letter from him the 
other day, beginning with, ‘‘ Great is my love to you,” 
and ordering me to send him by bearer one red 


1 Kapai Heke! tantamount to Vive Heke! Jn vino veritas—in 
his cups this stout defender of the pakeha lets out that he in 
reality is an admirer of Heke, and in another war would pro- ~ 
bably join him, being, as all the natives are, without any excep- 
tion, distrustful of the European, and suspecting we intend 
eventually to rob them of their country. I think their chief 
reason for this belief is that they themselves would treat us in 
that way were they able, they being all plunderers and maran- 
ders, both by nature and practice, and so “measure our corn in 
their own bushel.” 


NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND. 273 


blanket, and one cloth cap with a gold band, as he is 
going to Auckland to see the Governor, who he hopes 
to “talk” a horse and twenty pounds from, on the 
strength of his services during the war. Perhaps 
when he comes back he may tell me all about his 
journey, and what he said to the Governor, and what 
the Governor said to him, all of which I will write 
down in English, as I have this “ great talk,” which 
is all I am ever likely to get for my cap and blanket. 
It is to be hoped the story will be worth the cost. 


PNR 


Since the above was written, I am sorry to say that 
my old friend has departed this life. He was, with 
his brother, shot dead some years ago in a scufile 
about a piece of land. In justice to the memory of 
my old and respected friend I am bound to say, that, 
according to the very best native authorities, his title 


1 I am happy to be able to announce to the whole world that 
my friend the Ngapuhi chief has been to Auckland and returned 
safe bapk, having been extremely well received by the Governor. 
I have also to inform my friends that the chief has told me the 
whole story of his journey, leaving out nothing ; he has told me 
every word he said to the Governor, and every word the Gover- 
nor said to hin, all of which I have written in a book for the 
instruction and improvement of future ages, together with a 
plan of attack, whereby Auckland would, as he thinks, be taken, 
sacked, and burned, which this friend of mine made just to wile 
away the time when not engaged in paying his court to the 
Governor. I shall, however, reserve this last history till I see 
what fortune this my wakaka may have. 


7 


074 HEKE’S WAR IN NEW ZEALAND. 


to the land was perfectly clear and good. A sense of 
impartiality, however, forces me also to declare that 
the title of my other friend who shot him, is also as 
clear as the sun at noon; there can be no doubt of 
this. Both have clear undoubted pedigrees, which 
prove them directly descended from the “original 
proprietor.” The only point of any consequence 
which made against my friend’s title, was the circum- 
stance of his having been shot dead. ‘This has 
“made clear,” as I am bound to confess, the title of 
the other party, which now remains without a flaw. 
The only thing I see against them is the fact that, 
during the last seven years, their numbers have been 
much decreased by sickness, while it so happens that 
the sons of my old friend, and also his brother’s sons, 
have large families of stout, healthy-looking boys. 
Good native casuists, on whom I can place every 
reliance, tell me that posstely this may somehow or 
other affect the title of the others. I don’t know 
clearly how, for though I have studied “native 
tenure” for thirty years, I find I have even yet 
made but small progress. Indeed, I have lately 
begun to suspect that the subject is altogether of too 
complicated a nature for a European understanding. 
The only safe maxim I can give on native tenure, 
after all my study, is as follows:—Every native who 
is in actual possession of land, must be held to have a 
good title till some one else shows a better, by kicking 
him off the premises. 
PaxreHA Maori. 


GLOSSARY. 


Pace 2. 


negative answer to an inquiry, in which case 
the words mean that the thing inquired for is 
not, or in fact is nowhere. 


Pace 3. 


Mana—As the meaning of this word is explained in the course of the 
narrative, it is only necessary to say that in the sense in which it 
is used here, it means dominion or authority. 


Tangi—A. dirge, or song of lamentation for the dead. It was the 
custom for the mourners, when singing the tangi, to cut them- 
selves severely on the face, breast, and arms, with sharp flints 
and shells, in token of their grief. This custom is still practised, 
though in a mitigated form. In past times, the mourners cut 
themselves dreadfully, and covered themselves with blood from 
head to feet. See a description of a tangi further on. 


Pace 3. 


Pakeha—An Englishman ; a foreigner. 


Pacer 10. 


Tupara—A double gun; an article, in the old times, valued by the 
natives above all other earthly riches. 


276 GLOSSARY. 


Pace 11. 


Hahunga—A hahunga was a funeral ceremony, at which the natives 
usually assembled in great numbers, and during which “ baked 
meats” were disposed of with far less economy than Hamlet 
gives us to suppose was observed “ in Denmark.” 


