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Old New Zealand: A Tale of the Good Old Times

by Frederick Edward Maning · English · Gutenberg #39361 · 464,635 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: Old New Zealand: A Tale of the Good Old Times

Author: Frederick Edward Maning


        
Release date: April 3, 2012 [eBook #39361]

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/39361

Credits: Produced by Jonathan Ingram, Christine P. Travers and the
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OLD NEW ZEALAND: A TALE OF THE GOOD OLD TIMES ***




Produced by Jonathan Ingram, Christine P. Travers and the
Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net









              OLD NEW ZEALAND,

       A TALE OF THE GOOD OLD TIMES;

                   and

        A HISTORY 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:
          RICHARD BENTLEY AND SON,
  Publishers in Ordinary to Her Majesty the Queen,
           NEW BURLINGTON STREET.
                   1876.




    CHISWICK PRESS: C. WHITTINGHAM, TOOKS COURT,
               CHANCERY LANE.




CONTENTS.

                                                                  Page

  Introduction                                                      ix

  Preface to the Original Edition                                xxiii

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
  dissertation on "Courage" -- A few words on Dress -- The Chief's
  Soliloquy -- The Maori Cry of Welcome                              1


CHAPTER II.

  The Market Price of a Pakeha -- The value of a Pakeha "as such"
  -- Maori Hospitality in the Good Old Times -- A Respectable
  Friend -- Maori Mermaids -- My Notions of the value of Gold --
  How I got on Shore                                                14


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" --
  Expectation 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                                                             24


CHAPTER 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                           52


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 Commissioners --
  The Triumphs of Eloquence -- Magna Charta                         60


CHAPTER 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             67


CHAPTER 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 Examples of the
  Muru -- Profit and Loss -- Explanation of some of the Workings
  of the Law of Muru                                                81


CHAPTER VIII.

  The Muru falling into Disuse -- Why -- Examples of the Tapu --
  The Personal Tapu -- Evading the Tapu -- The Undertaker's Tapu
  -- How I got Tabooed -- Frightful Difficulties -- How I got out
  of them -- The War Tapu -- Maori War Customs                      92


CHAPTER IX.

  The Tapu Tohunga -- The Maori Oracle -- Responses of the Oracle
  -- Priestcraft                                                   116


CHAPTER X.

  The Priest evokes a Spirit -- The Consequences -- A Maori
  Tragedy -- The "Tohunga" again                                   122


CHAPTER XI.

  The Local Tapu -- The Taniwha -- The Battle on Motiti -- Death
  of Tiki Whenua -- Reflections -- Brutus, Marcus Antonius, and
  Tiki Whenua -- Suicide                                           129


CHAPTER XII.

  The Tapa -- Instances of -- The Storming of Mokoia -- Pomare --
  Hongi Ika -- Tareha -- Honour amongst Thieves                    137


CHAPTER XIII.

  "My Rangatira" -- The respective Duties of the Pakeha and his
  Rangatira -- Public Opinion -- A "Pakeha Kino" -- Description 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   140


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                     165


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                                                           174


  HISTORY OF THE WAR IN THE NORTH OF NEW ZEALAND AGAINST THE CHIEF
  HEKE                                                             181




INTRODUCTION.


In the good old times of Conquest and Colonization (I like to be
particular about my dates and places), the civilized 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 themselves 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 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 civilized 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 preserved,
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,[1] who having satisfied
the more pressing demands 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_ and
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 unhung.[2]

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

[Footnote 2: I regret to say that the strict propriety (according to
the received code of that day) with which the Poverty-Bay massacre,
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 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 scandalous. I forget what punishment was awarded him: let us hope
he got what he deserved; and may this story be a warning 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.]

