There has j ist pa-ssed from om.
niiclst :in oW ni;u:, tor many yeaW
resident iii \[aiU)oiOi'.gh (thougli of
laU- bill iitl.l«» Iviiown outside his own
imir.ediale cirole), the' stra.iigp
ronienco and ndveiituros of whose life
ins been equtlled oniy by its tragic
sadness. Wo veier to the late Mr
Kiuille Bent., who v.-us admitted to
ttie Waiiau Hospiial on 22nd M;<-y,
and dio<' (he .saii.e evening. Tht-
j>toi-y of his ht"o, ^vi)tt'n by Mr James
Covan Fron« ft-nt's, own manuscript
records and {'^''"'•onal reminiscenxies, '
afford a. striiiir.;? illustration of the
old adage t'-u*-. • 'truth is stra-nger
ilian fiction." Hoin at liii^itport jn
rthe State of Maine, l.S.A., in 1837,
witli a strain ,>f N'>rth A.iiericau
Indian Ulood i.;i his veins from his.
another's wde, he ^servetl as a youth
;f(.r three yea.-,-; in trie American navy,
.and, sidjsiexju^v-'.tly nnaiiig his wa-y Ut
'.'England, erh.ied in ilie 57th He^g^-
rient of Foe'. Toward.s the clcse. of
• the great mutiny his regi nent was
-Ordered to Irrdia, wliere it remained
for two yenvh. Then ou the out-
■fcreak ■f>l' the rii;Hn-i War it wis tTan.s-
ferred to lS(y.v- /.eiah-md. The voyag*^
^to Aiickliird tn(»k nearly ;thre«v
rxiunths, and o. ^irrival there the rt>gi-
'inent was i.mi'Kfdiat^-'ly despatched to
IN '^ w 1' 1 y m 1 1 ! h . and e n ea m ped for , la
.sliort time ou iVi^rshmd Hill. Of the
lte.;t few ye:*.r;>' active .service it is
needies-s tc> speak, except to say that
the severe ■ii<unit.'imcnts which Bent,
Kiiffercd, and ivhich sliaped the whole
of his after ciner, w(M-e foi- act.s of
insubordination, for the mo.st paj't of
a urivial nature, and doubtless aiU
o'ltcome of ti:e mea-vuj-e of Indian
blood ho had inheri(ed. Under cir-
©ximstances which he always stoutly
iRaintaiiifM.i jur.tifvxl Ins. .action, ho
■ desert<Hl froi;; his regiment, and wa.s
imirierliately (-:!p''>""e<l by (he Maoris,
.among whom iie lived, pru-lically as
SL slave, unl.i.! ^.fter the close <n the
wai. Jlegnrdvxl a.s a <langorous rebel,
mi'.ny crime:, wci-e hiic' at nis <loor,
. and he wa;; .-«um otitlawed with a
heavy ptMially oti Ids head. To .shoot
liiin iind win therewaifl wa.s the. eager
.cle'-emilnatio'; oi .nany. an<l on ono
oce,;;- ion ail iruKteent man, :-iipiws<Hl
tc be I'.ent, v/ \s niifevi unaLeiy killed
Ijy mistake. .\li efforts to capture
liim were futile. He was as Kucces»-
fnl ".1 dodging the Pakeha ludlet as
the Maori tonvUiawk. Some time
afier the aiinesty wa>- proclaimed he
•©n;i. get! fu>r,i the bush and a. rela-
on^hvivored to pvrsiuuie hir. to leave
New Zealand a-t once, and since then
rcu-.:ive« in Maine have ,v;iinly
rei'fi'ted their efforts to induco bin
turn to -bi ; native land. M>
to ^
alw.-
;-S pOMt
refused to leave lh'
mi •
do-
inc
tirV.
lau
bc' ■
Ne.
Mv-
fo.. .
kr^ -,
ho-ff-'i
oo:;'try uutil Ids name and cli.iractei
"had been elenrefl of the charges for j
w^'irh he ha.d been outlawed. The.^^M
he :i^ways vk«»"»!mced a.s a ti.ssue oi
nx.^.lidoa.'^ ai**! coAvardly faJselioods.
fo'- which there was not only no
ve-jti;'e of p<it«i)f, but which !»<> could
ah.so'V.telT disprore, if given the I
opportunity. Even- ehorc tnade b\
^yaio^thiseV"* on his lehilf in thi>
rW--vt failed, Vind he has died wi( li-
on. j.ettiiUg the chance to rel)iit th.'
j;e''>ii-, ciiarges once made again.-^L
hi-v. ISlorc sinned aga.mst than sin-
whatovor laray lave been his
i!-e« or wivjog-doings, he has paid
'- for tlw^ni. Soon after jeturn-
civdiscnl 'life, he found occupa-
-.t "WanraH on the farm of the
"^Ir Slaffard, with whom he had
actiuaijited thnnigh .sonu^
Ishind n.itivcs. It; Mr and
•tKifford a4!d tlK>ir family he
the kindest Triends he had ever
. in Xc'v Zeeland. and in their
ble home he lr«.'« spent the
.p_TCii»»£ ■oi" i^'^ d-'*^, liviTcJ u V'--ry
quiet and retired life, but always'
willing to talk over with anyone who
<le«ired it, some of the thrilling
ailventnres of his <;arlier years. Of
Tito-Kowarn, ihe great rebel chief
vvh.o owned him a.^ a slave ior scvtM-al
Vfiar>, he always spoke in kindl\
Urms. The story of his care>er, a.s '
toild bv Mr Cov.aii, ,\ill ever be le-
giuded as a cla.s,si<' of Maori life, as
ifc was iift.v years ago, when th.e
Maori wa.s at war witii the European,
ani we slioiild strongly rtK'ommend
anvone who has not yet done .so to
tWid "The .Vdvcntures of .Kiiid>lo
tient." The late Mr Bent wa.s 79
Vijars old at the lime of hi.i dea.th.
A REBEL OP;^ THE
SIXTIES.
KIMBLE BENT AND THE PATEA.
'liie recent adveuturous trip ol' 1(J0
milos down t]ie I'atea river in a flat-
bottomed boat bv Jfour Eitliam young
moti, brings to mind the .story of that
rebel and Pakeha-Maori Kimble Bent,
Avho for years had his home up the
Pa tea river, where amongst the wild
and rugged hills he thought himself
safe from capture (writes "NV.K.H. in the
Aucftand "Star"). Bent died at the
Wuiroa Hospital about seven years ago
fit a great age. His story is soon told.
