Chancellor of the
Notes
on
Early Life in New Zealand.
by
.
George Clarke
Robert:
1.
Walch and Sons, Printers, 43 Macquarie Street.
1903.
Preface.
This little book is personal and provisional. These Notes on an early chapter of my life were written ten years ago for the information of family friends, and were not intended for publication. They had to be egoistic to serve their purpose, but I thought they were too much so for general circulation. They are, however, charged with the historical element, from one who was not only behind those early scenes, but who took some effective part in them. They are at any rate the testimony of a witness at first hand, and it seems a pity to throw them into the waste basket of general oblivion. They may be of some little value in the coming years, just as they stand, if the readers only know that they are a family record. I leave my children to dispose of them as they please.
31st March, 1903
Mr. Clarke's little book, “Notes on Early Life in New Zealand,” was printed for private circulation, but as others besides his more intimate friends might like to obtain a copy, he has given us permission to dispose of a limited number as if they were published. He writes us:—“At eighty, I suppose I am about the only old man left who can tell of those early days of Maoriland from direct and personal knowledge.”
By the time a man has lived in this world for seventy years, I think he ought to have become interesting to some one. And if such a life should nearly all have been passed in these Southern lands, he ought to have a story that is worth the telling. And if he happens to be a minister who has been long in the same place, you need not suspect him of inordinate vanity, if he supposes that he himself, more than the public interests with which he had to do, may be rather interesting to his friends. It is with such a combination of claims that I venture to give you a very personal address to-night. In truth, I shrink, as much as most men, from talking about myself in public, but I am here under a sort of pressure. The story I am urged to tell cannot be told at all, in a way to hold your attention, without making myself the centre of the narration. I extract it from a selection of notes that were prepared to please my own family, and they allow me discretion to take from them what I think is within the limits of propriety.
Many friends tell me that one who has been at the beginning of such things as I have seen, may be allowed to say what in other circumstances might well be kept to the knowledge of one's more intimate circle, and, therefore, in deference to their wishes, I have consented to give you an account of what I had to do with the early history of New Zealand. I do it humbly, and with no disposition to show myself other than I actually was, but I know that, for good or evil, I had very much to do with the making of New Zealand history, and with bringing Maori and Pakeha to terms of mutual understanding.
The New Zealand of to-day is one of the fairest and most flourishing colonies of the British Empire, and I can simply say
About the year 1800, English whalers and scalers began to frequent the coast of New Zealand. The Maoris were anxious to procure firearms, and many of them, fond of adventure, shipped as sailors, for the chance of getting them. These men visited Sydney, and, in most cases, were tolerably treated, in some with great violence and injustice. There was a Bay of Islands Chief, named Ruatara, who, in the course of his wanderings, visited England under promise that he should be presented to the King. On arriving, however, in London, he was shamefully treated, and thrust ashore without wages, to shift for himself, and he nearly died from neglect and illness. By some means passage to Sydney was obtained for him in the convict transport, the “Ann,” and with nothing but a few rags on his back, he went on board, and sailed to the far South—that was in the year 1810.
Among the passengers on board the “Ann,” was the
Five English whalers, shortly after the “Boyd” massacre, visited the Bay of Islands, and under the mistaken impression that a Chief named not take part in the massacre. Not long after, a neighbouring tribe, in sheer exasperation at the slaughter of
The intercourse of the whalers and the natives for the next four years was very troubled; there was much treachery and bloodshed on both sides, and Governor Macquarie tried by proclamation and by exacting heavy bonds from all ships going from Sydney to New Zealand, to stay the horrors that were done. Mr. Marsden, the Colonial Chaplain, and the founder of the New Zealand mission, represented strongly to the C. M. Society the growing evils of the traffic, and commended the intelligence of the natives and the possibility of teaching them Christian and civilized ways. In answer to his importunity, two laymen, Messrs, Hall and King, were at length sent out, and
In September, 1822, my father and mother arrived at Hobart, in the “Heroine,” as missionaries, on their way to Sydney, and from thence to New Zealand. Hopkins, Mather, G. C. Clarke (well remembered by some of us but no relation of the family), Walker, Worthy, Barrett, and other well-known Tasmanian colonists were fellow passengers. My father went on to Sydney and was detained at Paramatta for over a year, no opportunity offering of getting to the Bay of Islands. During this time he had charge of the establishment of Aborigines at Black Town, and it was during his sojourn there, that the speaker made his first appearance in this troubled world, at Parramatta, 29th June, 1823. There is one dear old friend among us who I know from hearsay, though I daresay she has forgotten it, used to go with her mother to see my mother, and, as a very little girl, found pleasure in occasionally nursing the baby. I refer to Mrs. Sprent, daughter of Mrs. Oakes, the first-born of Australian children.
Some time in 1824 my father embarked on board a French corvette, “La Coquine,” under the command of Captain (afterwards Admiral). D'Urville, the celebrated circumnavigator. Many years afterwards I met the first Lieutenant Barrard (I think then Commodore) at the French settlement at Akaroa, who told me that I was such a nuisance with my squalling, that more than once the officers were on the point of pitching me overboard. He was glad now that they had not done it.
On arrival at the Bay of Islands, the parents and the baby went up an arm on the western side of the bay, some fifteen miles long to the Keri Keri, the new station that had just been formed by Messrs, Buller & Kemp.
At that time there was a population of many thousands of Maoris on either side of the inlet, where all is silent and deserted now.
The Keri Keri was the headquarters of the Chief, Hongi, or, according to his full name, now throw a stone a quarter of the way across the basin, but it once seemed to me as great a spread of water as the widest part of the Derwent between Hobart and the Iron Pot.
I have visited it several times since, and the contrast between my earliest and latest impressions is like looking at a landscape, first through one end of a telescope, and then through the other.
I have never heard such music as the sound of the waterfall near which our house was built. The entrance to this basin from the sea is by a channel like the three sides of the letter Z, and you see nothing of the enclosure until you turn the corner and find yourself in it. Just at the entrance, on the side of the basin opposite to our house, was Hongi's famous pah Kororipo, surrounded on three sides by water, and guarded on the land side by long stretches of mangrove swamp that no enemy could cross. It was also defended by a deep fosse, and a strong stockade. There was a perfect network of pits and palisade ways inside. It is all gone now, except the remains of the
Let me try and give you some idea of this Maori fortress, as I knew it in its strength. It was a double stockade of upright posts from fifteen to eighteen feet high, with a chain of pits between the two fences, and another chain of pits inside the second of them. The posts at the angles, and at certain intermediate distances, were, in fact, logs about two feet in diameter, the intervals being split logs, and they were surmounted by grotesque and carved hideous human figures, mostly head, with goggle eyes and protruding tongues, all looking outward as if in defiance of any hostile approach. So far as the faces are concerned, I have seen something like them in old English buildings. They have their counterpart in the gargoyles or projecting waterspouts which the old monks delighted to carve into contorted and agonised griffins, and dwarfs, and devils, squeezed down by the roof and struggling out of the super-incumbent weight that seemed to crush them. In the centre of the stockade was the ware puni, the Chief's state house. It was a wonderful specimen of Maori art. The beams and rafters inside were stained red, and were elaborately carved throughout after the general pattern of the moko or tatoo on a chieftain's face. The wooden posts which supported the ridge-pole were human figures after the manner of the osiride pillars in an Egyptian temple, or the caryatides round the temple of Poseidon, at Athens, though of course they were in wood, and far ruder in execution than the works of even the remotest Egyptian antiquity. I have seen many such chiefs' houses since, but none at all approaching the ware puni of Hongi for its elaborate decorations and carvings. Such specimens of Maori architecture have long since disappeared, and the fragments of carving that one sometimes meets with in museums give but a very poor notion of what was common enough in my early days. I could not have been more than five years old
I hope you will be tolerant, but my childish recollections of the Keri Keri must necessarily take the form of prattle, and yet they are the recollections of such things as go to the making of every man's particular life. It was a time when fishing for sprats and eels seemed the noblest occupation of humanity. I had to do most of my fishing with bent pins which, in those days were so precious a commodity, that if the stock ran out you had to send to Sydney for more, and were very lucky if you could renew your supply within three months of the order.
I had no difficulty at all in believing that “it was a sin to steal a pin.” A real fish-hook was a rare treasure, and it made me as happy as a king. No prohibition would keep me from the water. I have a lively recollection of squatting on a stone (it has been maliciously suggested that it was a Sunday) in the act of hauling in a small eel. When I was hitched by the slack of my lower garments behind and pitched head over heels into the river by a newly arrived priggish old missionary puritan, whom to this day I have never forgiven, but my dear mother thought it a shame, and told my tormentor so, and she gave me more indulgence in consequence of my ducking.
I have a faint recollection of the death of Hongi. Some time in 1827 he made an expedition to Wangaroa to settle a quarrel in which he was involved with a closely related tribe, and was shot through the lungs in a skirmish. Immediately afterwards the Wesleyan station at Wangaroa was plundered and burnt, and the fugitives, among whom were the late
I was about five years old, but I can remember joining the rest of our people, carried on my nurse's back, and crossing the river to meet the jaded and fugitive travellers, and bring them to our house. What struck me most was Mrs. Turner—it could have been no one else—with bare and bleeding feet, and but poorly and shiveringly clad. I am not sure, but I think
The years 1827–8 were times of great peril to the missionaries. Hongi died. My father and Mr. Kemp determined to hold on to their post, but made an arrangement secretly to send off the wives and children to the Bay of Islands. For some days before my little head had been puzzling over mysterious hiding and burying of things, and I fancied that if I only had leave to hunt, I might find all sorts of treasures in secret places. Indeed the notion clung to me for many years afterwards, and even last time I was in New Zealand (a pretty oldish man), as I wandered over the old house, I noted what I long ago used to consider the most likely places for a treasure quest—under the stairs, down the cellar, under the hearthstone, in the lining of the walls, and so on. It is hard to reproduce those old sensations.
I was not much over four years old, but I remember a time between midnight and morning, being lifted out of my cot and told to be very still. In the dim light of a lantern I saw my poor mother enveloped in a cloak, and quietly sobbing, then father wrapping me in a thick blanket, and taking me in his arms, they crept stealthily out of the house and made their way in the starlight to a boat, with muffled oars, under the rock, Mother, and I and baby Sam, were deposited in the stern sheets and we glided silently to the entrance, and passed the sleeping pah, beyond which I can say nothing of my own knowledge, though I have been told that we went on to Paihia, in the Bay. Hongi died commending the missionaries to the care of his people, and his last words were: “Be brave! Be brave!” The
I think I began to learn to read very early, and I can still remember the lesson books I conned when three or four years old. One was a great favourite, which I learnt by heart, for I was a child of one book, as most of us were in those times. It had a fine, clear print, and my favourite lesson began, “Hark! it is the huntsman's horn,” &c. The other, a more advanced book, would hardly pass with the Board of Education. One sentence ran: “It is wicked to look at the sun, and to point at it with the finger,” and my conscience was greatly exercised to find out wherein the wickedness lay. I began learning
It must have been soon after our flight, on the eve of Hongi's death (1828), that the Rev. that was the first of our sweet English roses that ever bloomed in New Zealand. Then, too, by way of improving the occasion, I had to learn a hymn beginning—
that, I don't think I have seen for over sixty years, but I have not quite forgotten it yet.
In the end of 1828 the first missionary “Huihuinga,” or gathering of their adherents, was held at Paihia. The missionaries of all the stations, their families, and their Maori followers, all came together and had examinations and services, and kept high festival. I remember, because the Rev.
Our parents did the best they could to keep us out of the sights and sounds of Maori savagery, and though the knocking of unfortunate slaves and prisoners of war on the head, and then putting them in the oven, was an every day occurrence around us, especially at the pah opposite, and on the return of a war expedition, I never, as a child, saw an actual murder, but I have watched the war canoes on their return from fighting expeditions with loads of backed humanity and crowds of unfortunate prisoners, who were jsut as likely as not to be massacred on landing by any of the fierce men or fiercer women who had lost father or son, brother or husband, in the battle. One evening when a fleet of war canoes returned with a score of
The murderous expeditions, begun by Hongi, kept up the supply, and the Maoris had not yet learned to be in the least ashamed of it. Even in times of peace it was not possible to escape the sight.