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 enlightened 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 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 extravagances 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 was a 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 success it must have
been founded on a thorough understanding of the native character. It
is no use making signs to a 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 Carelessness all contributed
their quota to the mischief, and their favourite blunder consisted in
jumping at conclusions concerning native character from certain
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 versa_, or that qualities which marked the presence
of certain other qualities in the Englishman 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 singing 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 Englishmen were
entirely absent.[3] When Christianity spread through the tribes with
amazing rapidity, we rejoiced over their capability for accepting the
doctrines of high and pure religion, never perceiving that they
accepted it simply because they thought from our superiority in ships,
arms, tools, and material prosperity in general, that the "Mana"
(_i.e._, 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 Englishman, blind to the fact that the chief simply liked
fighting as we might like eating or sleeping, and furnished his enemy
with arms and ammunition just as we might furnish one's cook with
money to buy meat with.[4]

[Footnote 3: 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 (_i.e._ a white man who lives amongst the Maories) on the
subject of missionary labour. At last he said, "I'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 a long start of him, and moreover _was the best fighting
man_ of the two, which went a long way. In a short 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 a 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 speaking of, outrun our
elders, and been nearly decimated in consequence? 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 myself, my
worthy converts, who philosophically and rightly looked upon religion
merely as a means to an end (_i.e._ killing the greatest possible
quantity of enemies), were unable to produce 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."]

[Footnote 4: 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 forwarded 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 untried. Chief number one was insulted, and declared that
if chief number two had not known his superiority in arms and
ammunition, 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 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 instinctively
upon fighting as the chief object in life. 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 him, it is not hard to imagine.]

By radical misconceptions, such as these, we 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 understand, and with
practical examples that he interpreted 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 goodwill 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 striking 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
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 an end. 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
impressed 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
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; so that (if that public wishes, as I
believe it does, to manage the races with whom England comes in
contact, 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 knowledge 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 complexion are not all like either those white
men who seem to have got into brown or black skins by mistake, whom
one reads about in anti-slavery books and some missionary reports, or
those equally tiresome black dummies whom one reads about in another
sort of book who have no marked characteristic 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 amusement than instruction that they
will be amply repaid by their perusal.

I hope the Pakeha Maori will pardon my impertinence 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. 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 opposite of what one would
expect of a man who had lived since his boyhood among savages. With a
real 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.




PREFACE TO THE ORIGINAL EDITION.


To the English reader, and to most of those who have arrived in New
Zealand 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 fiction. The different scenes and
incidents are given exactly as they occurred, and all the persons
described 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 unlike a civilised people or British
subjects.

The writer has therefore thought it might be 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."




OLD NEW ZEALAND.




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
     dissertation on "courage." -- A few words on dress. -- The
     chief's soliloquy. -- The Maori cry of welcome.


Ah! 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 somehow. 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
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 I? 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. I am a melancholy man. I feel somehow
as if I had got older. I am no use 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 I 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 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 trampling on your
landmarks. He mocks the war-song; but should _I_ see your fall, at
least one Pakeha Maori shall raise the _tangi_; 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, I 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 unaccountable 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 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
_bienseance_. They lived in a half savage state, or to speak
correctly, 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 impressions on seeing the mass of shouting,
gesticulating, tattooed fellows, who were exhibiting before us, and
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
particulars; 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 sincerity.) 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 understood 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 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 _terra 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
cannot 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 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 return 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
perseverance. 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--"The better part of
valour is discretion." 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 perhaps, 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
_eclat_ 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
appearance 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 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 appearances--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 representative 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--I 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 retired, in
consequence of the enlightenment he at different 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 natives," and cause awe and
respect for myself individually 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 attention 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 person? 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 combined 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 must
have this; I must _tapu_ 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 selling them before I knew he
had them. It's just the same as thieving, and I won't stand it. He
sold 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 Ngatiwaki 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 Ngatiwaki are
our relations, but then there was Kohu, we killed, and Patu, we stole
his wife. There is no saying what these Ngatiwaki may do if they
should get plenty of muskets; they are game enough for anything. 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
"pots" 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, however, 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 mai, e-te-pa-ke-ha, haere mai!_" mats, hands, and certain ragged
petticoats put into requisition for that occasion, all at the same
time waving in the air in sign of welcome. Then a pause. Then, as the
boat came nearer, another burst of _haere mai!_ 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 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 mai_" might not be the Maori for "dilly,
dilly, come and be killed." There was, however, no help for it now; we
were close to the shore, and so, putting on the most unconcerned
countenance possible, I prepared to make my _entree_ into Maori land
in a proper and dignified manner.




Chapter II.

     The market price of a Pakeha. -- The value of a Pakeha "as such."
     -- Maori hospitality in the good old times. -- A respectable
     friend. -- Maori mermaids. -- My notions of the value of gold. --
     How I got on shore.