Ho belonged to the old 67th Regiment,
joining it as long ago as 18o9. He came
to New Zealand in 1863, and was in
Taranaki the following year. At a small
place between Patea and Hawera, BenC
was sentenced to receive 25 strokes of
the la&h for disobeying orders, showing
how the severity of the Home rules had
at that time been allowed to enter this
young free country. From the moment
Kimble Bent bared his hafk he was a
rebel and an outcast, and tlie very first
chance he got he deserted to the Maoris
and lived with them for many decades,
adopting their rough mode of living and
becoming one of their number. He
ronld never be captured, and his chief
liiding-place was up the Patea river,
wli'ch we now know to he one of the
most inaccessible spots that anyone
could imagine, being full of natural hid-
ing-places that onTv the most skilled
could find out. AMien public feeling
against him died down a good deal, for
be greatly aided the Maori in his war-
fare against the pakeha, he came out of
his hiding-place and made it luiowu
that he wished to visit ciyilisati^i
again, and no serious objection was
made by the authoritios to his doing so.
Sviiile in hiding he fashioned a canoe oF
vpry fine design with the old-fashioned
Maori stone axes of a bygone ago of a
century before, and in this canoe he
paddled down the rivor to tbc Patea
wharf, a picturesque if a somewhat
pathetic figure, chanting as he sailed a
Slaori dirge which was now more fafnili-
ar to him than tjie words of his own
forgotten. Arrived ot tlie Patea
wharf he seemed to be engaged a good
deal with his own thoughts, and sat in
his boat for a long jpexnod, as was the
custom of tlie old-time Maoris, whose
ways ho had thoroughly imbibed. He
was viewed Avith a good deal of sus-
picion by his white brethren, and the
feeling must have been mutual, for he
could not be induced to say much about
himself. One of the first things that he
asked for was Abernctliy biscuits, and
when he had eaten one he^said it was
the sweetest morsel he had tasted for
years. He looked a wild man, and
there was a wild look in his eyes when
he remembered that for some years a
price had been put on his head as a
deserter and a rebel, and ho was not
happy when he came back to civilisji-
tion, for he felt completely out of his
element. He had lived too long amongst
savage people, and had acted such a
strange part, that he could not in a day
reconcile himself to a civilised way of
doing things. He soon paddled back,
taking advantage of the incoming tide '
to h^p him, to his usual haunts up)
the river, where it was said ho dis- i
carded for ever his old blanket and flax
loin cloth for a suit which had been i
given to him by one -of the sailors from \
one of the steamers at the Patea wharf.
He was not a lovable character, and
had witnessed and taken part in many
cannilialistic feasts, and this was an
example of how easy it is for a x>^rson
to slip away from a civilised to an un-.,
civili^ life. The old Taranaki set- ^
tiers hated Bent, among other reasons
being the fact that he was a gi'eat
friend and adviser of that old rebel
and uiifair fighter Titokowaru, whoso
dark deeds and treachery stain the
blackest page in Taranaki's history.
Probably the youths who recently sailed
down the Patea River and weJe hardly
able to find a flat piece of ground
whereon to pitch their tents for the
night knew little of Kimble Bent's his-
tory, but from those picturesque heights
the oW rebel must have basked in the
sunlight to hide his own dark thoughts
and to feel that, arch rebel though he
was. he was still a human being who
could enjoy the best of God's good gifts.
/■^Z-
THE LIBRARY
OF
THE UNIVERSITY
OF CALIFORNIA
LOS ANGELES
THE ADVENTURES OF
KIMBLE BENT
MAi- OF TAKANAKl, NEW ZEALAND.
{allowing engagements in the Maori War)
THE ADVENTURES
OF KIMBLE BENT
A STORT OF IVILD LIFE IN THE
NEW ZEALAND BUSH
JAMES COWAN
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS
WHITCOMBE AND TOMBS, LIMITED
LONDON MELBOURNE
CHRISTCHURCH, WELLINGTON AND DUNEDIN, N.Z.
191 I
PRINTED AND BOUND BY
HAZELL, WATSON AND VINEY, LD.,
LONDON AND AYLESBURY.
DLL
6^22
PREFACE
This book is not a work of fiction. It is a plain
narrative of real life in the New Zealand bush, a
true story of adventure in a day not yet remote,
when adventure in abundance was still to be had
in the land of the Maori. Every name used is a
real one, every character who appears in these
pages had existence in those war days of forty
years ago. Every incident described here is a
faithful record of actual happenings ; some of
them may convince the reader that truth can be
stranger than fiction.
Numerous instances are recorded of white de-
serters from civilisation who have allied themselves
with savages, adopting barbarous practices, and
forgetting even their mother-tongue. In the old
convict days of 'New South Wales escapees from the
fetters of a more than rigorous " system " now and
again cast in their lot with the blacks. Renegades
of every European nationality have been found
living with and fighting for native tribes in Africa
2072 ? 70
viii PREFACE
and America and the Islands of Polynesia. But
none of them had a wilder story to tell than has
the man Avhose narrative is here presented — Kimble
Bent, the pakeha-Mnori. Ever since 1865 — when
he first " took to the blanket " — he has lived with
the New Zealand Maoris. For thirteen years he
was completely estranged from his fellow-whites ;
he had deserted from a British regiment and a price
was on his head. British troops and Colonial
irregulars alike hunted him and his fanatical
Hauhau companions. His hairbreadth escapes were
many ; he had to risk death not only from British
bullet and bayonet, but from the savage brown
men of the forest with whom he lived. When
at last he came out of hiding, and dared once more
to face those of his own colour, he had almost
forgotten the English language, and could speak
it but with difficulty and hesitation. He has been
out of his bush exile many years, but is still living
with his Maori friends, and is still known by the
Maori name, " Tu-nui-a-moa," which his chief
Titokowaru gave him in 1868. When he writes to
me, he usually writes in Maori, and he is practically
a Maori himself, for he has lived the greater part
of his life as a Maori, and he has assimilated the
peculiar modes of thought and some of the ancient
beliefs of the natives, as well as their tongue and
customs.
PREFACE ix
One of the most remarkable portions of Bent's
narrative is his account of the revival of cannibalism
by the Hauhaus in 1868. Vague stories have been
heard concerning the eating of soldiers' bodies by
the bushmen of Ngati-Ruanui and Nga-Rauru
and of rites of human sacrifices performed in the
woods of Taranaki, but this account of Bent's is
the first detailed description from an eye-witness
of the man-eating practices in Titokowaru's camps.
Many of Tito's Hauhaus are still alive ; but they
are very reticent on the subject of "long-pig."
I first met Kimble Bent in 1903. In that year
Mr. T. E. Donne, now the New Zealand Govern-
ment Trade Commissioner in London, had induced
the old man to come to Wellington for the purpose
of being interviewed and photographed ; and it is
these interviews, very considerably expanded during
a seven years' acquaintance with Bent, and carefully
checked by independent Maori testimony, that
are now embodied in this book.
In confirmation and extension of Bent's story, I
have gathered data at first-hand both from Tara-
naki Maoris who fought under Titokowaru, and
from soldiers and settlers who fought against him,
and these particulars are incorporated with the
old pakeha-Maori's narrative.
The 1868-9 portion of the book is, therefore,
practically a history of the Titokowaru war in
X PREFACE
Taranaki ; and it embraces a great deal of matter
not hitherto recorded.