Many of the missionaries' servants were, in fact, war slaves, and it was often anxious work to keep them out of their owners' hands.
Fortunately, from the very beginning of their intercourse with the Maoris, the missionaries managed to keep the interior of their houses sacred from all intruders. Wild Maoris might cluster like bees at the windows, and flatten their noses on the glass in trying to see what was going on within, but they never entered a room without invitation. I fancy that there was some superstitious fear of the consequences of intrusion almost equivalent to a violation of their own tapu; at any rate, it often served us in good stead. Many a time when some cannibal friend was known to be prowling about the village, my mother has locked a poor slave girl in her room, or put a man
his fathers. No doubt in some cases it did develope into a real unsophisticated appetite for human flesh, but I think that such cases were altogether rare and exceptional.
At this time (1828) Maoris of the highest rank did not disdain to enter into a qualified service of the missionaries, prompted by the desire of learning our ways. Harriet, the daughter of
My mother used to tell of her first batch of bread at the Keri Keri. After it was made, she put it into a portable oven and set a very great young lady to watch it. In due time she told the girl to take it out and bring it into the pantry. She brought something like an ill-cooked batter pudding, steaming with an intolerable odour which made my mother's heart sink. The explanation was that the girl had a fine fish, half dried and very odorous, and she thought that “Mother Karaka” would not mind her putting it on top of this queer stuff, bread, where it would cook so nicely. What was the use of getting out of temper about such things? The missionaries took it merely as all in their bargain, though they often had to grin over its humour and inconvenience.
In 1830, Mr. Yate had to go to Sydney, about carrying some translations through the press, and kindly took me with him.
At that time hundreds of blackfellows could be seen in the streets of Sydney, and one could see at a glance that they were a lower race than the Maoris by many degrees.
I was a little over six, and stayed with Mr. Marsden and Mr. Hassall for six months, having a very good time of it, and then returned home. There is somewhere an effigy of me at this age with a blue jacket, to which the nether garments were buttoned
It was in the same year, 1830, that the Waimate station was formed. Hitherto, the mission stations had been by the seaside. This was the first advance inland. My father and Mr. Hamlin cut a road—ten miles—for drays, and built several bridges, and with the steady work of the Maoris, in parties under their direction, they finished it in three months. They then built three small cottages, and when all was ready, two families emigrated from the Keri Keri, and another from Paihia, and settled down in the new station. I remember the flitting well. My mother rode a famous little white pony known as “Lion,” the most vicious and long-lived of all ponies I have known. My younger brothers and sisters were carried, and I walked part of the way and rode pick-a-back on a stalwart Maori's shoulder for the rest.
In 1832 Mr. Yate again took me to Sydney, and after a short stay there I was sent on to Hobart Town by a wretched little schooner called the “Admiral Gifford.” It was a long and tedious passage. We were half-starved, and when I landed, on a Sunday in January, 1833, I came to the house in Patrickstreet now occupied by Mr. Charles Walch, miserably weak and ill after the voyage.
Just a word of explanation as to how this came about. My dear mother, and my wife's dear mother, were closer friends than most sisters are. Mrs. Hopkins could not bear the notion of her friend's child being brought up through all his boyhood with no better surroundings than those of early missionary life in New Zealand, and she affectionately pressed upon my mother the duty of sending me away. She promised, and most sacredly she kept her promise, that she would be a mother to me if I could only come for three or four years and be educated with her own children, and thus, through her importunity, I got my first introduction to Tasmania.
On that first Sunday I went to church with the other children. It was the Scotch Kirk that is now the school attached to St. Andrew's. I was very ill, and had as hard a time of it to get over my trouble as in emergencies most stray young boys know. I remember the old faces—the Walkers, Youngs, Gunns, Facys, Turnbulls, and the rest. They have all long since passed away, but their descendants to the second and third generation are among us still, and for the sake of the old past they are all very interesting to my feeling. In the beginning of July I went to school at New Town, at “Summerhome,” which has been for so many years our family nest, and made my first acquaintance with the forebears of my friend, Mr. Justice Giblin; but I need not take note of my early Tasmanian life, as Tasmania is not New Zealand.
On August 4th, 1836, I left Hobart Town to meet Mr. Yate at Sydney, and to return with him to New Zealand. On arrival, however, at Sydney, things were in great confusion. Charges of irregularity were brought against Mr. Yate, affecting his clerical character, which were so serious as to prevent his return to New Zealand, and he resigned his connection with the C.M. Society. He returned to England, and from that time to 1848 (twelve years) I never heard a word about him, except a vague rumour that he was preaching at some obscure village in Wales. I may as well finish at once what I have to say about this gentleman, whose faults, whatever they have been, could not quench my personal love and loyalty. Happily, I knew next to nothing of the gross charges or of their merits that had been brought against him. When I went to England, in the “Wellington,” in 1848, we were becalmed in the Straits of Dover, and do you mean?” I asked. “There,” he said, pointing with his finger to a brass plate on the next door, “Rev.
But now to return to the end of 1836, or rather the beginning of 1837, when I got back to Waimate (age over 14).
I went to school again, and began to take to the Greek and Latin classics—alas! I have nearly forgotten them—with so much interest, that my tutor, Mr. Williams (afterwards Bishop of Waiapu), pressed me to go on. I developed a greed for reading of all kinds, except novels, which were not allowed by our mentors, though we managed to read them surreptitiously, and got started in a direction from which I have never wholly swerved to this day.
Two years after—1838—Bishop Broughton visited New Zealand, and among other things, confirmed all the children of the missionaries above twelve years old. It was at this time that my old friend and tutor,
Towards the end of the next year Mr. Williams left Waimate to form a new station at Turanga (Poverty Bay), and persuaded me to go with him and to have a year's reading. When our vessel reached Poverty Bay the natives came off in crowds and landed us at the mouth of the river. After we got on shore the captain was uneasy about the position of the vessel, and was taking up anchor to shift to the other side of the roadstead, when somehow the Maoris got the notion that he wanted to make off with their missionary's goods. They at once overpowered the crew, cleared every bit of cargo out of the vessel, and took the whole on shore in their war canoes. The consequence was that the ship's copper was some feet out of water, and they had to make to the north shore for ballast to keep her steady. Fortunately the weather was fine. We really had nothing to do with it, but there was a great row, and the charter for the voyage expired in a storm of abusive slang, that might have unnerved Mark Twain himself. I spent a very happy year and a half at Turanga. The natives had built Mr. Williams a large house, nicely thatched, and with the walls inside beautifully lined with upright, pencil-like reeds. The position was half a mile from a very large Pah, and about eight miles inland from the beach. We had little peace for the first week. Hundreds of natives surrounded the house and all night long kept shouting in unison h-a ha, h-e he, hi, h-o ho, h-u hu, and so on through half the primer spelling book. I think they fancied that it was part of the missionary's “karakia” or worship. We had brought down with us a small primer in sheets, and had given away half a dozen copies, and this was the result.
It will be readily understood that the elder members of the missionary families had to take their share in teaching the natives
The subject of the song is
The words may be thus roughly Englished:—
The I of course is not the individual but the collective tribe.
Here, too, is an ancient love song that shows the sentimental side of the Maori character. I will give you the song first in Maori, and then render it into English as closely as I can. It is more than fifty years since I learnt it, and I have not heard it since, but I think it must then have been at least 50 years old. It is old and genuine Maori, untouched by Christian ideas, or by the after-thought of following generations, or the corruption of changing fashions of speech:—
“The Rua” is the under-world tunnel, into which, like the ancient Egyptians, the Maoris thought the setting sun entered at dusk, and travelled along through the night, to emerge again at the Eastern portal in the morning. The play between the setting sun and the setting love is too delicate to be easily translated into our language, but I have tried to give a hint of it in the rendering, which is as literal as even a slavish expert could demand. We think of the diversity of human nature and not enough of its sameness. Human nature is, at the heart of it, the same in all nations, and in all ages. Even a savage song like this may remind us that “He hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation.”
My fidus Achates at this time was my dog.” He was too ashamed to reproach us. However, that made him reckless, and the creatures
About four miles from our house, there was a great preserve of wood pigeons, that was made as tapu as the native chiefs could devise. At a certain season, the pigeons came in vast flocks to feed on the white berries of the Ti tree (braccena) and got so heavy with fat that they could hardly fly from one tree to another. No gun was allowed in the place. The Maoris, with a long slender rod and a slip noose at the end, squatted under the leaves and noiselessly slipped the noose over the necks of the stupid pigeons as they were feeding. We wanted to have a shot, and argued for permission, on the ground that we were proof against all harm from the most dreadful tapu that the “tohunga” could weave. They did not see it, but they did not positively forbid us. It was a risky thing to do, but we went. We gave two or three hours to the sport, and then desisted, because our friends were getting annoved. However, we brought away two such bags of birds as we fairly staggered under. We did not venture to repeat the experiment upon the temper of the tribe and were rather ashamed of the rashness and folly of our adventure.
In the early intercourse of the Pakehas and Maoris, many, if not most, of their quarrels rose from sheer ignorance of each other's ways.
One very frequent cause was the inadvertent or careless violation of the laws of tapu. The “burial places,” or rather “sacred groves,” in which the bones of the dead were deposited, were carefully guarded against violation. It was death for a Maori to go into them at any time, except when the funeral rites were being
head of the chief was tapu. To say even in joke: “I will break your head,” was one of the forms of “kanga,” or cursing. Nay, the word for the head of a beast, and the word for the head of a man, were different, and to substitute one for the other was a great offence. To burn the hair of a chief when his head was cropped, would be awful sacrilege. The possessive pronouns as applied to his limbs or to his property are different. One of the earliest tragedies of our intercourse with the natives, the massacre of Captain Furneaux's men, in 1773, arose from an unintentional violation of the tapu. I heard the story from a very old man when I was once on a visit to Blind Bay. He said that when the “Adventure's” boat landed in the cove, the men sat down to their meal, and one of them refused either to return or to pay for the stone hatchet of one of the Maoris; and that the latter snatched up a piece of bread and ran off. The white man ran after him with some kind of tin can in his hand, and coming back to a group of the natives sitting round the boat, he, sailor-like, put the tin, as if it were a hat, on the head of a chief. It had contained food, and it was to Maori feeling a very gross insult, and-that, he said, was the direct cause of the massacre that followed. Of course, from our having grown up among this people, we became acquainted with their superstitions and prejudices, and we took care not to offend them, if we could help
While I was at Turanga, Mr. Williams projected a tramp to the East Cape, and on to nearly as far as Opotiki, and asked me to join him. No missionaries had as yet got a footing along this coast, but a number of slaves had been released in the North, and had found their way back to their own tribes. Some of them were partially instructed in Christian doctrine, and, acting as teachers, persuaded their people to build places of worship, and conducted Christian services as well as they could every Sunday.
After several days march we came to Waiapu, a pah near the East Cape, with a population at that time of two or three thousand. Mr. Williams was more than a persona grata to these people who, in fact, almost worshipped him. The reason, I think, was this: in 1833 a whaler lay becalmed off the East Cape with twelve of the Waiapu people on board, who had sent their canoe ashore. In the night the wind suddenly rose, and the ship was driven northward by a violent gale. The Captain did not know what to do with his unwilling passengers, but at last landed them at Kororareka, in other words, into the very jaws of their enemies. The Northern Maoris instantly seized them, and distributed them among four chiefs as slaves. The Missionaries appealed to the Ngapuhi chivalry—and as we shall see by and by they were as chivalrous a tribe as ever lived—showing how unworthy it was of them, as gentlemen, to take advantage of an accident that was equivalent to a shipwreck, and which put these men in their power. The chiefs proudly admitted the force of the appeal, and gave up the captives, and Mr. Williams took them back—four years before this visit of ours to Waiapu—with a score of other released slaves who were received as those alive from the dead, and whom no one expected to see again, anymore than we expect
We got to Waiapu on a Saturday afternoon, and pitched our tent a hundred yards from the pah, on the edge of a deep ravine, and were hardly able to do it for the throng that pressed upon us. There were nearly as many dogs as men, and the human part of the assembly was as noisy and as wild and savage in appearance, as any crowd I ever saw. As the sun was setting, Mr. Williams settled that I was to stop in the tent and make arrangements for our morrow's dinner, while he went to have a short evening service in the spacious new church that had been built within the pah. He was very particular in his directions; we were sick of pancakes made without eggs, which were our normal substitute for bread. My chief care was to make a bolster pud ding, to mix the dough, roll it out with a bottle, spread over it the contents of our one jar of jam, then roll it over into a bolster and properly tie and boil it. We were to have it cold for our Sunday dinner; and I remember it all from the intense disgust with which my friend regarded the performance when the picce de resistance came to be discoveted the next day. It was beautiful and correct in form, that I know, but it was rather black in colour, and of the consistence of soaked leather. My friend got out of temper, but could not blame me for the absence of what we had not got. I learnt the lesson then that you cannot make a proper bolster pudding without suet.