Here I must remark that in those days the value of a pakeha to a tribe
was enormous. For want of pakehas to trade with, and from whom to
procure gunpowder and muskets, many tribes or sections of tribes were
about this time exterminated or nearly so by their more fortunate
neighbours who got pakehas before them, and who consequently became
armed with muskets first. A pakeha trader was therefore of a value say
about twenty times his own weight in muskets. This, according to my
notes made at the time, I find to have represented a value in New
Zealand something about what we mean in England when we talk of the
sum total of the national debt. A book-keeper, or a second-rate
pakeha, not a trader, might be valued at say his weight in tomahawks;
an enormous sum also. The poorest labouring pakeha, though he might
have no property, would earn something--his value to the chief and
tribe with whom he lived might be estimated 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. Two men of this description (runaway 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:
what could be made of him? Of what use on earth was he except to eat?
And, indeed, not much good even for that--they say he was not good
meat. But good well-to-do pakehas, traders, ship captains, labourers,
or employers of labour, these were to be honoured, cherished,
caressed, protected, and plucked. Plucked judiciously, (the Maori is a
clever fellow in his way,) so that the feathers might grow again. But
as for poor, mean, mere, _Pakeha tutua,--e aha te pai?_

Before going any farther I beg to state that I hope the English reader
or the new-comer, who does not understand Maori morality--especially
of the glorious old time--will not form a bad opinion of my friend's
character, merely because he eat a good-for-nothing sort of pakeha,
who really was good for nothing else. People from the old countries I
have often observed to have a kind of over-delicacy about them, the
result of a too effeminate course of life and over-civilization, which
is the cause that, often starting from premises which are true enough,
they will, being carried away by their over-sensitive constitution or
sickly nervous system, jump at once, without any just process of
reasoning, to the most erroneous conclusions. I know as well as can be
that some of this description of my readers will at once, without
reflection, set my friend down as a very rude, ill-mannered sort of
person. Nothing of the kind, I assure you, Miss. You never made a
greater mistake in your life. My friend was a highly respectable
person in his way; he was a great friend and protector of rich,
well-to-do pakehas; he was, moreover, a great warrior, and had killed
the first man in several different battles. He always wore, hanging
round his neck, a handsome carved flute, (this at least showed a soft
and musical turn of mind,) which was made of the thigh-bone of one of
his enemies; and when Heke, the Ngapuhi, made war against us, my
friend came to the rescue, fought manfully for his pakeha friends, and
was desperately wounded in so doing. Now can any one imagine a more
respectable character?--a warrior, a musician, a friend in need, who
would stand by you while he had a leg to stand on, and would not eat a
_friend_ on any account whatever, except he should be very hungry.

The boat darts on; she touches the edge of a steep rock; the "_haere
mai_" has subsided; six or seven "personages"--the magnates of the
tribe--come gravely to the front to meet me as I land. There is about
six or seven yards of shallow water to be crossed between the boat and
where they stand. A stout fellow rushes to the boat's nose, and "shows
a back," as we used to say at leap-frog. He is a young fellow of
respectable standing in the tribe, a far-off cousin of the chief's, a
warrior, and as such has no back; that is to say, to carry loads of
fuel or potatoes. He is too good a man to be spoiled in that way; the
women must carry for him; the able-bodied men of the tribe must be
saved for its protection; but he is ready to carry the pakeha on
shore--the _rangatira pakeha_, who wears a real _koti roa_, (a long
coat,) and 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 multitude, 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 firma_ 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 surface; 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 _Veni 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 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, properly 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 matter--how did I, in the
first instance, become possessed 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,
consequently, 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, upon the 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 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, and what more can any
one desire? So now Adam Smith, McCulloch, and all the rest of them may
go and be hanged. The whole upshot of this treatise on political
economy and golden hair, (which I humbly lay at the feet of 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 beautiful 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 situation:"--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 "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 direction. 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 I?--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 _utu_ I heard roared by many voices, but did not then
know its import. The pakeha was drowning the Maori for _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 unnecessarily 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." -- Expectation 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
hat, 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, elbowing 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 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 _can_ he mean?" said I. "He is challenging you to
wrestle," cried one of the Englishmen; "he wants _utu_." "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 a
ring. 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 antagonist 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 wearing him
out, and avoiding his _ta_ and _wiri_. All this time the mob were
shouting encouragement to one or other of us. Such a row never was
seen. I soon perceived I had a "party." "Well done, pakeha!" "Now for
it, Melons!" "At him again!" "Take care, the pakeha is a _taniwha_;
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. I 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 welcomed 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 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 fellow, in the prime of life, black with
tattooing, and splendidly dressed, according to the splendour of those
days. He has on a very 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 surrounding 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 oration, 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
sentence; 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 exhausted the subject and tired his legs. The
Englishmen 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 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 with a 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
_utu_. (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 _koti
roa_?--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
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 republican, 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 gunpowder into the cartridges with
his hand, and smoking 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 filling 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 I 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. 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 delectable days, now, alas! passed and
gone. Some short time after this, news came that a grand war
expedition, 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, however, had afterwards been formally made; but,
nevertheless, the news of the return of this expedition was not heard
without causing a sensation almost amounting 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 village, 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 fortress 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, knocking down houses inside the place, clearing away
brushwood and fern all around the outside within musket shot. I 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 lashing 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, passing the end of the
_toro-toro_ from one to the other through the fence of large upright
stakes and round a cross piece which 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
permitting, 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-a-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 dying wild bull. Babel, with a dash of Pandemonium, 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 explaining to me
the design of the whole. I learned something 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 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 preparation.