Many of the settler-soldiers who survive from
those wild forest days now farm their peaceful
lands within sight of the battle-fields of Te Ngutu-
o-te-Manu, and Pungarehu, and Moturoa, and
Otapawa. With them the recollections of bush-
marches and ambuscades and storming of Hauhau
stockades are still fresh and vivid. But the younger
generation know little of the dangers and troubles
through which the pioneers passed. The available
histories deal very meagrelj^ and often very in-
accurately with the story of the Ten- Years' Maori
War, even from the white side, while the Maori
view-point is absolutely unknown to all but a few
colonists. Therefore it is fortunate, perhaps, that
one has been enabled to gather before it is too late
from the old Hauhau warriors themselves the tale
of their ferociously patriotic past, and to place on
record this true story of wild forest life from the
lips of one of the last of that nearly extinct type
of decivilised outlander, the 7)aA:e^a-Maori.
For information and assistance in regard to
various engagements in Titokowaru's war I am
indebted to Colonel W. E. Gudgeon, C.M.G., Colonel
T. Porter, C.B., and other old Colonial soldiers.
Tutange Waionui, of Patea, who was one of Titoko-
waru's most active scouts and warriors, has given
PREFACE xi
me many details concerning the campaign from
the Maori side ; and the Rev. T, G. Hammond,
Wesleyan Missionary to the Taranaki Maoris, has
also furnished assistance on the same subject. To
Mrs. Kettle, of Napier, daughter of Major von
Tempsky, I owe my thanks for permission to
reproduce three of the illustrations in this book,
copies of water-colour sketches by her celebrated
father, representing scenes in the Taranaki campaign
of 1865-6. The picture of the fight at Moturoa
in 1868 is from a black-and-white sketch by a
soldier-artist who took part in the engagement ;
the original was in the possession of the late Dr.
T. M. Hocken, of Dunedin, who allowed me to
have it photographed for this book,
J. C.
\\' ELLINGTON, N.Z.,
Feb. 1, 1911.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I
THE DESERTER
On the banks of tlie Tangahoe — Tlie runaway soldier — -A
Maori scout — Off to the rebel camp . . . pp. 1-6
CHAPTER II
KIMBLE BENT, SAILOR AND SOLDIER
Kimble Bent's early life — An Indian mother — Service in the
American Navy — Departiu'e for England — " Taking the Shil-
ling " — British Army life — The flight to America — A sinking
ship — Rescue, and landing in Glasgow— Back to the Army again
— Soldiering in India — The 57th ordered to New Zealand — The
Taranaki Campaign — A court-martial — At the triangles
pp. 7-21
CHAPTER III
THE CAMP OF THE HAUHAUS
In the Maori country — Arrival at a Hauhau pa — Maori
village scenes — The ceremonies round the sacred flagstaff —
" Rire, rire, hau ! " — The man with the tomahawk — A white
slave — The painted warriors of Keteonetea — The blazing
oven pp. 22-33
xiv CONTENTS
CHAPTER IV
IN THE OTAPAWA STOCKADE
The return from Keteonetea — The hill-fort at Otapawa —
A korero with the Hauhaus — Bent's one-eyed wife — " The
wooing o' 't " — Bent is christened " Ringiringi " . pp. 34-42
CHAPTER V
TE UA, PRIEST AND PROPHET
Te Ua and his gods — The Pai marire faith — " Charming "
the British bullets — Bent's interview with the prophet — His
life tapu'd — Preparing for battle — Life in the forest pa
pp. 43-54
CHAPTER VI
THE STORMING OF OTAPAWA
British forces attack the stockade — The bayonet charge —
Flight of the Hauhaus — Through the forest by torchlight —
Doctoring the wounded — The tangi by the I'iver . pp 55-65
CHAPTER VII
BUSH LIFE WITH THE HAUHAUS
Wild days in the forest — 'J'hc Hauliau hunters — Maori wood-
craft — Bird-snaring and birtl-spoaring — The fowlers at Te
Ngaere — The slayer of Broughton — Another runaway soldier,
and his fate — The tomahawking of Humphrey Murphy
pp. OG-77
CONTENTS XV
CHAPTER VIII
THE HAUHAU COUNCIL-TOWN
I,it'e in Taiporohcnui — A great praying-house — -The ritual
of tho Niu — Singular Hauhau chants — " Matua Pai marire''^ —
Bent's new owner, and his now wife — The tattooers — Another
white renegade .... . pp. 78-91
CHAPTER IX
A FOREST ADVENTURE
The two eel-fishers — Bivouac in tho bush — A murderous
attack — The Waikato's tomahawk — " Ringiringi's " escape
pp. 92-101
CHAPTER X
THE WAR-CHIEF AND HIS GODS
The war-chief Titokowaru — Ancient ceremonies and religion
revived — Uenuku, the god of battle — Titokowaru's mana-tapu
— Bent makes cartridges for the Hauhaus — A novel weapon
pp. 102-107
CHAPTER XI
" THE BEAK-OF-THE-BIRD "
The stockade at Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu — In the Wharekurn
• — Singular Hauhau war-rites — The " Twelve Apostles " — The
enchanted taiuha — The heart of the pakeha : a human bur it-
ofTering — An ambuscade and a cannibal feast . pp. 108-1 18
h
xvi CONTENTS
CHAPTER XII
THE ATTACK ON TURUTURU-MOKAI REDOUBT
Haiuvhenua's war-party — A night marcli — Attack on Tin-u-
turu-Mokai Redoubt — A heroic defence — The heart of the
captain — Touch-and-go — Relief at last . . pp. 119-133
CHAPTER XIII
THE KILLING OF KANE
Bent and Kane brought before Titokowaru — Kane's flight-
Captured by the Hauhaus — A traitor's end . pp. 134-138
CHAPTER XIV
ADVENTURES AT TE NGUTU-0-TE-MANU
In the midst of dangers — Bent stalked by Hauhaus — Old
Jacob to the rescue — " Come on if you dare ! " — The wliite
man's new Maori name — Government forces attack and burn
Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu — A new use for hand-grenades pp. 139-144
CHAPTER XV
A BATTLE IN THE FOREST ; AND THE DEATH OF
VON TEMPSKY
The second fight at Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu — Titokowaru's
projDliecy — Tutang6 and his sacred war-mat — Bent's narrow
escape — Government forces defeated— How von Tempsky fell
— A terrible retreat — Colonial soldiers' gallant rearguard figlit
pp. 145-179
CONTENTS xvii
CHAPTER XVI
THE CANNIBALS OF THE BUSH
After the battle — Tlie slain heroes of Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu —
A terrible scene on the marae — What Bent saw from his prison-
hut — The sword of '' Manu-rau " — A funeral pyre — Priestly
incantations — A soldier's body eaten — Why the Hauhaus
became cannibals ...... pp. 180-194
CHAPTER XVII
SKIRMISHING AND FORT-BUILDING
Te Ngutu-o-te-!Manii abandoned — On the march again —
Skirmishing on the Patea — Pakeha in pickle — A new stockade