To go back, however, Saturday evening was closing in when we were rather startled by the sound of a most melodious bell. It was simply a musket barrel, hung from the branch of a tree, and struck with a stone, but the effect was more musical than the ringing of many a bell I have since heard. One of its most astonishing effects, however, was that on its first stroke all the dogs around made for the bush, howling and yelping as if they were possessed. The explanation was, that the Maoris knew that the church was no place for dogs, and that the ringing of
You can readily imagine that in these rough tramps we had not much opportunity for the use of blacking. It was our practice every night to grease our boots with as much as they would absorb, and so we kept the leather supple and our feet dry. It was also our practice to keep a good stout stick at our bedside for any emergency that might arise. On this particular night there were some dozen Maoris sleeping round a fire some twenty yards or so from us, with their thick, thatch-like mats drawn over their heads. Towards the small hours of the morning we were disturbed by a shuffle in the tent. It turned out to be a dog walking off with my friends boots. Mr. Williams sat up, rubbed his eyes, gathered all his forces together, and with one fell swoop his stick came down on the head of the unluckly intruder. The wretch was only half killed, and we were in great fear lest his moans should awaken the sleepers outside, and let us in for a row. I advised a second rap, and then we sat up in our beds, and considered what we should do. I suggested that in the circumstances we were not bound to wait and explain, and that our volatile friends need not know that there was anything to be explained. So at last I took up the limp, nasty beast, and stepping stealthily, out of the tent door, I carried him gently away from the sleepers, and at the edge of the ravine hurled him into the depths below. It awakened no one, and to our great relief I got to the tent and turned in again, without any of our savage friends being a whit the wiser for what had occurred. It was very amusing, but still we knew that we were among savages, and that with all their expressions of joy at our visit, a breach of their laws of hospitality might give us a good deal of trouble. As it was the wretched dog did not seem to be missed, and we were relieved from all suspicion of unkindness.
Next day, I saw, perhaps, as wonderful a congregation as ever assembled for Christian worship. But first a word about the Church.
That was the equipment of many an earnest helper of his country in those days.
were dressed at all, in such a grotesque and fantastic variety of costume as no rag fair ever presented. The men were on the right side, the women on the left, and we passed along with all eyes following us, to the dais at the end, where the native “Teacher” awaited us.
Mr. Williams went into the pulpit, and after a few minutes gave out the Maori version of “With one consent let all the earth.” It was then a common custom for the “leader” to sing the first line by himself, and then the people joined in with a roar; Mr. Williams struck up the “Old Hundredth,” but when he got to the second line not a soul fell into the tune, and on all that sea of upturned faces there was a look of blank surprise and unmistakable disgust. The “Teacher,” however, rose to the occasion, and stepping up to the pulpit, said, “They don't
start, and every face began to lighten. With a sound like the bursting of thunder, they took the second line out of the leader's mouth, and, as it were, carried off in a roar, like the noise of many waters, all the rest of the singing. It was terrible. They felt that now or never was the time to show their friends what good Christians they meant to be. Man, woman, and child were on the strain, holding their sides, stooping to the effort, gasping for more breath, and working till the perspiration made long brown seams, where it rolled down their red smeared faces. I saw our two old club friends gesticulating wildly in the distance (it was getting misty with the steam), and close by me there was a hoary old sinner, whom I could just hear gasping out “Kia Kaha, Kia Kaha” (sing louder, sing louder). Poor things they meant well, and were surely hearty enough, but it was hard to reconcile it with our notions of the Apostolic precept—“Let all things be done decently and in order.” The rest was comparatively calm, and Mr. Williams gave them a quiet, sensible sermon, to which they listened in rapt attention. This was the place, and these were the people that gave name to the diocese, and Mr. Williams liked nothing better than to be known in after years as Bishop of Waiapu. I afterwards took another tramp with my friend over what was, in a missionary sense, virgin ground, and we went South as far as Ahuriri, which was one day to be known as the district of Napier. Before the country was ceded to the Queen I had thus gone from one camp to another, and, as a rule, even the hostile natives who accompanied me were unmolested, provided that they did not carry arms. Of course things changed very much afterwards, but down to the time of the British occupation of New Zealand as a Colony, this impunity had, as far as we were concerned, the force of law. It was by this sort of training that I got such qualification as I had to deal with the natives in cases of dispute and difficulty when I afterwards entered the Civil Service, and it was by this know-ledge of their ways that I succeeded in averting many a quarrel
I was still at Turanga when
In the last chapter I brought down my notes to the time when I was about seventeen years old. I was then at Turanga, with the Rev. W. Williams (afterwards Bishop of Waiapu), reading Latin and Greek, and travelling with him among tribes that had been seldorn visited, and whose know-ledge of the Pakeha was derived from what they had seen of a few scare-crow, vagabond specimens of the English people. They were savages, pure and simple, only knowing the white man in his roughest character, and, in fact, were rather appalled at our exceptional decency. It gave me a rare opportunity of studying Maori character and customs, and proved a good discipline for the unknown duties and difficulties that were before me. Of course the mere information one gained about tribal history, personal acquaintance with the chiefs, and insight into Maori ways, was something, but the best lesson I learnt was the ability to put myself mentally in the Maori's position, and to look at questions through his eyes, as well as through those of the white man. That helped me much in after years to mediate between the two races, and to stave off many a quarrel when we were quite unprepared to support our contention if it came to a trial of strength, and which, but for careful handling, would have precipitated us into serious peril and disaster, ending, perhaps, in our weak condition, by simply wiping us out altogether. I could estimate our perils better than many of my elders, and could guard against them more carefully than would have been possible without this experience.
It was in the year 1840 that See Treaty of Waitangi, Appendix I.
It was with great reluctance that the British Government assumed the responsibility of taking formal possession of New Zealand, but it is quite certain that they would soon, in any circumstances, have had to annex the country, not only to save the natives from anarchy, but for the protection of our own interests, and to prevent the Islands from being occupied by a rival power. Two things, however, compelled them to decide at once what they would do: the secret preparations of the French to forestall us, and the pretensions of the New Zealand Company to found an independent State. We know now that while we were hesitating, Louis Philippe was officially assuring the Foreign Office that he had no designs on New Zealand, and yet all the while was secretly pushing on a scheme of French colonization. There was a French Company of adventurers, the Nantes-Bordelaise, with a scheme to acquire land in New Zealand by purchase, and they obtained authorization from the King, who appointed Admiral Duperré, Minister of Marine, to make terms with them, and he promised the Company that he would sustain their action, by the presence of one or two ships of war. That was in 1839, and no doubt the Foreign Office
The other thing that precipitated the action of our Government was the formation of the
Among these adventurers were several gentlemen who had been more or less implicated in the Canadian rebellion, and who
William would have been a master of diplomacy if he had only had art enough to conceal his art, but he always, in any negotiation, betrayed his subtlety in scheming, and put the other side on their guard lest they should concede more than they meant to do. Captain Wakefield, at Nelson, was a brave straight-forward sailor, to whose nature the craft of diplomacy was altogether distasteful, and who was always disposed to take the shortest cut to the end he desired. Young Edward was very eccentric, and there was a certain strain of rowdyism in his composition that did more harm to himself, poor fellow, than to those against whom it was directed. He could hardly open his lips without uttering some bitter sarcasm against those he disliked, and he was not at all particular in whose presence he did so.
The new settlers; on landing, organized themselves into a government, and claimed to exercise all rights of sovereignty on the ground that, with the land, the Maoris had also transferred to them their functions of chieftainship within the alienated district. So they elected magistrates, tried cases, and inflicted fines, conducting themselves in all respects as an autonomous State. A man named Pearson was arrested on a charge of breach of contract with someone in Hobart Town, and when he refused
In September, 1840, six months after the Treaty of Waitangi was signed, the assembled missionaries, at
It soon became apparent that the Bay of Islands was in no way suited for the seat of Government, and my father was instructed to proceed to the Thames and to treat with the natives, if possible, for the purchase of a better location. The issue was that in the end of September he bought a block of forty thousand acres at Auckland, and afterwards a still larger tract, and there the British flag was hoisted on a hill on the Southern shore of Waitemata harbour within the site of what is now the city of Auckland.
All this had happened while I was still at Turanga. It was in the last days of 1840 that I returned to the Bay of Islands, and in January, 1841, I took my stool as probation clerk in the native department of the Civil Service of New Zealand, age nearly eighteen. The government establishments were then being removed to Auckland, and when I got there, the city was represented by three of four rough shanties and a few hundred tents.
From a little after seventeen I began to form the ambition of getting qualified to become some day a Minister of Christ's Holy Gospel. The tumult of my political life for the next few years never changed my purpose. My duties were thrust upon me by no will of my own. I could not escape them, but in my heart I always regarded them as an episode. I can see now that they were a full preparation for the work that was to come on at last. My old grind in classics, now so much forgotten, was not altogether labour in vain. Bishop Williams drilled me severely in language and logic by the analysis of Greek and Latin sentences, after the strict and literal fashion of the old Oxford School. The exercise has served me well through life, and not the least in the old complications of Maori affairs, where accuracy was often of vital importance, and looseness of expression might so easily lead to misunderstanding. With such a training and knowing Maori and the Maoris more than most men, I was not morally free, and could not resist the call to public service at a crisis when such qualifications were sorely needed in the interests of both races, though I had little notion of the cares it would entail. It seemed to spoil my scheme of life but it did one no harm in the end. My way was hedged in, and I had to face the pressing and often perilous duties of the passing hour, which someone must have discharged, at a time of experimental, abrupt and almost violent transition. It was too exhausting a process to allow one, while it lasted, the luxury of dreaming disappointed dreams. Yet through all I never let go the hope that in quieter times I might have the chance of carrying out the purpose of my earlier youth. The opportunity was in the end made for me, and I did not make it for myself. That all should issue in such a quiet course of ministry as mine has been in Tasmania, never entered into my imagination or forecast in those harrassing times, though I often prayed the old Hebrew aspiration: “Oh, that I had wings like a dove! for then I would fly away and be at rest …. I would hasten my escape from the windy storm and tempest.”
Whether I deserved it or not, I soon got the credit of being a clear and careful interpreter, and for so young a fellow I was thought to have unusual discretion in all dealings with the Maoris. The time was near to test whatever might be in me.
In November, 1841, news came of an atrocious murder committed by a young Chief in one of the islets off Kororareka, in the Bay of Islands. The name of the murderer was he wahine au). God is looking at you, and you must put it away.” Twice he presented the weapon, and dropped it at her calm and steadfast look, and then he withdrew. When the fit of madness was over, he was full of remorse. He was the Chief of a village about three miles from our house, and ever after, when my mother passed his place, he was eager to ask her to his house, and to show her every kind of attention and respect that he could think of; putting all he had at her disposal, and at a him he was delighted to be at any trouble to serve her. No doubt there was the same mad strain in
The trial was fixed for February, 1842, and it was the first Criminal Sitting of the Supreme Court in New Zealand under
Before I take you into this part of my work, I should like to try and explain in as few words as possible, the essential difficulties of our position. Setting aside for the present the Law of the Blood Bond, which we see everywhere at a certain stage in the progress of nations. It is not at all the unreasonable thing that has sometimes been thought. The idea of separate and individual responsibility, or of separate possession of every kind of property, is a late product of civilisation that has no place in the earlier condition of society. What the Blood Bond was with our remote ancestors, is well explained in the opening chapter of “Green's English People,” and the explanation will do just as well for the modern Maoris as for the ancient Britons.