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 considerably from the forest to the
fort, the whole intervening space was clearly visible.

Another night of alarm and sleepless expectation, the melancholy moan
of the _tetere_ 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 diabolical 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. Anxious glances are turning from all quarters
towards 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 _taua_ 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 _taua_ still comes steadily on. As I
have said, the men are all stripped for action, but I also notice that
the appearance 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 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 _taua_ 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, heavy-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. Instead 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.

The mimic opposition is now discontinued; the outpost rushes in at
full speed, the men firing their guns in the air as they run. _Takini!
takini!_ is the cry, and out spring three young men, the best runners
of our tribe, to perform the ceremony of the _taki_. They hold in
their hands some reeds to represent 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 unexpected 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 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," (_Tai Haruru_) for the "Black
Cloud," (_Kapua Mangu_) 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, "Sounding 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 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 before their faces, in the
manner already described. The _elite_ 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 beginning to wonder what will be
the end of all this; and also to speculate on the efficacy 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 herculean 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 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 Maorified,) starting from the ground like
a single man, endeavoured to outdo even their amiable friends'
exhibition. They end; then the new-comers 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! 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 I have described. Part,
however, of the "_impedimenta_" 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 nearest they had been to each other was thirty yards
when the war dancing was going on, and they seemed 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 from the
oven. The groundwork of this feast appeared 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 seated, our chief advanced towards him, fell upon his neck
embracing him in the most affectionate manner, commenced a _tangi_, 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 this, however, both these chiefs were dead, and others reigned
in their stead. While the _tangi_ 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 _tangi_ 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 greenstone _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 interesting, 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 determined 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 do I 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, to a 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 something
bold and defiant about the whole air of the head. Another was the head
of a very old man, 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 than ordinary. "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 his own "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?" says I. "That's just it," says he. "_Capital_
felony!" says I. "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 involuntarily 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 number of women were
standing in a row before it, screaming, wailing, and quivering their
hands about in a most extraordinary manner, and cutting themselves
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 upwards to her left shoulder, the
spouting blood following as it went; then from the left shoulder
downwards, 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 conceived. 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.

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 scratching 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 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, however, hope to be excused for the last two or three 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
Frenchmen, hail! (A bit of fine writing does one good.) Nestling under
thy wing, I will scrape sharp the point of my spear with a _pipi_
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 IV.

     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.


Pakehas, though precious in the good old times, would sometimes get
into awkward scrapes. Accidents, I have 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 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 gunpowder"--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
gunpowder! who ever heard of such an awful imposition? 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 hesitate: 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 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 massacre--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 daylight 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 shouting
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
perceived at a glance that the faithful old creature would probably
save a sleeve. A long line of similar articles, my property, which
had graced the _taiepa_ 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 behind, by a fellow who seemed to be about
as strong as a 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 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 carrying 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
assailants 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 commander;
"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 broadside of a three-decker). Bang! The elevation was perfectly
correct. The shot struck the water at 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 _taua 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 connected 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 _tika_ (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 inform 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 does not matter, as I shall add a
"glossary," in Coptic, 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 arguments 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--_his_ 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.

After this the land about which this little misunderstanding 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 commissioners.
     -- The triumphs of eloquence. -- Magna Charta.