— Bent the pa-builder ..... pp. 195-200
CHAPTER XVIII
THE FIGHT AT MOTUROA STOCKADE
Katene's vigil — Attack on the stockade — Major Hunter's
death — A Hauhau warrior's desperate feat — Over the palisades
— Government forces repulsed — A rear-guard fight — An un-
answered prayer — Scenes of terror — Tihirua's burnt-offering — A
soldier's body eaten ...... pp. 201-225
CHAPTER XIX
THE TAURANGA-IKA STOCKADE
Another fighting-pa built — Scouting and skirmishing — The
watcher on the tower — McDonnell and Titokowaru — How
Trooper Lingard won the New Zealand Cross — Hairbreadth
escapes — Pairama and the white man's leg , pp. 226-2.39
xviii CONTENTS
CHAPTER XX
A SCOUTING ADVENTURE
The passage of the Okehu — A night's vigil — Mackenzie the
scout — " Maoris in the bush ! " — Tlie watchers in the fern — A
race for hfo ....... pp. 240-254
CHAPTER XXI
THE FALL OF TAURANGA-IKA
Shot and shell — The fort abandoned — Flight of the Hanhaus
— The chase — The fight at Karaka Flat — Mutilation of the dead
— The ambuscade at the peach-grove — The sergeant's leg —
Rewards for Hauhau heads. .... pp. 255-261
CHAPTER XXII
THE FOREST-FORAGERS
Fugitive Hauhavis — Hard times in the bush — The eaters
of mamaku — Bent's adventiu'c — Lost in the woods — Rupo to
the rescue — The tapu'd eels .... pp. 2G2-269
CHAPTER XXIII
A BATTLE IN THE FOG
The surprise of Otautu — An early morning attack — Kimble
Bent's dream — " Kia tu])ato !" — A gallant defence — Bravo old
JIakopa— Flight of the Hauhaus . . . pp. 270-270
CONTENTS xix
CHAPTER XXIV
THE HEAD-HUNTERS
The skiriiiisli at ^^ haUainara — Hauliaus on the run — Govern-
ment head-hunters — IMajor Kemp's white scout — Sharp work
in the bush — Barbarism of the Wlianganui — Kupapas — Smoke-
drying the heads — A present for Whitmore — The heads on
the tent floor — End of the war .... pp. 277-292
CHAPTER XXV
THE LAND OF REFUGE
Tlie flight from Rukumoana — Retreat to the Waitara — The
Kawau pa — Life in the Ngatimaru country — Rupe and his
white man — A Maori Donnybrook fair — A tale of a taniwha
pp. 293-305
CHAPTER XXVI
BUSH LIFE ON THE PATEA
The return to Rukumoana — The forest-village — Bird-snaring
and bird-spearing — Bent the canoe-builder — His third wife
pp. 3U6-310
CHAPTER XXVII
HIROKI : THE STORY OF A FUGITIVE
Hiroki, the slayer of McLean — Strange faces at Rukumoana
— A foi'ost chase — A meeting and a warning — Hiroki's wild
bush life and his end . . , . . pp. 311-320
XX CONTENTS
CHAPTER XXVIII
OUT OF EXILE
Canoeing on the Patea — The voyage to Hukatere — The
white man's world again — Bent the medicine-man — Makutu,
or the Black Art — Bent's later days — The end . pp. 321-332
Appendix pp. 333-336
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
Sketch Map of Taranaki .... Frontispiece
PAGK
Mount Eomont, Taranaki . . . . . .15
A Taranaki Frontier Fort . . . . .17
Patara, a Hauhau Prophet ..... 47
A British Column on the March . . . . G9
The Scout 85
The Ambuscade . . . . . . .113
TuTANGE Waionui, A Hauhau Warrior . . .151
Major von Tempsky . . . . . . .159
Major von Tempsky . . . . . . .173
Major Kemp (Kepa te Rangihiwinui) . . .211
The Fight at Moturoa ..... 218, 219
A Hauhau Scout ....... 235
A Constabulary Officer in Bush-fighting Costume . 279
Kimble Bent, the Pakeha-Maori .... 32»
THE ADVENTURES OF
KIMBLE BENT
CHAPTER I
THE DESERTER
On the banks of tlie Taiigalioe — The runaway soldier — A
Maori scout — Off to the rebel camp.
On the banks of one of the many swift rivers that
roll down to the Tasman Sea through the Taranaki
Plains a young man in the blue undress uniform of
a private soldier sat smoking his pipe. He was
dripping with water, and a little pool had collected
where he crouched in the fern, a few feet from the
bank of the stream. He had plainly just emerged
from the river. His clothes were torn, and he was
capless. He was a man of about the middle size,
spare of build, with sharp dark eyes and a bronzed
complexion that told of past life under a tropic sun.
Less than an hour previously he had left his com-
rades' camp, the tented lines of Her Majesty's 57th
Regiment, on the ferny flats of Manawapou. Left
unofficially, and without his arms, strolling down
1
2 THE ADVENTURES OP KIMBLE BENT
towards the Taiigalioe River as if for a bathe. A
" shut-eye " sentry was on duty that morning ; and
the deserter's tent-mates, too, were sympathetically
blind to his departure. The Tangahoe was the
border-line between the country covered by the
British rifles and the unconquerable bush of the Maori
rebels. Towards this rubicon he made his way
through the thick, high fern, which soon concealed
him from view. He attempted to ford the rapid,
muddy river, but it was up to his waist, and almost
swept him off his feet. Struggling ashore again, he
took to the fern and travelled slo^^'ly and with great
toil through it, keeping parallel with the course of
the Tangahoe, and heading down stream. He
forced his way through the thick fern " like a wild
pig," to use his own simile. In this way he travelled
something over a mile down the river, and then
once more attempted to ford across, but it was
too deep and swift. He crawled back up the bank
again, and quite exhausted, with scratched hands
and face and gaping half-buttonless clothes, he
sat down to recover his breath and strength. His
heart Mas thumping fearfully with his frantic ex-
ertions in the closely matted, entanghng fern, and
it was some minutes before he could command his
trembling fingers to till and light his pipe.
After the soldier had sat and smoked a while he
rose, and making his way to a slight elevation on
the banks where he could see over the top of the
THE DESERTER 3
coarse rarauhe fern, in some places ten feet high,
he looked around him. Directly across the river
the bush began, the seemingly impenetrable forest
solemn and dark, pregnant with danger and mystery
Turning in the other direction, and facing the north-
west, he could just discern in the distance the
tops of a number of bell-tents — the camp he had
left behind him. And as he looked his last on the
tents of his comrades and his tyrants, he heard the
sweet notes of a bugle sounding a call. The mid-
winter air was very clear and still. It was the
midday mess call — " Come-to-the-cookhouse-door,"
" No more cookhouse-door now, that's a moral,"
said the soldier aloud. " Pork and potatoes for
you, me boy — or else a crack on the head with a
tomahawk."