Green says: “Order and law were made to rest in each little group of English people upon the Blood Bond, which knit its families together; every outrage was held to have been done by all who were linked to the doer of it; every crime to have been committed against all who were linked by blood to the sufferer from it. From this sense of the value of the family bond as a means of restraining the wrong doer by forces which the tribe, as a whole, did not as yet possess, sprang the first rude forms of English justice. Each kinsman was his kinsman's keeper, bound to protect him from wrong, and to suffer with and pay for him if wrong were done. So fully was this principle recognized, that even if any man was charged before his fellow tribesmen with crime, his kinsfolk still remained in fact his sole judges, for it was by their solemn oath of his innocence or his
A second fundamental Maori law was the law of (2) Tribal Possession. The private, separate, and exclusive ownership of land was not recognized among them, though I have seen this denied. There might be gradation in personal claims, but the consent of the tribe as a whole, or of some subdivision or group of its families, was necessary for the alienation of any part of the tribal territory. No Chief, however high his rank, could dispose of a single acre without the concurrence of his tribe. Without such a law, no tribe could be sure of its integrity, and any number of wedges might be driven into its territory. Throughout the Northern Island, and through the greater part of the Southern, the divisions of land were accurately known, and on no subject was there greater jealousy than on the invasion of each other's boundaries. It was fatal to the tribe to allow the individual, on his own mere motion, to admit a stranger to get foothold on its land. Long before the white man showed his face in New Zealand, there was a proverb among the Maoris: “He wahine he wenua, e ngaro ai te tangata,” which may be rendered in English: “For land or wife, man stakes his life,” meaning that a man, who is a man, will fight with all his life rather than be forced to surrender either land or woman. The depth of this feeling about their land, to say nothing about the wife, was greatly underrated by Europeans, and their disregard of it was, and has continued to be, the source of most of the trouble that we have had with the Maoris.
The third and last Maori law that I will notice, was the law of (3) Possession by Conquest. Most of the land held by the tribes was held by right of inheritance—but not a little was claimed to have been wrested from its original owners by force
Now, anyone who carries these three laws in his mind—the law of the Blood Bond, the law of Tribal Possession, and the law of Possession by Conquest—will have the key to all our great troubles with the Maoris, from the Treaty of Waitangi to the present hour.
Our only hope of keeping peace between the races, was by gradually modifying their system until it should be merged into our principles of possession, and I am very strongly of opinion, that nearly all our contention with the Maoris has arisen from our disregard of these fundamental considerations, or from the attempt to abolish them too suddenly, and with too high a band.
The agents of the company could have got more out of such a man if they had not begun by shaking their fists in his face, grimacing to their utmost power of contortion, and defying his authority in a very larrikin sort of manifestoing.
We were not very welcome to the community of Wellington. No Government officials were at that time. Many of the settlers were sore at the coutse that things had taken. The
One of the first witnesses called was From a Photo, by Angas. HONE HEKE.
Young Wakefield now attacked me in the local paper, asserting broadly that I knew nothing of Maori; that I was always prowling about the pahs; that I was helping the natives to concoct false evidence; and finally, by way of climax, he suggested that I was deliberately perjuring myself as Interpreter to the Court. That last hit was going too far. I insisted at once that the charge be disposed of, and the court refused to move another inch until it was settled. To bring the matter to an issue, I then threatened the paper with a prosecution unless they retracted and apologised, and they came out with both in the next number, but not without giving me a parting kick for my youthful presumption. The fact was that there could be no mistake about what I did in Court, for every question and answer was
Some time after my work was done in the South, when things were going on badly with the Company in England, as well as in the Colony, Colonel Wakefield sent his nephew home, and on arrival in London young Edward set himself to write a book in defence of his uncle and of the Company, and professing to recount the proceedings of the Government after they assumed the sovereignty of the country. It was a very clever and a very savage book, but its sarcasm was so unrelieved, and its animus so apparent, that it did no one much harm. Some of his facts are hard to recognize, and it may be said, generally, that they take shape and colour from the spectacles through which he looked at them. Everyone who in any way had checked the Company's agents was presented in unredeemed lamp-black, and everyone who supported them was made beautiful as an angel of light. The young man spared no one on the other side from the lash of his scorn. The successive Governors, the Chief Justice, the Commissioners, the Police Magistrates, the Bishop, the Missionaries, with the single exception of Mr. Hadfield, the protesting Maoris, and even the captains of the English ships of war, were all included in his satire. But bete noir, and he never missed a chance of giving me a cut as he passed me in his narration. Now and then he drew finely on his imagination, as when he told that I was on one occasion “pale and frightened” because I would not head an unruly mob who wanted to force on a row in the pah. However, I am not afraid that any of you would take young Edward's picture for a portrait.
As the examinations of the Company's titles proceeded, Mr. Spain found himself in a position of very serious difficulty. He could soon have given his decision, and as far as the Company was concerned, it could only have been that none of their purchases was completed, and that the original negotiations had been of the loosest description, but then there were the unfortunate settlers who had purchased in good faith from the English Company in London.
A precipitate decision might have raised Maori expectations and demands to the point of danger. I had to repress the Maoris as well as to keep back the Pakehas. In fact I had to stand as a buffer in madly contending interests. It was not possible to turn the settlers out of their allotments. It would have been cruel to punish them for the sins or the blunders of the Company. Mr. Spain, therefore, determined to spin out the proceedings, so as to give time for some workable compromise that would at least leave the settlers in secure and legal occupation of their lands. He simply indicated in which direction compensation was due.
The native side of the business was left in my hands, and Colonel Wakefield was to act for the Company. If we could not agree on terms of compensation, we were to refer the matter to Mr. Spain as umpire, and his decision was to be final. A long and troublesome correspondence passed between the Colonel and myself. I could not bring him to terms. The preliminary condition I laid down, that the Maoris should not be ousted from their pahs, burial places, and cultivations, he would never frankly accept, and, for the most part, our negotiations about compensation fell through. He refused to refer our differences to the umpire, and it was not till the arrival of Captain Fitzroy, the new Governor, that he was compelled to give compensation in some of the cases that were most pressing, and that could not be left open any longer without peril to the community.
Besides my duties in the Land Court, I had to watch, with the greatest care, the general course of Maori affairs throughout the Southern district, and that involved many tedious journeys along the West Coast, as far north as Wanganui and Taranake. There were personal dangers enough everywhere, but I was never very anxious, except in Wellington itself. Things were in such an inflammable condition in that town, that it would have taken very little to bring on serious disturbances at any moment between the settlers and the Maoris. There were foolish, hot headed people enough who were bent upon forcing on a conflict between the races. They thought that the natives could be intimidated
There were other land claims of the Company that we had to investigate, at Porirua, at Manawatu, at Wanganui, at Taranake, and on the southern side of the Strait. It was difficult to get the Colonel now to attend the court, and Mr. Spain was often kept waiting, and had to threaten that if he did not attend, the examination must go on without him. The Colonel was always privately very kind and friendly to me however fiercely we might be opposed in our political contention. He went with us to Wanganui, where the Commissioner decided (I quote his words) that “the Company's claims to that district were defective to the extent of millions of acres. They only established a claim to land on one side of the river,” and even for this, they had still to compensate owners who had never been paid.
I come now to one of the saddest tragedies connected with these miserable land squabbles that made an old man of me when I was just turning twenty one. There were districts in the Southern Island that were as much disputed between the Company and the Maoris as any in the North. Some seventy miles from
In the course of the next day the gale abated, and we sailed across the Strait to Cloudy Bay. There we fell in with the
Things were getting very dangerous now for all of us. The Maoris were exasperated at what they considered our treachery, and our own people were thirsting for revenge. Happily there was a gentleman living at Waikanae, who had great influence with the Maoris allied to Rauparaha, and was equally respected by both races, the
In January, 1844,
After this business, I accompanied Mr. Spain to Wanganui, and then to Taranake, and the Commissioner made his award. To the surprise of Colonel Wakefield himself, and to the consternation of all who knew anything about the Maoris, Mr. Spain declared that this was the fairest of all the Company's purchases, and that they were entitled to 60,000 acres of land. The Chief,
In June, 1844, I received instructions to go to Otago, and to assist in the purchase of a large block of land for the Scotch settlement that was then being projected. Colonel Wakefield was to act for the Company, and I for the natives, while Mr. John G. Symonds, the Police Magistrate of Wellington, was to superintend and endorse the whole transaction on the part of the Government. We took Mr. Spain with us part of the way, and dropped him at the French settlement of Akaroa, in Banks Peninsula. This settlement had been projected by a French company in 1839, after secret negotiations with
Somehow the secret leaked out that she was on a voyage to support a company of French colonists on their way to Akaroa. H.M.S. “Britomart” was in the harbour, and Captain Stanley, a brother of the late Dean of Westminster, was sent off in the night with instructions to sail for Akaroa with the utmost
When we got to Otago we anchored a mile or two inside the heads, off a native village on the eastern side of the harbour. The natives appeared to be in a miserable condition. More than in any other part of the country they had suffered by their intercourse with the very roughest of whalers and sealers, and altogether they were in a more pitiable state than any of the tribes in the Northern Island.
In numbers, in physique, and in morals, they had greatly gone down. The very jargon they spoke in their common talk with Europeans was a strange medley of bad French, bad English and low Maori. We found them ready to sell, but a good deal out of temper. The irrepressible Tuckett, known familiarly in our expedition as “Bill Sykes,” who had learnt nothing by his escape from the Wairau massacre, would insist upon cutting his survey lines over anything that came in his way, and took not the least notice of the remonstrance of the Maoris. The Government and Colonel Wakefield together had to make him stop, and until he did so, Mr. Symonds refused to begin any negotiations. So the gentleman was not in very good humour when we arrived.
With Symonds's consent, as well as Colonel Wakefield's, I started with the understanding that the whole negotiation with the Maoris should pass through my hands, and I told the natives that I should be answerable for no conditions or promises whatever, except what I myself should tell them. We pulled up in a boat to what is now Port Chalmers. It was then a little forest of Kahikatea trees, and we pitched our tents on the edge of it. The wood swarmed with pigeons, and I shot as many as we could eat, from the tent door. It is all a nest of warehouses now. The first hitch in the business was the question of native reserves. The Maoris knew too much about the Company's purchases in the North, and did not believe in making over the whole block and then leaving it to us to say what portions should be assigned to them, nor would they hear of parting with their village cultivations and burial grounds. I had a hard fight with Tuckett and Wakefield to make the reserves and put them into the deed. These proposed reserves lay almost wholly in the Peninsula on the eastern side of the bay, white, naturally enough, Colonel Wakefield was as anxious to buy the Peninsula as the Maoris were to retain it. I believe that in after years they did part with most of it. There were at this time some two or three hundred men on the ground, most of them were from different parts of the coast; there were also a few miserable looking women and hardly any children. The principal Chiefs were Tuhawaiki and Taiaroa. Contact with the whalers and sealers had taken much of the dignity out of them, and their bearing was nothing like that of their Northerly countrymen. There were some twenty heads of septs a little lower in rank. One day we crossed over with them to look at the ground which they wished to retain, and, walking to the top of a hill, Tuhawaiki asked the Colonel, Mr. Symonds and myself to sit down. Stretching out his arm and pointing with his finger, “Look here, Karaka,” he said, “here, and there, and there and yonder; those are all burial places, not ancestral burial places, but those of this generation. Our patents, uncles, aunts, brothers, sisters,
The next question we had to settle was the exact boundary of the block of land that the natives were willing to sell. Except the Maori occupants of the Eastern Peninsula, and one or two small stations on the coast, there were no inhabitants in the whole district. The nearest white settlement was a decayed whaling station, about thirty or forty miles away. What is now the city of Dunedin and its surrounding farmsteads, was only a run for wild pigs. On the Eastern side of the block there was,
Then we pushed on, striking first across country, and coming down to the coast.
The ground was undulating, covered with snow, and almost bare of trees, except that some miles before us we could see a small island of forest. A curious spiky plant stood out above the snow in tussocks, with points as sharp as needles, that made it wary walking for the shivering Maoris, and clumps of aniseed grew thick upon the downs. The whirr of innumerable quails, almost kicked up by our feet, would have been tempting to sportsmen, but we had to push on for shelter, and we felt too cold to shoot them. We reached the island of forest late in the afternoon, and pitched our tents on its edge. The forest was infested with wild pigs, that made it unsafe to wander alone, and the trees were alive with wood-pigeons, which we shot in sufficient quantity to supply all our party for two days. Next day we emerged on the beach; it was backed by a sweep of flat table land, which broke off like a low wall, and where the water trickled over the edge there hung great icicles, sometimes as
From a Picture by Angas.