"Every Englishman'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 present 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 different 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, declared 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, _i.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 grandfather had been murdered on the land, and--as I am a
veracious pakeha--another claimed payment because _his_ 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 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 boundaries 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 ever 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 _wahi 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 gunpowder 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.

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 impossible 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.

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 informed 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 disparagement 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
or a 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 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.
Besides 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
shillings 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 I had thoughts of doing, the commissioners would not
have minded examining them all. They were, I 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 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 it."




Chapter 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.


I 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 housekeeping. My house was a
good commodious _raupo_ building; and as I had a 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 as much more. Their duties were not heavy; being chiefly to
amuse themselves fishing, wrestling, shooting pigeons, or pig-hunting,
with an occasional pull in the boat when I went on a water excursion.
Besides 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 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. At a time, however,
and in a country like New Zealand, where every man was a fighting man
or nothing, these desperadoes, sooner or later, came to grief, being
at last invariably shot, or run through the body, by some sturdy
freeholder, whose rights they had invaded. 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; threatened 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 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 potentate--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--committed 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 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 unquestionably
"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 friends 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
out if I dare. That was his meaning--there was no mistaking it.

I have all my life been an admirer of the _suaviter 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 _suaviter in modo_ can be combined with the
_fortiter in re_. They in fact can't understand it for some reason
perfectly inexplicable to me. It was, however, quite a matter of
indifference, I could perceive, how I should open proceedings 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." He seemed 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, however, with my friend. It shook
him, certainly, a 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 without 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, I 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 furniture 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. I, 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 lightning he snatched at a
large carving fork which, unperceived by me, was lying on the floor
amongst the smashed furniture and _debris_ 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 conquered. 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 helpless 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 afterwards 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 antagonist. 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 chattels, 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 concealed under the _whariki_, 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 however 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 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 great _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, considering 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."

"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 enormously disproportionate outlay of labour in its
construction, and, in consequence, became precious to a degree
scarcely conceivable by people of civilised and wealthy countries.
This great value attached to personal property of all kinds,
increased proportionately 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 hundred men
on a distant expedition, through the boisterous seas surrounding their
island.

As a consequence of their warlike habits and character, they are
self-possessed and confident in themselves and their own powers, and
have much diplomatic 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 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 dangerous 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 institutions, new habits of life, new ideas, sentiments, and
information,--whom we must either civilise or by our mere contact
exterminate. How is this to be done?[5] Let me see. I think I shall
answer this question when I am prime minister.

[Footnote 5: PRINTER'S DEVIL:--How is _this_ to be done?--_which?_
_what?_--how?--_civilise_ or _exterminate_? PAKEHA MAORI:--_Eaha
mau!_]




Chapter 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 Examples of the
     Muru. -- Profit and loss. -- Explanation of some of the workings
     of the law of Muru.


The natives have been for fifty years or more in a continual state of
excitement on one subject or another, which has had a markedly bad
effect on their character and physical condition, as I shall by-and-by
take occasion to point out. When the first straggling ships came here
the smallest bit of iron was a prize so inestimable that I might be
thought to exaggerate 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 _iron_ 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
forgotten, and would continue long to be the subject of anxious
expectation and speculation.

After this, regular trading began. The great madness 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
neighbours, 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, particularly 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 "the Maori difficulty" without having been paid for it,
which would have been a great oversight, and contrary to the customs
of New Zealand. I 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, however, crept into this
system--so great, indeed, as to render the retention of any sort of
moveable property almost an impossibility, and to, in a great measure,
discourage the inclination to labour for its acquisition. These great
inconveniences were, however, met, or in some degree softened, by an
expedient 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 ceremony 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 intended, 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 distraints
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 disgraceful in the highest degree, _but it would have
debarred 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 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 by a 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 illustrating
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 one or another if attacked. But
this is of no consequence; 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 in a 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; it
is 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 relations. 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 _taua_ 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 circumstances. 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 intended to exterminate all before them, the _kai
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 instantly 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! 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 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
purchaser; 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 shouting, "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
consequences; 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,
made some smart bangs and thrusts, which I parried, and then
explained to me that I had "cooked his grandfather;" 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 grandfather," 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 perceive 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 neighbours, 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 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 consequence 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, however, to an English
lawyer, may require some explanation, 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 with it. 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 companions--_i.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 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 unpunished; the murderer
in general managing to escape to some other section of the tribe where
he had relations, who, as he fled to them for protection, were bound
to give it, and always ready to do so; or otherwise 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 enforcing 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 unpunished. The Government ask for him to be given
up, the tribe refuse, and there is an end of the matter.--Pembroke.]