Beyond the tents, another tent-shaped object
took the soldier's eye. It was a lofty snowy moun-
tain, ghttering in the midday sun. It was far
away in the nor'-west, so far that its base was
hidden by the intervening bush, and only the
white symmetrical upper part of the vast cone,
a wedge of white culminating in as perfect an
apex as any beU-tent, was visible to the eye from
this part of the great plains. It was the peak of
Taranaki mountain, wliich the white man calls
Mount Egmont.
Satisfying himself that there was no one in
sight and that he was not followed, the soldier
4 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
squatted down again and smoked his pipe medi-
tatively.
Suddenly he started up and listened intently.
He heard something, and any noise meant danger.
The sound was the trotting of a horse.
Scrambling through the fern a little space back
from the bank, he found that a narrow track wound
through the tangle of tall brown bracken. Peering
out from his shelter place he saw — first, the glitter
of the muzzle of a long rifle above the fern ; then,
next moment round a turn in the path came a
mounted man, a Maori. He was a tall, black-
bearded fellow, wearing a European shirt and
trousers, but bare as to feet. Each stirrup-iron
was thrust between the big toe and the next one,
as was the universal Maori mode when riding
bare-footed. In his right hand he held an Enfield
rifle, of the pattern used by the white troops in
those days ; the butt rested on liis thigh, cavalry-
man fashion. Round his shoulders hung a leather
cartouche-box ; there was another buckled round
his waist, from which there hung also a revolver
in its case. A Hauliau scout, evidently, venturing
rather daringly close to the British camp.
The white man hesitated only a moment. Then
he boldly stepped out on to the track, directly in
front of the startled Maori, who pulled his shaggy
pony up sharp, and instantly presented his gun at
the white man.
THE DESERTER 5
Seeing the next moment, however, that the
white man was unarmed and alone, the Maori
brought his rifle-butt down on his leg again, and
stared with wonder at the forlorn -looking white
soldier before him.
" Here, you pakeha ! " he cried, in mixed English
and Maori ; " go back, quick ! Haere atu, haere
atu ! Go 'way back to t'e soldiers. I shoot you
suppose you no go ! Hoki atu ! "
" Shoot away ! " returned the white man. " I
won't go back. I'm running away from the soldiers.
I want to go to the Maoris. Take me with you ! "
" You tangata kuware ! " the Maori said. " You
pakeha fool, go back ! T'e Maori kill you, my
word ! You look out."
" I don't care if they do," replied the soldier.
" I tell you, I want to live with the Hauhaus."
'' E pai ana'"/ ("It is well"), said the scout.
" All right, you come along. But you look out
for my tribe — they kill you."
" I'm not frightened of your tribe," said the
soldier.
" What your name, pakeha ? " was the next
question.
" Kimble Bent," answered the pakeha.
The Maori attempted the pronunciation of the
name, but the nearest he could get to it was " Ki-
rn ara Peneti."
"Too hard a name for t'e Maori," he said.
6 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
" Taihoa ; we give you more better name — good
Maori name. If " — he qualified it — " my tribe
don't kill you."
Then the swarthy warrior dismounted and ordered
the pakeha to get into the saddle ; he saw that his
prisoner was dead-tired. He turned the horse's
head back towards the Maori country, and the
strangely-met pair struck down along the banks
of the Tangahoe, the Maori striding in front.
For about three miles the track wound down
through the fern and flax, parallel with the course
of the river. Then the travellers came to a ford.
They crossed safely, and clambering up the steep
muddy bank on the other side, they marched on
towards the blue hills of the rebel country.
CHAPTER II
KIMBLE BENT, SAILOR AND SOLDIER
Kimble Bent's early life — An Jndian mother — Service in the
American Navy — Departiu'e for England — " Taking the Shil-
ling " — British Army life — The flight to America — A sinking
ship — Rescue, and landing in Glasgow — Back to the Army again
-^Soldiering in India — The 57th ordered to New Zealand — The
Taranaki Campaign^A court-martial — At the triangles.
While the runaway soldier is riding on to the
camp of the brown warriors of the bush — a journey
which is to be the beginning of a wild and savage
life leading him for many a day, like Thoreau's
Indian fighter, on dim forest trails " with an uneasy
scalp " — there is time to learn something of liis
previous history and adventures.
Perhaps the impulse that led to his passionate
revolt against civilisation and rigid army discipline
came from his American Indian blood.
ICimble Bent's mother was a half-caste Red
Indian girl, of the Musqua tribe, whose villages
stood on the banks of the St. Croix River, State of
Maine, U.S.A. Her English name before marriage
was Eliza Senter. She became the wife of a ship-
builder in the town of Eastport, Maine ; his name
7
8 THE ADVENTUREJS OF KIMBLE BENT
was Waterman Bent ; he worked at first for Caleb
Houston, shipbuilder, but afterwards had a yard
of his own. This couple had seven children, two
sons and five daughters ; one of these sons was
Kimble Bent. He was born in Eastport on
August 24, 1837.
The roving wayward element in young Kimble
Bent's blood soon made itself manifest. When he
was about seventeen, he ran away from home and
went to sea. He shipped on a United States
man-of-war, the training frigate Martin, and spent
three years aboard her, cruising along the Atlantic
Coast. He quickly became a smart young sailor
and gunner, and from the rank of seaman he
graduated to deckman, a sort of quartermaster.
It was part of his duty during the last year of his
service to instruct the boys who came aboard as
recruits in the working of the muzzle-loading
6-pounder and 8-pounder guns.
Paid off from his frigate at the end of his three
years, Bent returned to his people as unexpectedly
as he had left them. But he didn't stay in Eastport
long. The prosaic life of the old town was no more
to his liking than when first he had run away to
follow a sailor's life ; so he soon took to the seas
again. He gathered together what money he
could — a considerable sum, he says, for his father
was indulgent — and took ship across the Atlantic,
in his head some such unexpressed sentiment as
SAILOR AND SOLDIER 9
Robert Louis Stevenson long afterwards put into
verse in his " Songs of Travel " :
" TIic uiitcntcd Kosinos my abode
I go, a wilful stranger,
My mistress still the open road
And the bright eyes of Danger."
But no man-of-war life for him. He booked his
passage in a barque sailing for Liverpool, resolved
to see something of life in the Old World.
When he landed in the big city he " made himself
flash," to use his own expression, and went the
pace with a few like-minded young fellows, and one
way and another his stock of cash soon vanished,
and he found himself stranded, friendless, and
alone — his companions of the " flush " times had
no more use for him. One day, as he wandered
disconsolate along the streets, his eye was taken by
the scarlet tunic and lively bearing of a smart
recruiting-sergeant, and on the impulse of the
moment he took the Queen's shilling and was en-
listed in Her Majesty's 57th Regiment of Foot.
This was in the year 1859.