Just after we entered the lake the word passed that a quarter of a mile ahead there was a vast flock of wild ducks that were evidently not accustomed to be disturbed. Silence was ordered and I was sent with my gun to the bow. The crew paddled gently, and when near enough I gave the signal to stop, and we glided gently to within two boat lengths of them.
I fired both barrels, and to our great satisfaction brought down nearly a dozen. We at once pulled on shore, lighted fires, half picked and half roasted our game. It all disappeared in less than an hour after the ducks were alive; we were well supplied so long as our boating lasted. Leaving the head of the lake, after hauling the boat ashore, we struck towards the south-west, dragging wearily over long rolling downs, with here and there a small clump of stunted trees, often miles apart. We always pitched our tent near one of these clumps, for the sake of shelter and firewood. Sometimes it would rain in the night and then freeze, so that the packing of the tent next morning was like folding a sheet of tin, and made it rather an unpleasant back-load for the unfortunate Maori who had to carry it.
So we went on until we reached the boundary, and then returned by the same track, luckily killing three or four wild pigs on the journey. They were in fair condition, but with very thick skins, and had to be flayed before we could eat them. Back to Otago, I prepared the Maori deed. The block we acquired must have been, I think, a good deal over 400,000 acres. The original deed is in Maori in my hand writing,
Translation of Deed of Sale. Appendix II.
Things were now quieting in the South. Some of the worst and most dangerous questions in dispute between us and the Maoris were settled, or in the way of settlement. Some questions still remained, formidable enough, but insoluble for the present, and such as only time and patience could set right.
The last two years of incessant care and heavy responsibility had taken a good deal out of me. I was very weary, and told Governor Fitzroy that I thought myself now due for a rest, little dreaming of the fresh troubles that were waiting for me in the North.
The Governor was very kind. In a few weeks he summoned me to Auckland, and sent down a gentleman to take my place in the South.
In the last chapter I gave you a sketch of my official life down to the time when I negotiated the purchase of Otago from the natives.
That was at the end of July, 1844. Things were now quieting in the South. The titles of the New Zealand Company had been carefully sifted. Some of the most pressing difficulties had been arranged by compensation, and though there were still dangerous questions awaiting solution, nothing could be done with them for the present, and it would be a work of time and patience to dispose of them. For more than two years, all my powers of endurance had been strained to the utmost. It had been a time of incessant care and heavy responsibility, and I was getting very weary. I told the Governor that I thought myself due for a rest, and he very kindly recalled me to Auckland, and sent a gentleman to take my place. A rest was what I asked for, and little dreamed of the new troubles in which I was soon to be entangled.
There had been very little difficulty about the land question in the North, nor indeed was there serious disaffection on this subject anywhere except such as grew out of the loose purchases of the New Zealand Company. The rising of Heke and his followers was not at the beginning a question of Land Titles at all, but simply a revolt against the British Government, as such, for its assumption of power over the natives, which Heke declared to go far beyond what was contemplated in the Treaty of Waitangi. The land question did, however, come in before the final breach, in a way that no one had anticipated, and was, in fact, the last consideration that determined Heke to commit himself to war.
It was with some hesitation that he was induced to sign the Treaty of Waitangi. He was enraged at the surrender of the murderer
The Bay of Islands was at the time of the cession of New Zealand, the great resort of whaling ships, French, English and especially American. There were often as many as twenty whalers anchored at Kororareka at the same time, and of course there was a large trade between them and the natives.
The proclamation of British sovereignty changed it all. The immediate result of imposing Customs regulations, was to destroy this local commerce, and the Ngapuhi tribe, from being the richest and most prosperous in the country, sunk rapidly into poverty. The port was deserted, and the flag-staff and what it
and above all by the Customs' regulations, which have almost destroyed the traffic of the Bay, without producing any considerable amount of revenue. By removing the Custom-house officers from this port, the root of the mischief will be, I think, extracted.”
In this statement I think the Governor was mistaken in attributing any weight as yet to the land question, which, as I have said, was the source of disturbance only among the Southern tribes. Things seemed to be smoothed down; but now there came tidings of the report of a select Committee of the House
The staff was again set up, and to guard against surprise, it was sheathed this time with iron for several feet from the ground, a block-house was put up at its foot, trenches cut round the hill, and two or three guns mounted. A guard was put into the block-house every night, and a military camp formed in the town below. The “Hazard” was anchored close off the town, and the residents were drilled in arms.
In the beginning of February, after I had been in Auckland a week or ten days, the Governor, who was in great trouble, and in some doubt about what was really going on in the Maori mind,
So I visited the Bay, and spent a week in sounding the principal Chiefs, and listening to the common talk of their people, and having satisfied myself as to the course things were likely to take, I returned to the Governor and reported.
My impression was that Heke, Kawiti, and half a dozen other Chiefs were determined this time to fight, and, if possible, destroy the flag-staff, against any opposition of the garrison; that Nene, Patuone, Taewai, Repa and all the Hokianga branch of the tribe would support us; and that Pomare, Tareha, and Mauparaoa, the resident Chiefs in the Bay itself, and
Meanwhile the two other detachments of the enemy sprang from their lair and made for the town, the largest one under Kawiti. They were met at the entrance and gallantly repulsed by the marines and sailors of the “Hazard,” who were stationed
A good many Maoris were killed, the rest were driven back, and Captain Robertson, who was in command, and who engaged Kawiti hand-to-hand, fell covered with wounds, from which, I am glad to say, he afterwards recovered.
Desultory firing went on till noon, when the Maoris at the block-house hoisted a flag of truce, and brought down a woman and our wounded men into our lines; among them, the signalman of the block-house, who stuck to his guns when the rest retreated, and was badly wounded before he would surrender.
A few minutes after, our powder magazines on shore blew up, and then it was determined to evacuate the town. It was awful blundering throughout.
Under somewhat wild, but heavy firing from the “Hazard,” the English men, women and children were brought off, without any interference from the natives.
The American corvette, the “St. Louis,” could not, of course, take part in the fight, but she manned all her boats, took off the families, and received a great crowd of fugitives on board. Next morning all the vessels left for Auckland, and the Maoris plundered and burnt the deserted town.
Much to the annoyance of Heke, not only the wives and children, but most of the men of the old missionary families, joined the fugitives in their panic. He thought that they ought to have known him better.
Mr. and Mrs. Williams remained at Paihia, Mr. Burrowes at Waimate, and Mr. Kemp at Keri Keri. Some of the young men also had not gone away; but H., who was the Maori Protector of the district and the official agent of the Government in all dealings with the natives, joined the flight in great trepidation. He had known Heke intimately all his life, but had taken fright and gone with the rest. He was an intelligent, well meaning man, and one of the best Maori scholars in the country, but he listened too much to alarmist reports, and could not keep his head in a time of any calamity or danger.
I had told the Governor before, that I thought in any case Heke had no disposition to meddle with any of the missionaries' families if they conducted themselves with common prudence.
Fitzroy was annoyed at this gentleman, H., having come away in such haste, though he would not blame him. He sent for me, and bewailed the absence of any Government agent, who might at least rally our Maori allies and keep up communication with head quarters. Not a solitary representative of the Government had dared to stick to his post. He was afraid, as every one was, that Heke's next move would be to march on Auckland, unless we could get our Maori friends to hold him to the North. I at once told him that I did not think Heke would touch me, and at any rate I was ready to go, if there were any way of sending me, and I would do what I could to hold Heke back from any advance towards Auckland.
Fitzroy was pleased, and said he would not order me into so much risk, but if I volunteered, the United States corvette was going to look in at the Bay, and he had no doubt that Captain McClellan-would oblige him by giving me a passage and landing me.
So it was arranged, and the next day I sailed in the “St. Louis.”
My instructions were to make my way if possible to Waka Nene's camp, and to do all in my power to block the threatened advance of Heke upon Auckland by keeping him employed in his own district. My duty was to watch and strengthen what was at first the very shaky alliance of our Maori supporters; to report the movements of the Northern Tribes; to keep the Government in touch with the friendly natives; and to be the organ of communication between them and the authorities of Auckland.
They put me on shore at Paihia, and after ascertaining from Archdeacon Williams that Waka Nene was at Waimate, and Heke at Waitangi, I started by myself for the inland tramp of fifteen miles. At the landing place near the Waitangi falls of Haruru, I came upon a group of Heke's people, Heke himself being among them.
He was rather surprised to see me, as he thought I was still in the far South, looking after Maori rights at Wellington. He knew well how hard I had fought, almost single handed, to get justice for the Maoris, and so he was prepossessed in my favour. I told him that I had left because I was tired almost to death, and when I had no idea of the trouble in the North; that I had come up in the “St. Louis” by the kindness of the American Commander; and that I wanted to get on to Waimate. “Oh,” he said, “I suppose you want to see Waka Nene and the Hokianga people. I do not know what they are going to do, but you can go on if you like. I am disgusted with H. for going away. You know that he and you and I were old playmates together, and unless you came upon me, sword in hand, I should not hurt either of you. Though you are a Government officer, you are an officer for the Maoris also according to your lights. You are not a stranger, and so long as you do not turn soldier, or policeman, or collector of customs, I do not mind if you are the only representative here of the Government in Auckland, but you must give up any letters you have on your person.”
I told him I had none. He then asked the news from Auckland, what the Governor was going to do, and enquired how the fugitives were disposed of. He said that the Pakehas who were not in arms need not have fled from Kororareka, and that he would not have molested the women, or plundered and burnt the town, if they had remained to look after their property. He enquired especially about Captain Robertson; said they admired his pluck; that in the encounter with Kawiti, he cut through the handle of the chief's tomahawk and nearly cut him down; and that he was the only very brave officer in the fight. Then he complained that the “Hazard” had not treated him well, but that after his people had ceased firing, she kept discharging her guns at the church, which was rather sacrilegious, and behind which the wounded were lying, though, as it happened, none of the people about the building were killed or even hurt.
I told him I was quite sure that they knew nothing of the wounded there, or they would not have made the church their mark.
So we parted for the present, and I went on my solitary road.
Within a few miles of Waimate, I came upon Waka Nene's scouts, and soon reached his camp. Nene was very glad to see me, but as several Chiefs were present of whom he was evidently doubtful, he whispered to me that I had better reserve my confidences till they were gone. So I sat down and talked gossip, and purposely made very idiotic comments now and then about the state of political affairs. I hung about the place, laughed at the display of the war-dance, and chaffed the young men about their brave talk, reminding them of Ahab's proverb, “Let not him that girdeth on his harness, boast himself as he that putteth it off.” In the evening when Nene was alone, I dropped in “promiscuous like,” for a smoke and a chat.
Here I may explain that Waka Nene and his followers belonged to the Western branch of the Ngapuhi tribe, who had their seat in the district of Hokianga. Hokianga was necessarily the base of Nene's operations, while the region about Waimate was the centre of the Eastern branch of the tribe which was closely allied to Heke. Nene told me that of the five hundred people I saw around him, there were only two hundred of his own men that he could trust, and that, therefore, he had secretly sent to Hokianga for a contingent of two hundred more, who would arrive next day.
The people about Waimate were wavering, and, apart altogether from the cause of quarrel, they were drawn to Heke by blood relationship.
I found that though Heke and Nene were watching one another, no shot had as yet been fired on either side, and I was anxious that our friends should commit themselves. So I persuaded Nene to send off a troop of skirmishers next day, to the river Waiaruhe, half way to Heke's camp, to make a show of opposing the passage of the river. He did so, there was a
Heke and Nene now came to an understanding as to the way in which the contest should be carried on.
The two divisions of the tribe were so entangled by marriage-relations, that they could not afford to carry on war in the old, savage, and indiscriminating way. The actual fighting was to be kept as much as possible to the ground between and about the opposing camps. Women, children, stragglers, and unarmed whites were not to he meddled with when they were off the fighting ground.