Kainga—A native town, or village: their principal head-quarters. 


Pace 12, 


Haere mai! §¢.—Sufficiently explained as the native call of wel- 
come. It is literally an invitation to advance. 


Pace 15. 


Tutua—aA low, worthless, and, above all, a poor, fellow—a “ nobody.” 


Pace 16, 
A pakeha tutua—A mean, poor European. 


E aha te pai?—What is the good (or use) of him? Said in con- 
tempt. 
Pace 17. 


Rangatira—A chief, a gentleman, a warrior. Rangatira pakeha— 
A foreigner who is a gentleman (not a tutua, or nobody, as de- 
scribed above), a rich foreigner. 


Pace 18, 
Taonga—Goods ; property. 
Pace 21. 


Mere ponamu—aA native weapon made of a rare green stone, and 
much valued by the natives. 


Pace 22. 
Taniwha—A sea monster; more fuliy described further on. 


Utu—Revenge, or satisfaction ; also payment, 


Page 26. 


Tino tangata—A “ good man,” in the language of the prize-ring ; a 
warrior ; or literally, a very, or perfect man. 


eee eee ee 


GLOSSARY. 277 


Pace 36. 


Taua—A war party ; or war expedition. 


Pace 46. 


Tena koutou; or, Tenara ko koutou—The Maori form of salutation, 
equivalent to our ‘“‘ How do you do?” 


Pace +9. 


Na! Na! mate rawa!—This is the battle ery by which a warrior 
proclaims, exultingly and tauntingly, the death of one of the 


enemy. 
Pace 62. 


Torere.—An unfathomable cave, or pit, in the rocky mountains, where 
the bones of the dead, after remaining a certain time in the first 
burying place, are removed to and thrown in, and so finally dis- 
posed of. 

Pace 80. 


Eaha mau—What’s that to you? 


Pace 130. 
Jacky Poto.—Short Jack; or Stumpy Jack. 


PaeeE 131. 


Tu ngarahu.—this is a muster, or review, made to ascertain the 
numbers and condition of a native force; generally made before 
the starting of an expedition. It is, also, often held as a military 
spectacle, or exhibition, of the force of a tribe when they happen 
to be visited by strangers of importance: the war dance is gone 
through on these occasions, and speeches declaratory of war, or 
welcome, as the case may be, made to the visitors. The “ review 
of the Taniwha,” witnessed by the Ngati Kuri, was possibly a 
herd of sea lions, or sea elephants ; animals scarcely ever seen 
on the coast of that part of New Zealand, and, therefore, from 
their strange and hideous appearance, at once set down as an 
army of Taniwha. One man only was, at the defeat of the Ngati 
Kuri, on Motiti, rescued to tell the tale. 


278 | GLOSSARY. 


Pace 132. 


Bare Motiti—The island of Motiti is often called “ Motitt wahie kore,” 
as descriptive of the want of timber, or bareness of the island. 
A more fiercely contested battle, perhaps, was never fought than a 
that on Motiti, in which the Ngati Kuri were destroyed. 


Pace 149. 


Ki au te mataika—I have the mataika. The first man killed in a 
battle was called the mataika. To kill the mataika, or first 
man, was counted a very high honour, and the most extraordinary | 
exertions were made to obtain it. The writer once saw a young 
warrior, when rushing with his tribe against the enemy, rendered 


-_—~ 


almost frantic by perceiving that another section of the tribe 
would, in spite of all his efforts, be engaged first, and gain the 
honour of killing the mataika. In this emergency he, as he 
rushed on, cut down with a furious blow of his tomahawk, a sap- 
ling which stood in his way, and gave the ery which claims the 
mataika. After the battle, the circumstances of this question in 
Maori chivalry having been fully considered by the elder warriors, 
it was decided that the sapling tree should, in this case, be held 
to be the true mataika, and that the young man who cut it 


a ee ee 


down should always claim, without question, to have killed, or as y 
- the natives say “ caught,” the matacka of that battle. : 


Pace 152. 


Toa—A warrior of preéminent courage ; a hero. 


Pace 171. 


Kia Kotahi ki te ao! Kia kotahi ki te po !—A close translation would 
not give the meaning to the English reader. By these words 
the dying person is conjured to cling to life, but as they are 
never spoken until the person to whom they are addressed is 
actually expiring, they seemed to me to contain a horrid mockery, 
though to the native they no doubt appear the promptings of an 
affectionate and anxious solicitude. They are also supposed to 
contain a certain mystical meaning. 


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