The young Eastport sailor soon bitterly regretted
the day that his eye was dazzled by the Queen's
scarlet. The British Army was less to his taste
than life in Uncle Sam's Navy. He was sent to
Cork with a draft of two hundred other recruits,
and the interminable drill soon gave him an intense
disgust for the routine of barrack-yard instruction.
10 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
Four months of recruit-drill — then one day Private
Bent took a stroll down the Cork wharves and cast
his eyes round for a likely craft in which to give
the army, drill-sergeants, and all the slip.
A Boston barque, the Maria, happened to be
lying at one of the tees, and her skipper, one Captain
Cann, Bent, to his joy, found to be an old acquaint-
ance. He unfolded his dejected tale, and the sailor
at once offered his assistance in rescuing a fellow-
countryman from John Bull's grip. That evening
Bent stole away quietly from the barracks, boarded
the barque, and was stowed away safely below in
the dunnage-hole. He did not show his nose above
hatches for two days ; the barque by that time
had left the harbour on her return voyage to Boston,
and the deserter was able to appear on deck, a free
man.
But not for long. J^ent's misfortunes were only
beginning. When about three hundred miles off
the land a furious easterly gale began to blow, and
the old barkey sprang a leak. Hove-to in the
storm, all the crew could do was to stand to the
pumps. The huge Atlantic seas came thundering
on deck, and more than once washed the men away
from the pumps. For six days and six nights they
wallowed in the deep, all hands, sailors and pas-
sengers, taking turns at the pumps, working for
their lives.
All those terrible days of storm and fear the
SAILOR AND SOLDIER 11
Maria's hands had nothing to eat but hard biscuits
soaked with salt water. There was no place to
cook and no means of cooking, for the galley with
all its contents had been washed overboard. While
the crew laboured at the pumps, the captain tried
to cheer them up and put a little life into their
weary bodies and despairing hearts by playing
lively airs on his concertina and singing sailors'
chanteys.
" One day," says Bent, " a German brig hove in
sight and spoke us. Seeing our signal of distress
she asked the name of our barque and the number
of the crew. We signalled our reply, and she
answered that she could not help us, there was too
much sea. Then she squared away and left us.
All this time we were labouring at the pumps to
keep the old barque afloat. Next day another brig,
a Boston vessel deep-loaded, from the West Indies,
hailed us and stood by, signalling to us to launch
our boats. This we did, after hard and dangerous
work, and managed to reach the brig's side, where
all the sixteen of us were hauled on board safely.
About two hours after we left our ship we saw her
go down."
To Bent's intense disappointment he found that
the brig that had rescued him was bound for the
wrong side of the Atlantic. She landed the ship-
wrecked mariners at Glasgow. Bent was walking
about the streets one day, wondering however he
12 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
was going to get a passage home, for he had no
money, when he was arrested as a deserter — recog-
nised by the description which had been posted in
every barrack-room and every poHce-station. He
was taken to the mihtary barracks, and then sent
under guard to Ireland and down to Cork, where
he was tried by court-martial, and sentenced to
eighty -four days in prison. When he had served
his term he was shipped off to India with his regi-
ment, landing at Bombay, and for some time did
garrison duty at Poona.
The 57th spent two years in India, only just
recovering from the terrible throes of the Mutiny.
Then news came of a serious war with a wild native
race in a distant country called New Zealand, far
away down in the Southern Ocean, and the regiment
was ordered to hold itself in readiness to go route-
marching to Bombay, thence to sea. Marching
orders soon followed, and the headquarters of the
regiment sailed for Auckland ; the company in
which Bent was a private (No. 8 Company) was
one of those left behind to look after the women and
children of the regiment. Orders for them also
quickly came, and they took the road for Bombay.
The journey from Poona to Bombay took four
days, or rather nights, for all the marching was
done by night. Part of the way was through a
dense jungle in which man-eating tigers swarmed.
The troops marched through this jungle by torch-
SAILOR AND 80LDIER 13
light, winding along a narrow track through the
densely -matted vegetation. The growling of the
tigers was heard all round at night, but the blazing
torches kept them away.
Embarked in a troopship at Bombay, Bent and
his fellow-soldiers sailed not unwillingly for a land
spoken of by report as a country which, though
wild and new, was a pleasanter place to live in
than scorching sun-baked India.
After a voyage of eighty-nine days, the troopship
anchored in Auckland Harbour, and her soldiers
spent their first week on New Zealand soil in the
old Albert Barracks, where the bright flower-
gardens and tree-groves of a beautiful park now
crown the hill that in those troubled days was
girt with a massive crenellated wall, and was alive
with all the martial turmoil of campaigning-time.
Then the new arrivals were sent down to Taranaki
by sea to join the headquarters of the 57th, and
went into new barrack life on Marsland Hill, New
Plymouth.
Kimble Bent's longing for a free independent
life became stronger than ever in this new country.
He would gladly have exchanged camp-life for even
the perilous occupation of a frontier settler, so
that he were free. The parade ground was a
purgatory, and the restraint of discipline and the
ramrod-and-pipeclay system of soldiering were
irksome beyond words. He was sick to death of
14 THE ADVENTURES OP KIMBLE BENT
being ordered about by sergeants and corporals.
Eigliting would have been a relief, but there was
none yet. He endeavoured to get his discharge
from the regiment, but without success ; and his
impatience of discipline led him into various more
or less serious conflicts with the regimental au-
thorities.
So opened Kimble Bent's life in the new land,
the land in which he was to roam the forests an
outlaw for more than a decade.
In those war-days of 1860-70 dense forests covered
the wide plains of this Taranaki province, where
now most of the dark old woods have been hewn
away, and have given place to the pastures and
homesteads of dairy farmers. It was a wild but
beautiful land. The coast curved out and round
in a great sweeping semicircle from Waitara in
the north to Wanganui in the south ; the inter-
vening region of forest, liiU, and plain was the
theatre of war. High and central, Taranaki's
great mountain-cone, which the pakeha calls Eg-
mont, swelled to a height of over 8,000 feet, its
base hidden in the forests, its snowy peak ghttering
far above the broad soft swathes of clouds, the
sailor's landmark a hunch'ed miles out at sea.
Remote from all other higii mountains it soared
aloft — " lonely as (Jod and uliite as a winter morn,"
as Joaquin Miller wrote of his beloved Mount Shasta.
SAILOR AND SOLDIER 15
On all sides Taraiuiki — the holy mountain of the
Maoris — sloped evenly and gently to the plains,
and from its recesses sprang the head waters of
many a beautiful river. The mountain, huge yet
exquisitely symmetrical, was revered by the old-
school Taranaki Maori as the mighty symbol of
his nationality, and regarded as being in some
mystic fashion the source of his tribal mana.
MOUNT EGMONT, TARANAKI.