They were not to intercept each others supplies, or to make raids on distant and defenceless villages, and they were to treat with humanity and kindness any of each others wounded who might fall into their hands.
And here I may anticipate, that when our troops came upon the scene, Heke had many a chance of capturing our convoys of food and ammunition and of cutting off detached parties in the rear, but he never attempted it. He even allowed one or two resident contractors to supply our soldiers with fresh meat, and let them go within his lines to drive up the cattle we needed for our support. There was no glory, he said, in fighting half starved men, who after all were serving their government, and between whom and himself there was no personal resentment.
There was hard fighting in this war; but Heke always said, “if fight we must, let us fight like gentlemen,” and, from beginning to end, I never heard of a single act of treachery on either side, and only of one reported, but doubtful, act of wanton cruelty. This was after our repulse at Ohaeawae, when we left our dead and dying at the foot of the stockade we had vainly tried to storm; the cries of some poor wounded fellow were heard in the camp, and the soldiers got the impression that he was being tortured, but the enemy afterwards denied it, though they confessed that some of the dead had been hacked and mutilated
Nene soon found his position at Waimate very uncomfortable. He was really in the heart of Heke's country. Even the best disposed of the Waimate people gave him a grudging and half-hearted support, and the great majority sympathised with the enemy.
There was nothing now to keep Nene so near the Bay of Islands. Kororareka had fallen, the Bay was deserted, and there was no settlement to protect.
Nene was twenty miles from Hokianga, which was the proper base of his supplies. So he determined to give up his Waimate camp, and to build his pah some eight miles nearer to his own district. He would be out of the range of doubtful adherents, there would be nothing then in his rear, and it would not be difficult to feed his force.
The road from Waimate to Hokianga is about twenty miles long, and runs in a north westerly direction. About three miles from Waimate it skirts a remarkable volcanic hill, from the top of which there is a wide view of the surrounding district. Beyond Puke Nui, or “the great hill” as it is called, there is a deep lake six miles long and a mile or two across, caused by the subsidence of the land in some not very remote eruption.
Just under the hill, at the point where the road touches the edge of this lake, and with a network of impassable swamps on flank and rear, Heke built his stronghold of Okaihau.
Four miles farther on the road was Nene's pah. A stream crossed the centre of the intervening space and divided the hostile lines.
On Heke's passing through the Waimate to build his pah, I met him and had a few words of talk.
He was rather sulky at the opposition of Nene, which held him to the district, when he would fain have been marching on Auckland, but though he would not say much, he was not at all uncivil.
I knew I had nothing to fear from the bulk of his followers, and that the safest place was always where they were congregated in the greatest number, but on this occasion he had a contingent of wild Maoris from the interior, to whom I was not so well known. I was quietly looking on at a war dance near the road, when a file of these wild rascals finished there capering by levelling their muskets at me at some ten paces off, I suppose to frighten me. To move would have been to invite a volley, so I stood still, when a man in the ranks, who had been an old servant of ours, rushed forward and beat their guns aside.
When the two pahs were finished, there used to be a skirmish every two or three days, and the passing of a challenge from one to another to let the young men “play,” as the old fellows called it, in the open.
The house I was living in was three miles to the rear of Heke, and his force lay across the direct road to Nene's pah, which I could only otherwise reach by taking a circuit of some ten miles.
There were wild larrikin lads about Waimate, as nearly related by blood to one side as to the other, and who of course did not care a rush for the cause of battle, but they looked upon a scrimmage much as we do at a game of football.
I generally knew a day or two beforehand, when anything important was coming on, and I was often amused to see a group of four young scamps sitting round their evening fire, and making up their minds which side they would severally take in the skirmish of the morrow. Sometimes they would even borrow cartridges from one another, and before daylight half would go to Heke and half to Nene.
Next day, perhaps, they would change about. The fight over, the friends would find their way back before midnight, and spend
I remember one particular day when there had been a sharper brush than usual, some had been killed and there were a good many badly wounded on both sides. The news came to me that they were torturing the poor wretches by laying rags soaked in rum upon their wounds, which they had been told by some quack Pakeha was the best thing to do for speedy healing and recovery, and I thought, for mere humanity's sake, I ought to try and stop it. So I rode to the outside of Heke's pah, and persuaded them to use no other treatment but washing with cold water, and then laying a green leaf upon the orifice. They were doing the same barbarous thing at Nene's pah, and so Heke allowed me to go through and stop it.
I had a quiet talk with Nene about the position of affairs, and he told me that if they continued to burn powder at the rate they had been doing in these skirmishes, he was a little afraid that their ammunition would run short. His object was not to fight a decisive battle at a heavy cost of life, which, even if he won, would not politically be of much service to our Government.
It was necessary that Heke should be crushed by a force of British soldiers, and not by people of his own race.
His own duty, he (Nene) thought, was to hold Heke back from the least advance towards Auckland until we had gathered a force, and the best service he could render us was just to keep harassing the enemy by frequent skirmishes, until we were ready to encounter him ourselves.
I told him that I would give his message to the Governor, and ask him to arrange time and place for delivering the ammunition. I thought we could only land it at the head of the Keri Keri, and Nene would have to send an escort to bring it on to the camp.
On my return, towards evening, I came upon Harriet (Heke's wife) and a group of attendants outside Heke's pah. We talked about the wounded, and I told what I had seen of them, though they did not need the information, and at last Harriet said with an air of innocence, “How many letters did Nene give you for the Governor?” I said, “I am not a postman, and you don't suppose I should be such a fool as to carry despatches through your lines! No, the only letters I have brought are in my head.” She laughed and said, “I know you don't tell lies, but let me feel,” and so she passed her hand lightly on the outside of my pockets and said, “That will do, good night.” The letters came to hand in the evening.
In due time the supplies of ammunition came to the Keri Keri, in charge of my brother, and he came on with the escort to Nene's camp, and gave the messages with which he had been charged by the Governor.
Early in May, 1845, that is two months after the fall of Kororareka, the Governor sent a force under Colonel Hulme to Nene's aid. It consisted of detachments of the 58th and 96th, and some sailors and marines from the “Hazard” and the “North Star,” a little over four hundred in all.
They landed near the mouth of the Keri Keri and marched some fourteen miles to the old missionary station at the falls.
Two days after they tramped, with an escort of friendly natives, some sixteen miles to Nene's pah.
After a day's rest Colonel Hulme determined to attack, much against Nene's advice. I went with a few others to the top of Puke Nui to watch the day's events.
The ground lay before us like a map. Heke's pah, some hundred yards from the edge of the lake, was close at our feet. Four or five miles before us was the slope up to Nene's stockade, and we could see the troops in the distance, with two or three score of Maoris, slowly approaching. We could see also the preparations that Heke had made to receive them.
From a Drawing by K. L. Sutherland.
As the troops came on and neared the pah, there was on their right flank a considerable force of the enemy under Kawiti, ready to attack if the soldiers should try to storm the pah. We could see them plainly enough, though they were hidden from the approaching troops by a rise in the ground.
We thought it looked dangerous, when suddenly we noticed a force of sailors and marines and a score or two of Maoris detach themselves from the main body, and making a sweep to the right they came round on Kawiti's flank, and, after a volley, charged with the bayonet. There was a struggle for a quarter of an hour or so, and then we saw Kawiti's people scattering in every direction.
They were badly beaten, a good many fell, and among them were two of Kawiti's own sons.
The troops before the pah fired a rocket or two into the enclosure, and, rushing forward with fixed bayonets, they drove in the stragglers, and then lay on the ground close in to the palisades. Colonel Hulme saw at once that the place was much too strong to be stormed by the bravest men without artillery, and he withdrew his men without the Maori garrison attempting to molest their retreat.
We had lost fourteen killed and over forty wounded in the fight with Kawiti: a large number out of four hundred men.
Nene's men covered the rear till all were back in the friendly camp.
Our dead were hurriedly buried, and a day or two after, Heke ordered the graves to be deepened, and the poor fellows to be more decently laid to their rest, and then he himself read over them the Maori version of the burial service.
Colonel Hulme returned with his force to Keri Keri, and re-embarked for Auckland. He expressed himself grateful for the care and tenderness with which Nene's men carried the wounded over that thirteen miles of bush road, and praised the loyalty of our allies.
Heke now found that apart from the British troops, Waka Nene alone was too much for him, and that if he could not manage to crush him before we mustered for the next attack, his cause would be lost.
He would not wait for another expedition at Okaihau; it was getting more difficult to draw his supplies; and he had to be in a position from which, if worsted, he could retreat to where our soldiers could not follow him. He removed his pah to the other side of the Mawe Lake.
A day came when Heke knew by his spies that Nene's pah was nearly empty. Two thirds of his men were absent, getting supplies from Hokianga, and now, Heke thought, he had got Nene at last. He attacked him with a force of about five to one. This roused the old warrior at last. He not only held his own, but watching some movement of hesitation or confusion in the enemy, he fiercely charged them, and drove them headlong before him. Many were killed, Heke himself was badly wounded, and very nearly captured. Heke was now thrown entirely on the defensive. He never ventured to attack Nene again. He now built a new pah at Ohaeawae, some five miles to the west of Waimate.
There was a model either of this pah or of
In the month of June, that is nearly four months after the fail of Kororareka, Captain Fitzroy received fresh reinforcements, and
Nene, with two hundred and fifty men, accompanied the troops and pitched his camp on our right, a little to the rear. On our right front there was a low hill, backed by scrub, which commanded the inside of the stockade, and there we established a battery, and fired in a desultory way on the palisades.
I left the camp before the work was finished. My brother Henry was on the Colonel's staff as interpreter. On the 30th of June I happened to be on board the “Hazard” for a day at the month of the Keri Keri river, and a little after daylight the next morning I started alone on a tramp to Ohaeawae. I first walked 10 miles to the Keri Keri station, then 10 miles to the Waimate, and then five more miles to the camp. Two miles before I reached my destination I met a friendly Maori with the unpleasant news, “O Hori Karaka your brother Henry fallen this morning, shot through the head.” Presently I met another, whose version was that he was shot through the lungs, but was still alive, and I might see him if I hurried on. A third said, “he is badly but not fatally wounded, and you will find him all right.” When I got to the camp, I learnt that during the night a party of the enemy had worked round to the rear of the battery, which commanded the works inside the pah, and watching their opportunity had carried the battery with a rush in the early morning, driven out the guard and spiked the guns with wood, and they in their turn had been driven out by a bayonet charge of the 99th. At the moment when the enemy made their rush
Before Kororareka was taken it was Phillpotts who drilled the civilians, and, on Captain Robertson being wounded, he had taken command of the “Hazard.” It was afterwards said that he had been too precipitate in his surrender of the place. It galled him terribly, and the poor fellow took it as a reflection on his courage, and was very sore about it. It made him reckless, and he joined the camp with the foreboding that he should never return. There were three of us brothers who were free and open guests to the company of officers on board the “Hazard,” and, as it happened, two of the officers bore the same distinguished name of Clarke. One day we were all five at dinner, and as you can imagine our several personalities got rather mixed. The two Lieutenants were distinguished by their familiars, one as “Polly” and the other as “Jemima” Clarke, and at Phillpotts suggestion we were nicked off, I, as “Prophecy,” Henry as “Litany,” and William as “Gospel.” Prophecy, Litany and Gospel were our current designations in the fleet to the end of the war. Gospel was a special chum. One day Phillpotts said, “Gospel, I am writing my will, what shall I leave you?” Of course William thought it a joke, and said, “Oh, leave me your Manton,” and a month after, to his great surprise and sorrow, the gun was handed over to him, and I believe he has it to this day. A day or two before the flag staff was cut down, Phillpotts took a walk by way of reconnoitring the enemy, and had been captured by Heke, disarmed, and escorted back to our lines when he gave him back his sword.
The Maoris knew him everywhere as Toby Phillpotts, and liked him for his good humour. Once at Ohaeawae, a little after dusk, Phillpotts crept up to the palisade, and began slashing with his cutlass at the flax screen, when, of courses, nothing could have been easier than to strike him down, but instead of that an awful voice came from the ground at his feet, not five yards off: “Go away Toby, go away Toby,” and he went away.