Chapter VIII.

     The Muru falling into disuse. -- Why? -- Examples of the Tapu. --
     The personal Tapu. -- Evading the Tapu. -- The undertaker's Tapu.
     -- How I got tabooed. -- Frightful difficulties. -- How I got out
     of them. -- The war Tapu. -- Maori war customs.


The law of _muru_ is now but little used, and only on a small scale.
The degenerate men of the present day in general content themselves
with asking "payment," and 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,
especially 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 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 shorthand 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 present 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 is 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 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 considerable 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 ordinary _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 everything 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. 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 punishment 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 punishment 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, _if_
one, who had sufficient resolution to dare the shadowy terrors of the
_tapu_. I actually have seen an instance where the offender, though an
involuntary 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 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 _tapu_ 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 unconsumed. 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 ammunition 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
remained behind when the _taua_ had moved on--of the fatal act he had
committed. I 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.) 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 inability 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
effective 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 restraint was sometimes very
troublesome and inconvenient. A man of any standing could not carry
provisions 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 useless--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 rubbing
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 _tapu_ was perhaps 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 appropriate 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 infected 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, supposing him to be of a hospitable and obliging
disposition, 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, 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 bystanders, and
been set down as a _tutua_--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 _tapu_ would even hold its own in some cases
against the _muru_, though not in a sufficiently general manner to
seriously affect the operation of that well-enforced law. Its
inconveniences were, on the other hand, many, and the expedients
resorted to to avoid them were sometimes comical 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 go on. We were beginning to think we must
give up the expedition 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 (_pikau_) the provisions, we
will _hiki_ them." (_Hiki_ 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
_hiki'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 so, having thus evaded the law, we
started on our expedition.

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 _tohunga_, or that other
form of _tapu_ 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 _hiki_ and
_pikau_ 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 dangerous to them.

The other instance of dodging the law was as follows:--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 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! I 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, _infected_ 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 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
admiring 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 _tapu_ was fairly
beaten! No one could say he was _in_ 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 was the _tapu_ of those who
handled the dead, or conveyed 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 bedeviling 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 immunity 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 inconveniences of the _tapu_, as well as
its dangers. One of these people might be easily recognized, after a
little experience, even by a pakeha. Old, withered, haggard, clothed
in the most miserable rags, daubed all over from head to foot with red
paint (the native 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 tuft 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 requires, 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
_tapu'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 word
"excommunication" means, and I did not understand what it meant till I
got _tapu'd_. I was returning 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 without
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 longer 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 _kai tango atua_ or undertakers are wont to do. I had,
however, no idea of any such proceeding; and pulling out my knife
proceeded 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, in 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
command 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 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 welcome, 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 eatable 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 I have anything more to do with cooking? 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!" 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 _materiel_
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 _tapu_ 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 advanced towards the kitchen, which was detached from
the house, and which, in the late deplorable 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 gesticulating 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 kai mau_." I of course accepted the
offered food, took a bite, and as I ate he mumbled his incantation
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 but
believing member of the Church of England as by Parliament
established, "knuckling down" abjectly to the ministration of a
ferocious old cannibal, wizard, sorcerer, high priest,--as it appeared
very probable,--to Satan himself. "Blacken his remaining eye! knock
him over and run the country!" whispered quite plainly in 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 desperate danger; but just in those moments the
ceremony, 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 presence 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 everything." 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. Out I 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 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 necromantic 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 imaginable cause. "Boy," said he, gravely and quietly, and
without seeming to notice my very noticeable declaration of war and
independence, "don't act foolishly; don't go mad. No one will ever
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
Hurlothrumbo there, I yield--so here goes." Let me not dwell upon the
humiliating concession to the powers of _tapu_. Suffice it to say, I
disrobed, and received 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 performing 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 considerable 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 flocking 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 considered 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 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 enemies, 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.


Then came the _tapu tohunga_, or priest's _tapu_, a quite different
kind or form of _tapu_ from those which I have spoken of. These
_tohunga_ presided o

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