Under the shadow of Taranaki began the Ten Years'
War ; here the Hauhau fanaticism took its mad
rise in 1864. From Taranaki's foot set out the
Hauhau apostles, preaching a strange jumble of
Scriptural expressions and pagan Maori concepts,
promising their converts that no pakeha bullet
should harm them if they but repeated their magic
incantations ; and brandishing before the ranks
of their devotees the dried and smoked heads of
16 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
slain wliite soldiers. The relapse into bai-barism
was more marked in Taranaki than anywhere else,
and even to this day the hatred of the white man
lingers there, amongst the remnants of the old
Hauhau stock. Te Whiti, the Prophet of Parihaka,
until his death in 1907, held his court under the
shadow of lofty Taranaki, and preached his old
mysticism fortified by the towering presence of
his mountain-god, cold and immutable, and all
unmindful of the pakeha\s nuirch through the
plains below.
In March, 1804, the 57th were ordered from New
Plymouth to Mana\\apou (not far from the present
town of Hawera), near the Tangahoe River. The
fanatic Hauhau faith had just been born amongst
the Maoris, whose palisaded pas dotted the out-
skirts of the great forests on the farther side of
the Tangahoe, and whose war-songs could some-
times be heard from the white soldiers' camp. At
Manawapou the regiment went under canvas, and
now began the regular round of sentry-go and
outpost duty, and all the preparations for an
advance on the rebel positions.
Meantime there was fighting in tlie northern and
western parts of the Taranaki province, between
the 57th camp and New Plymouth. There was
the disastrous affair at Te Ahuahu, where Captain
Lloyd and several soldiers were killed ; their heads
SAILOR AND SOLDIER
17
Mere cut otf and smoke-dried by the Hauhau
savages, and were carried away to distant tribes
by Kereopa, Patara, and other rebel emissaries, the
Hauhau recruiting officers. Another momentous
affair which happened soon after the 57th took post
at Manawapou was the desperate assault on the
British redoubt at Sentry Hill (Te Morere). A large
A TARANAKI FRONTIER FORT.
Sli-i'/ch III/ Mr. .S'. Pirri/ .Sinilli, 1865.)
force of Hauhau warriors, deluded by their prophet
Hepanaia into believing that his incantations
rendered them invulnerable to the white man's
bullets, rushed against the redoubt in open day-
light one morning, but were beaten off, leaving
some fifty of their number lying dead in front of
the fort. It was in this engagement that Tito-
kowaru — who was afterwards Kimble Bent's chief
9
18 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
and master — ^lost one of his eyes through a bidlel
wound.
Kimble Bent's final revolt against constituted
authority came one wet, cold day in the Manawapou
camp in April 1804, It was pouring with rain,
but a corporal, one who took a vindictive sort of
pleasure in asserting his authority over those
privates whom he happened to dishke, ordered
Bent to go out and cut some fu-ew ood in the bush.
Irritated by the manner in which the order was
given, the young " Down-Easter " was foolish
enough to argue with his enemy the corporal.
" Look here," he said, '' this is no day to
send a man out cutting wood. The officers can
stay in their tents laughing at us fellows out
in the rain. We're treated like a set of blessed
dogs."
" Oh, you won't go, won't you ? " sneered the
corporal, rejoicing at having irritated the soldier
into insubordination.
"No, I won't go," said Bent defiantly; "so
you can do what you Jike about it."
The corporal reported Bent to his immediate
superiors, and the soldier was arrested and lodged
in the guard-tent. Next morning he was brought
before a court-martial and tried for disobedience
of orders. Major Haszard was the president of the
court. VV'ith him sat Captain Clark, Lieutenant
SAILOR AND SOLDIER 19
Brown, and Ensign Parker. Bent knew it was
useless to attempt a defence, for his offence was
an inexcusable breach of disciphne. He was found
guilty, and the sentence of the court was that he
should receive fifty lashes, and serve two years in
gaol.
The triangles were then a familiar institution
in every military camp in the Waikato and in
Taranaki ; for those were flogging days, when even
slight breaches of military rules brought down the
lash upon the soldier's back.
One of the regimental surgeons, D;-. Andrews,
examined Bent, as was the practice before flogging
was inflicted, and he reported that in his opinion
the young soldier was not constitutionally fit to
endure the fifty lashes ordered.
Soon after Bent had been taken to his tent under
guard, one of the officers of the court-martial came
in to see him. Ihis was Captain Clark, a fine
jovial young Canadian-born soldier, who had
rather a liking for the unfortunate man from his
end of the world.
" Cheer up. Bent," he said ; '' you'll only get
twenty-five — the sentence is reduced. And put
that in your mouth when you go to the triangles,"
and he threw down a sixpence. Then, when the
guard-tent corporal was not looking, the kindly officer
took a flask of rum from liis breast-pocket, laid it on
the tent floor, and walked away to liis quarters.
20 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
W'lien Bent was called out for punislimeiit, he
quickly drank off the rum, and put the sixpence
in liis mouth. He knew the old soldier's recipe
for a " stiff upper hp " in the agony of Hogging —
" bite on the bullet." The sixpence would serve
him as well. It would keep his teeth from biting
through his tongue in the throes of that horrible
punishment.
A bugle sounded the " Fall in." No. 8 Company
was paraded in review order on the drill ground to
" witness punishment." Bent was marched down
to the square ; he was stripped to the waist and
tied to the triangles. The big drummer of the
Company stepped to the front ; he was the flagel-
lant. Bent bit on his substitute for a bullet as
the cat swished through the air and fell like a red-
hot knife on his quivering back. Again and again
came the frightful cuts, criss-cross upon liis back
and shoulders, till the tale of twenty-five was
complete. Then the prisoner was cast loose,
swearing in his pain and passion to have the drum-
mer's hfe. A blanket was thrown across his raw
and bleeding shoulders, and he was marched
back to the guard-tent, where the surgeon pre-
scribed for him in rough-and-ready fashion ;
then to prison — he refused to go into the camp
hospital.
Bent served some months in Wellington Prison,
doing cook-house work, in expiation of liis offence
SAILOR AND 80LDIER 21
against military discipline. Then he was sent
back to his hated regiment. The shame of that
morning at the triangles, with his comrades paraded
to witness his disgrace and agony, was burned into
him for ever. He grew morose and desperate. At
last he resolved to desert to the enemy. He con-
fided his resolve to his tent-mates, and they, know-
ing that other soldiers had deserted to the Maoris
and had not l)een killed, did not attempt to dis-
suade him. " I can't be worse off with the Maoris
than I am here," he told them ; " if they do toma-
hawk me, it will end all my troubles. I don't very
much care."
So he bided his time for a favourable oppor-
tunity to steal from the camp ; and soon his chance
came. It was on June 12, 1865, that he broke
camp and fell in with the Hauhau scout on the
banks of the Tangahoe.
CHAPTER III
THE CAMP OF THE HAUHAUS
In the Maori country — Arrival at a Hauhau Pa — Maori
village scenes — The ceremonies round the sacred flagstaff —
" Rire, rire, hau ! " — The man with the tomahawk — A white
slave — The painted warriors of Keteonetea — The blazing
oven.