The battery had been firing all day, and Colonel Despard fancied that there must be a practicable breach, and gave the order, “prepare to storm.” Nene told him that there was no breach, and that the bravest soldiers in the world could not find a passage for two abreast, and the Senior Officer of Engineers supported him. But Despard was not to be moved. Late in the afternoon the bugle sounded the assault. The storming party consisted of two hundred men, under the command of Major Macpherson and Lieutenant Phillpotts. Phillpotts was in flannel and carrying a seaman's cutlass instead of the regulation sword. It was not a rush of more than one hundred yards.
The poor fellows went on bravely, and might as well have run their heads against a stone wall. There was not a breach wide enough for a single man to enter. Phillpotts tried to do it; two officers and ninety six men out of the two hundred were struck down before they gave up the hopeless task.
We found out afterwards that with all our bombardment, the second, or inner palisade of the stronghold was hardly scratched, and many of our round shot were sticking in the posts of the outer palisade.
Two days afterwards a flag of truce was flown from the pah, and we were invited to bury our dead. We laid thirty four together in a single pit. Captain Grant of the 58th, and Lieutenant Phillpotts were among the killed.
We afterwards laid these officers in the quiet little churchyard at Waimate. See Appendix III.
But to go back to the assault: just as it was at its height, and they were dragging the wounded in, I made my way through a
After midnight a dray load of weary, drenched, and groaning men came into the settlement, among them Major Macpherson, who had led the storming party.
The rain and the jolting had been bad enough for the poor fellows, but in the dark the bullocks had managed to take a stump and upset the dray.
I took the old Major in charge, and made him a bed on the floor by the side of my brother, to his very great content. The Major was very stout; he had been struck down by a bullet which flattened on a snuff box in his breast, and while in the act of falling another shot had gone through, the thickest flesh it could find in his body.
I was desperately tired, but my patients were feverish and restless, and I was perfectly stupid with sleepiness. They
After the repulse, Colonel Despard was naturally depressed, and began to talk about withdrawing the force. Again Nene remonstrated, telling him that it would be ruinous to the public interest, and would make the last error worse than the first. At last he said, “Well, Colonel, if you go, I mean to stay.”
It came on now to rain heavily for several days, and the trenches inside Heke's pah became so full of water that they were no longer tenable.
On the night of the roth of July the enemy silently evacuated the place, and no one knew it till next day, when they were already in the forest. We blew up the guns and burnt what we could of the place, and a few days after returned to Waimate. There the troops entrenched themselves, and remained in that position till the arrival of Captain Grey to assume the Government.
Heke had retreated far inland, and it was impossible for us to follow him.
Nene remained near Waimate, and for some time there was practically a suspension of hostilities. Heke and Kawiti parted early in September, and Kawiti built his new stronghold at Ruapekapeka, far away from what had hitherto been our fighting ground. The new pah was some ten miles inland from the head of the Kawa, Kawa, on the south eastern side of the Bay of Islands.
Active operations, as I have said, were suspended, and towards the end of October I went back to Auckland. I had been eight months in the very focus of the rebellion, and for most of the time I was the only representative of the Government in the district. I came, knowing that our only chance of
I could watch the course of affairs and do something to rally our Maori friends, and could be the channel of communication between them and the Government of Auckland. I found that my safety, until I joined the troops, was in being somewhat ostentatiously defenceless and unarmed. I never even tried to get out of Heke's way, if he had chosen to hurt me. He always said, frankly enough, that I might do anything except fight in battle. I never saw the interior of Heke's defences as long as he occupied them, and it was understood, as a point of honour between us, that I should not try to do so.
I never carried arms until the attack on Ohaeawae, and after wards when before the stronghold of Ruapekapeka. But it had been an anxious time and I was glad of a short respite.
When I was in Auckland Governor Grey arrived, and he assumed the administration on the 18th November, 1845, and at once attached me to his personal staff. He was anxious to have done with the war; he had 1,100 available men on shore at his disposal; and there were four ships of war at anchor in the bay. Grey directed Despard to move with all his force to the head of the Kawa Kawa, which was within ten miles of Kawiti's stronghold at Ruapekapeka, and which Kawiti held with a garrison of a little over two hundred men.
The Governor and I joined the expedition, and took our passage in the frigate “Castor,” which had just come from the China Station, commanded by Captain Graham, brother of Sir James Graham.
In a conference with the friendly Chiefs, I wrote instructions at the Governor's dictation as to the plan of proceedings.
Mokoare was to be detached from the main body of Nene's people on special service. He was to make his way into the difficult country behind Kawiti, and to do his best to prevent a
Our friend did his work well, and Heke was not able to send any considerable aid to his beleaguered ally. We had to cut a road from the Kawa Kawa to the front of Ruapekapeka.
Nene and his people pushed on in advance, and kept the work of road making clear of interruption.
Soon after Christmas Day we pitched our camp in sight of the stronghold and half a mile from it; we were separated from Kawiti by a deep wooded ravine. It was the strongest place we had as yet encountered, though it had a smaller garrison to defend it than that which occupied Ohacawae.
On our right front, a narrow ridge swept round the head of the ravine to the pah, and we were able to place a formidable battery of heavy guns within a hundred and fifty yards of the palisades, while we had another battery in the front of our camp. Nene's men were in high spirits at having the Governor at hand, and they built their stockade at the left rear of the advanced battery. Once only were we thrown into a few minutes confusion by a sally from the pah. There was a difficult way by which a bold enemy might sneak through the forest to our left front, and it had been left by us too slightly guarded. Suddenly our sentries on that side were driven in, and the alarm was sounded. Things looked likely to get mixed, and there was danger lest we should fire by mistake upon our own natives. Nene saw it in a moment; he was at the time with the Governor, the Colonel, and myself in the Governor's tent.
He at once begged the Colonel to order his men on no account to fire, and he (Nene) would soon account for the assailants. Calling to his men, he rushed at their head into the forest. There was a sharp skirmish, several on the other side
We, with our great guns, mortars, and rockets, including our allies, numbered about two thousand men in arms.
The garrison of the pah never reached three hundred. On Saturday, the 25th of January, we opened fire from all our guns at daylight, every shot being directed to the same part of the stockade, so as to make a breach, and we continued the bombardment till evening.
Colonel Despard seemed to have learnt nothing from our repulse at Ohaeawae, and was actually preparing to storm a stronger place.
Mohi Tawai vehemently remonstrated against the madness of the attempt, and at length the Colonel gave way.
All through the coming night a gun was fired into the breach every half hour or so to prevent its being repaired, till at length daylight broke and there was a lull.
That Sunday morning the Governor and I were at breakfast in our tent when Nene came in. He said things were very quiet in the pah, and he was going to send one of his young men to find out what it meant. He asked that with as little noise as possible a few men should be got to the advanced
In his official report to the Governor, Colonel Despard said: “Your Excellency has been an eye witness to all our operations, and, I may say, actually engaged in the assault;” which was so far true that we were in with the first party who rushed into the breach, and had to stand the fire of the enemy from outside.
Despard had good reason to rejoice that he had not repeated the blunder of Ohaeawae.
The pah turned out to be much stronger and far lesss injured than we thought. We had made a practicable breach through the outer palisade, but the inner works were not seriously broken. The inside was a network of covered ways, and the houses were all bomb-proof.
The Maoris afterwards said that on account of its being Sunday morning, they thought they were safe from an assault, and so they were taken by surprise. It took us many years to learn how to attack a Maori stockade, and in after wars we suffered terribly from our rashness and ignorance.
The capture of Ruapekapeka virtually closed the Northern war.
There were negotiations by letter between the Governor on one side and Heke and Kawiti on the other, that passed through my hands. At last peace was declared. Very wisely, in the circumstances, the Governor did not put Heke to open shame by insisting upon the re-erection of the flag-staff at Kororareka. It remained where it had fallen till both Heke and Kawiti were dead. The natives themselves who had been fighting against us set it up again in 1858.
Heke never got over the hardship of the war. He broke down in health and died in 1850, about forty, from pulmonary disease.
His widow Harriet was re-married to hook in it.” He wrote to Grey: “I am very ill, but do not grieve about that. This body is not our everlasting habitation.” He died professing the Christian faith, and kindly attended by his wife, the daughter of Hongi.
Heke's war stands quite alone in the history of our struggles with the Maori race; alone in its magnanimity, its chivalry, its courtesy, and, I dare to say, its control by Christian sentiment.
I did my best, with a good conscience, to frustrate Heke's plans, and to thwart his ambitious aims, for his success would
Personally we were always on terms of kindness, and I should be the last man to grudge him his meed of honest praise.
We had other wars afterwards that were bitter with all the elements of personal resentment; on the native side wars in which, I fear, there has been almost always more or less of excuse that we had provoked them to do their worst.
In the years to come we were to fight a people who for the most part had given up Christianity, and relapsed into their ancient ways, and who thought murder, treachery, cruelty, and, indeed, anything short of actual cannibalism, only fair reprisals in such a conflict of races.
There were many noble exceptions, but even with the best of them, they did not approach the chivalry of our first antagonists.
On our side, too, I am afraid that our hands, since that first war, were not always clean, and the feelings of our later wars took on a character of exasperation, that had no place in the conduct of the first.
I may here, too, say all that is necessary about our friend Nene and our relations with him, and the part he played among his countrymen. At the time when New Zealand was ceded, to the Queen, I roughly calculated the Maori population at about 60,000. Since the beginning of the century perhaps as many more had been carried off by war and disease, and everything portended that they were among the vanishing peoples that could not stand for long against the forces of what we call civilization.
It had been a race amongst the tribes which should be the first to arm themselves with the European rifle, and Hongi began that series of exterminating wars before which thousands and thousands disappeared.
We brought them epidemics against which we have been partially fortified by the innoculation of many generations, but
For a short time there was a rage among them for intoxicating liquors, which was a kind of defiance to the legal prohibition of their sale to the Maoris. That madness, however, has very much passed away, though intemperance is far too common a vice among them, as among ourselves.
The four greatest Chiefs of the country in my time were Waka Nene of the Ngapuhi, Whero-Whero of Waikato, Heu-Heu of Taupo, and Rauparaha of the Ngatitoa. They were all great warriors, but they were also men of exceptional ability in the diplomatic management of what we should call civil and intertribal affairs. Waka Nene was strong all through, in mind as in body. He had a singularly open, honest, and benevolent, expression of face, and though, if needs were, he could be stern enough, there was little of cruelty or vindictiveness in his composition, as there could possibly have been in one whose youth was spent in such surroundings. He was the bravest among the brave; a splendid Maori general; averse to fighting until every way of conciliation was exhausted: and, though he never heard of Polonius, with him, too, it was a maxim: “Beware of entrance to a quarrel, but being in, bear't that the opposed may beware of thee.” He was impressed with the abiding feeling that the only chance for his Race was to keep peace with the Pakeha; to accept loyally the supremacy of the Queen; and to hear themselves patiently through the slow and difficult transition from Maori custom to British law. His bare word was trusted through all the country as the most binding writing would be trusted among ourselves, and he had the power of attaching followers to his person with a devotion which made them ready to stand by him in life or in death.
If I remember right, he was the first to sign the Treaty of Waitangi; at anyrate his influence was paramount, and but for
He had for many years been a convert of the Wesleyan Mission, and received at his baptism the prefix “Thomas Walker,” to his old Maori name of Nene. From beginning to end he never swerved from his pledge of loyalty to the Queen. When he died he was buried in the little churchyard of Kororareka, having solemnly adjured his friends not to allow the Maori custom of disposing of his bones, but to let him lie at peace in a Christian grave; and over his grave the Government raised a stone monument with an inscription in both languages expressive of their gratitude, and purporting that that was the resting place of one who was alike steadfast in his friendship, for the English, and in his labours to secure the best interests of his countrymen—a chief of men, as wise in counsel as he was brave in war.
For once in a way, this was an epitaph of severe and simple truth, and there was not a word of flattery in its praise of the dead. He had been one of Hongi's lieutenants, and had traversed with his war parties the whole of the Northern Island to the neighbourhood of Cook Strait. But it war for his wisdom as a councellor, and his influence as a peace-maker, that he was specially famous. No one could set down his conciliation to weakness or fear. In his ordinary bearing be was as gentle as a child. In conversation his voice was soft as a woman's, but in the shout of battle it was said to be terrible, and it could be heard above all the clash of arms and the din of the conflict. He was hardly ever defeated, and it was his way before he fought, to look beyond the victory, and to determine the move by which it should be followed. He was half a life older than Heke, and, indeed, he regarded the action of that Chief very much as the escapade of a petulant boy. In their case, too, the struggle had none of the bitterness of personal resentment, and, when Heke made his somewhat sulky submission,
I saw him last during Colonel Gore Browne's administration, when I paid a visit to New Zealand.
The Taranake war was then at its height, and the old man told me mournfully, that his heart was darker than it had ever been, when he thought of the issue of the struggle, whether to ourselves or to the people of his own Maori race. Of this I am sure, that throughout that first Maori war we were opponents who thoroughly respected each other, not only as the brave respect the brave, but as they admire the honour, the courtesy, and the humanity that may redeem even a war of races from sinking into a mere brutal struggle for existence, or a base and greedy struggle for our ruder neighbour's goods. I need not carry you farther.
After the war was over I accompanied Governor Grey to the Southern settlements, and we secured a good deal of the disputed land at Wellington, Nelson, and elsewhere, by compensating the unsatisfied Maori owners.
In the upper valley of the Hutt new disturbances broke out in which the natives were aggressive, and, I think, almost wholly in the wrong. There was a splutter of hostilities for a few months, with considerable loss on our side, but the aggressive natives were driven back to the mountains, and their principal leader died.
From a Drawing by K. L. Sutherland.
TE RAUPARAHA.
Things continued outwardly quiet for some years, though all the while the storm I had distinctly foretold was brewing, till it broke out in the Taranake war, and the series of struggles that followed in its train.
Before this, however, the time had come when I was wanted elsewhere, and much against the advice of the Governor, and many friends, I tendered my resignation and closed the Maori chapter of my early life.
A fit of prostration had brought me very low, and I knew that neither body nor mind could bear the strain much longer. It was a sort of living martyrdom to one not over robust in health and constitution, and to be always in the storm was not at all suited to my temper. I longed for a quieter scheme of living, and it did not trouble me to give up the splendid prospects which the Governor held before me, if I could only fulfil what had been all through my peaceful ambition—to be a plain and simple preacher of Christ's Holy Gospel. It was not the mere peril and care and worry of the life which made me give it up, but the change was hastened on because I was vexed by some things which the Governor had lately done in the South, and I thought they were not as straightforward as in our dealings with the Maoris we should have been. I was very unwilling to be an agent in a policy against which my private conscience revolted, or to be entangled in a business that I could not stomach in the way of morality. So I cut the knot, and definitely withdrew from active service, much against the wishes of the Governor with whom all along I had been on the most pleasant terms of intercourse. In fact the Governor would not accept my resignation when I tendered it, and I left with the arrangement that I should have six months leave of absence, and that if at the end of that time I still persisted in resigning, my service should be closed. Nothing could have been kinder than the way in which the Governor treated me, though I am afraid he thought me rather a fool for my decision. My brother Henry suceeded to my post and became a much trusted judge of the Land Court, who was often
It was not easy at first to break with such a past as is described in these notes, and, “forgetting those things which are behind,” to subdue oneself to the yoke of a simple college student, but I did it and have never regretted it. The issue has been the long, happy, and, I hope, not quite unless life of a Congregational minister in this fair land.
The story I have tried to tell you is a story of the beginning of things. My recollections go back to a time before the formation of a single town in New Zealand, and the point to which I have brought you is still as far back as fifty years ago. You know what those fifty years have done. The New Zealand Company with all its good and evil passed away. Nearly all the territory that it claimed, and large tracts of land besides, have been acquired by purchase from the natives. Many a wilderness and solitary place has been made glad, and the desert has blossomed as the rose.
We have had many a disastrous conflict between the races; and at great expense of blood and treasure, and still more of labour and thought, the dangers and difficulties of the earlier times have been overcome. Not only in numbers, but in all other ways, the British colonists are in the ascendant.
It seems that slowly but surely the Maori race is passing away, or at least hanging in the balance, as their own native birds, the Kiwi, the Weka, the Tui, and the Korimako, are vanishing before the pheasant, the partridge, the sparrow and the linnet.
It seems as if in God's providence, our English speaking race were destined to gain a supremacy in the world's affairs of which there is no example in the history of the past. But it is sad to think how much goes down before us. Let us hope that we may put something better in its place. Forty years hence those who look back at our time will think of it as the day of small things. It is in all these colonies the day of beginnings;
For the rest—my Tasmanian friends know for themselves the manner of life I have had among them for fifty years. The foregoing story may, perhaps, help to account for it.
June 1895
Appendix I.
The Treaty of Waitangi.
6thFebruary, 1840.“Her Majesty, Victoria, Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, regarding with her Royal favour the native Chiefs and Tribes of New Zealand, and anxious to protect their just rights and property, and to secure to them the enjoyment of peace and good order, has deemed it necessary (in consequence of the great number of Her Majesty's subjects who have already settled in New Zealand, and the rapid extension of emigration both from Europe and Australia which is still in progress) to constitute and appoint a functionary properly authorized to treat with the aborigines of New Zealand for the recognition of Her Majesty's sovereign authority over the whole or any part of those islands. Her Majesty therefore being desirous to establish a settled form of civil government, with a view to avert the evil consequences which must result from the absence of the necessary laws and institutions, alike to the native population and to her subjects, has been graciously pleased to empower and to authorize me,
William Hobson , a Captain in Her Majesty's Navy, Consul and Lieutenant-Governor over such parts of New Zealand as may be, or hereafter shall be, ceded to Her Majesty, to invite the confederated and independent Chiefs of New Zealand to concur in the following articles and conditions:—“1. The Chiefs of the Confederation of the united Tribes of New Zealand, and the separate and independent Chiefs who have not become members of the Confederation, cede to Her Majesty the Queen of England, absolutely and without reservation, all the rights and powers of sovereignty which the said Confederation or independent Chiefs respectively exercise or possess, or may be supposed to exercise or possess, over their respective territories, as the sole sovereigns thereof.”
“2. Her Majesty the Queen of England confirms and guarantees to the Chiefs and Tribes of New Zealand, and to the respective families and individuals thereof, the full, exclusive, and undisturbed possession of their lands and estates, forests, fisheries, and other properties which they may collectively or individually possess, so long as it is their wish and desire to
retain the same in their possession: But the Chiefs of the united Tribes and the individual Chiefs yield to Her Majesty the exclusive right of pre-emption over such lands as the proprietors thereof may be disposed to alienate, at such prices as may be agreed upon between the respective proprietors and persons appointed by Her Majesty to treat with them in that behalf.” “3. In consideration thereof, Her Majesty the Queen of England extends to the natives of New Zealand her Royal protection, and imparts to them all the rights and privileges of British subjects.”
This short treaty was duly signed by
Captain Hobson , and by the assembled Chiefs, and attested as “Done at Waitangi, this 6th day of February, in the year of our Lord, 1840;” with the following addition:— “Now, therefore, we, the Chiefs of the Confederation of the united Tribes of New Zealand, being assembled in congress at Victoria in Waitangi, and we, the separate and independent Chiefs of New Zealand, claiming authority over the Tribes and territories which are specified after our respective names, having been made fully to understand the provisions of the foregoing treaty, accept and enter into the same in the full spirit and meaning thereof, in witness of which we have attached our signatures or marks at the places and the dates respectively specified.”
Of the forty-six who signed the treaty at first, twenty-six had signed the Declaration of Independence in 1835. In both cases they had been stirred by desire to keep the French from their land, and to obtain English protection. In both they had the sympathy of their English resident friends.
TRANSLATION OF DEED OF SALE.
Know all men by this Document, We, the Chiefs and Men of the Ngaitahu Tribe in New Zealand, whose names are undersigned, consent on this Thirty-first day of July, in the year of our Lord 1844, to give up, sell, and abandon altogether to William Wakefield, Principal Agent to the New Zealand Company of London, on behalf of the Directors of the said Company, all our claims and title to the lands comprised within the undermentioned boundaries; the names of the said lands are Otakou, Kaikarae, Taieri, Mataau, and Te Karoro; these are the boundaries, the northern boundary line commences at Purchurchu, runs along the sea shore, crossing the entrance of Otakou (Harbour), to Otupa, thence along the coast to Poatiri; the eastern boundary is the ocean from Poatiri to Tokata; thence the southern boundary runs along the summit of the Kaihiku Range, and
In the presence of these Witnesses:
-
John Jermyn Symonds, P.M.
-
Frederick Tuckett.
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George Clarke , junior, Protector of Aborigmes. -
David Scott.
A true translation of the original Deed,
George Clarke, junior, Protector of Aborigmes
I, William Wakefield, the Principal Agent of the New Zealand Company, do undertake to select one hundred and fifty thousand acres, to which the Crown's right of pre-emption has been waived in favour of the said Company, from the block of land specified in the Deed to which this is annexed, as soon as such land shall have been surveyed, leaving the unappropriated residue to to be dealt with in such manner as His Excelleney the Governor shall deem fit.
THE REV. H. WILLIAMS AT OHAEAWAE.
The memory of Archdeacon
Pakaraka, Kawakawa
Bay of Islands,
Auckland, N.Z.
October 28th 1902
Alex, Morton
Curator and Secretary Museum,
Hobart, Tasmania
Re
Model of the Ohaeawae Pah.
Sir,—I thank you for your letter of the 1st October last, in which you say you will be glad to get a clear account of what I have, relating to the taking of the Pah, to lay before the Trustees.
I will quote from an impartial witness—a military officer—who was present on the occasion. The following is an extract from “The Story of New Zealand, Past and Present, Savage and Civilized,” by
“One day the enemy made a sortie from the Pah and attacked Walker Nene's (our Maori ally) position. So sudden and unexpected was this sally, that a British flag was taken, and Colonel Despard and some senior officers only escaped by a ridiculous flight. This taken of success was hoisted inside the fortification under Heke's flag. After twenty-six shots had been fired from the thirty-two pounder, Colonel Despard thought the palisades sufficiently broken in two places for an assault, but Captain Marlow, the Senior Engineer Officer, did not consider either breach practicable. In defiance of this professional opinion, Colonel Despard ordered a storming party of 160 soldiers, under Majors Macpherson and Bridge, and 40 seamen and volunteers under Lieutenant Phillpotts, R.N., with hatchets and ropes and ladders, to be ready at 3 p.m. on 1st July. All the troops old off for this awful service paraded at the hour named, save one man of the 99th Regiment, who was taken prisoner in the morning…. When the advance was sounded, the stormers rushed on the breach at So yards, and for ten minutes tried to enter the Pah by pulling down the palisades, but the inner fence being unbroken, and two officers and half the men having gone down, the party fell back baffled from an impregnable stockade. The whole force then withdrew to a position 400 yards from the Pah.”
On page 118—“Colonel Despard was justly blamed by soldiers and civilians for sacrificing men's lives in attacking a half breached Pah, and it was whispered in military circles in London, that the Duke of Wellington on reading the dispatch, stated, that distance alone prevented him bringing Colonel Despard to a Court-Martial.”
Moss' Book “School History of New Zealand,” page 90, says:—“On the 1st July, in spite of the adverse opinion of the officer in command of the
In “The Life of
On page 113, the following extracts from letters and journals supply details. From Archdeacon
“July 3rd—Returned to the camp to endeavour to recover the bodies. On my arrival, learned that a flag of truce had been hoisted at the Pah, and
See also “Plain Facts relative to the late war in the Northern District of New Zealand,” printed by Philip Kunst, of Auckland, 1847, pages 21 and 22.
Archdeacon Williams, for he is the Mr. Williams referred to, had for more than twenty years been a Minister of the Gospel of Peace amongst the Maoris, and is it at all probable that he would have interfered in military matters and advised an assault on the Pah, or that a military commander would order an assault on the advice of a civilian?
Archdeacon Williams had served for nine years in his youth as an Officer in His Majesty's Navy, and was too good a disciplinarian to interfere in matters outside his own calling.
It will be seen from the above extracts from Archdeacon Williams's Journal that he did not see Colonel Despard until after the assault, having only arrived at Ohaeawae whilst the assault was being made.
I trust that your Board of Trustees, after verifying the above quotations, will be satisfied that it would be only just and proper to remove the statement which is attached to the Model.