The saturnine Hauhau spoke little to the white
man during that journey to the rebel camp. He
stalked silently on in front, his rifle over his
shoulder, turning quickly now and again to assure
himself that the soldier was still following him.
Presently they forded another stream, which Bent
afterwards came to know as the Ingahape, and
passed through a deserted settlement, with its
tumble-down dwellings of raupo reeds, and its old
potato-gardens. A few minutes later tliey came
in sight of their destination, the Ohangai j)a. A
high stockade of tree-trunks sunk in the ground,
some of the up])er ends licwn into sharj) points,
others with round knobby tops that suggested
impaled human heads, surrounded a populous
village of thatched huts. Just beyond it was the
bush, stretching away as far as the eye could carry.
22
THE CAMP OF THE HAUHAUS 23
It was a secluded, pretty scene, that village with
its neat enclosure, its rows of snug tvhares which
could be seen through the gateway and the openings
in the palisade, and its squares of maize and potato
cultivations, sheltered by the friendly belt of dark
green forest.
Some little, nearly naked children were playing
about on the open space in front of the palisades.
When they suddenly beheld a white man riding
along towards them, with a Maori walking by his
stirrup, they stared wide-eyed and open-mouthed,
and then rushed helter-skelter into the pa, calling
out at the top of their voices, " He pakeha, he
pakeha ! "
What a commotion that cry of " Pakeha "
aroused in the slumbering pa ! Men leaped from
the flax ivhariki (mats), where they had been drows-
ing away the afternoon awaiting the opening of the
steam ovens, and poured out of the narrow gateway
armed with their guns and tomahawks. When
they saw that the European was a harmless, un-
armed individual, and that he was apparently the
prisoner of one of their own people, the clamour
died away, and they escorted the soldier and his
captor into the pa. Bent quickly perceived that
his companion was a man of some importance,
from the peremptory orders he issued and the
alacrity with which they were obeyed. The scout
was, in fact, the chief Tito te Hanataua, a rangatira
24 THE ADVENTUHES OF KIMBLE BENT
of high standing in the Ngati-Ruanvii tribe, and one
of the Hauhaus' best fighting-leaders.
It was a wild scene that met the young soldier's
gaze when he entered the stockade, and his heart
sank before the savagely hostile gaze of a crowd
of armed, half-stripped warriors, the black-bearded
and shaggy-headed men of the bush, and their
scarcely less savage-looking women.
A strange ceremony began.
In the centre of the village square or tndrat stood
a rough-hewn pole or flagstaff, about fifteen feet
high, on which flew one or two coloured flags.
This was the Niu, the sacred staff which the Hauliau
prophet Te Ua had commanded his followers to
erect as a pole of worship in each of their villages.
[The Niu was in more ancient times the name of a
peculiar ceremony of divination often resorted to
by the tohungas or priests ; it is perhaps worth
noting, too, that in the Islands of Polynesia, the
traditional Maori Hawaiki, it is the general name
for the coco-nut-tree.] All the inhabitants of the
village — men, women, and chi'dren — formed up,
and began to march round and round the Niu,
with a priest in their midst, rushing frantically to
and fro, and brandishing a Maori weapon as he
yelled a ferocious-sounding chant. The people,
too, lifted up their voices as they marched, and,
after listening a while, Bent found to his astonish-
ment that part of what they were chanting in a,
THE CAMP OF THE HAUHAUS 25
singular wild cadence were these words in " pidgin "
English : " Big river, long river, big mountain,
long mountain, bush, big bush, long bush," and
so on, ending with a loudly chanted cry, " Eire,
rire, hau ! " This meaningless gibberish formed
part of the incantations solemnly taught to the
Hauhaus by Te Ua, who professed to have the
" gift of tongues " of which the 'pakefia's New
Testament spoke ; his disciples fondly believed that
they were endowed by their prophet's " angel "
with wonderful linguistic powers.
The singular march suddenly ceased, at an order
from the shawl-kilted tohunga in the centre, and
then the people filed into the village meeting-
house, a large raupo-reed-huilt structure, taking
Bent with them. He was motioned to a seat
beside a Maori, whose name, he afterwards found,
was Hori Kerei (George Grey), and who could
speak English fairly weU.
Sitting opposite Bent was a white-bearded old
fighting-man, a dour-faced savage, his brown face
deeply scored with the marks of blue-black tattoo ;
his sole attire was a blanket ; in his right hand,
and partly concealed by the blanket, he held a
tomahawk. His hand twitched now and then, as
if he were about to flash out the tomahawk and
use it on the pakeha, from whose face he never
withdrew his fierce old eyes. He was the chief,
Te Rangi-tutaki.
26 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
A long talk began. Hori Kerei interpreted. The
Maoris asked Bent why he had come to them, why
had he run away from his own people. The de-
serter frankly told tliem that he was tired of
being a soldier, that he had been ill-treated
and imprisoned, and that he came to them for
protection.
" Pakeha,^^ said Kerei, " they want to know if
you will ever leave the Maori and go back to the
soldiers."
" No," said Bent ; " tell them I'll never i-un
away from the Hauhaus. I want to live with them
always ; I don't ever want to see a white man
again ! "
" Kapai ! " said Grey good-hum ouredly. " That
the talk ! All right, I tell them true."
When Kerei had interpreted the white man's
reply, the old man with the tomahawk leaned over
and said, very earnestly, tapping the blade of the
weapon with his left hand as he spoke :
" Whahirongo mai ! Listen, qmkeha ! You see
this qmtiti in my hand ? Yes. If you had not at
once replied that you would never return to the
white soldiers I would have killed you. I would
have sunk this into your skull ! "
After this brief speech, delivered with a fierce-
ness of mien and glitter of eye that made the
refugee tremble in s])ite of his efforts to appear
calm, the old l)arbarian shook hands witli liim.
THE CAMP OF THE HAUHAUS 27
Then Tito te Hanataiia — the man who had
brought tlie soldier to the pa — rose and said :
" O my tribe, hsten to me ! Take good care of
the pakeha, and harm him not, because our prophet
has told us that if any white men come to us as
this man has done, and leave their own tribe for
ours, we must not injure them, but must keep them
with us and protect them."
Tito's word assured Bent's safety, and the tone
of the people changed to one of friendliness ; many
of them shook hands with the lonely white man.
The women cooked some pork and potatoes for
him in an earth-oven, and he was given to eat,
and received into the tribe. Henceforth he was
as a Maori.
Now began for the runaway an even harder life
than that which he had endured in the army. He
found that he was virtually a slave amongst the
Maoris. He had had fond imaginings of the easy
time he would enjoy in the heart of Maoridom, but
to quote from his own lips, " they made me work
like a blessed dog." Soon after his arrival in the
pa a party of men was sent off to Taiporohenui —
a celebrated old village and meeting-place near
the present town of Hawera — and he was ordered
to go with them, and was set to work felling bush,
clearing and digging, gathering firewood, and
hauling water for the camp. Tito was his master
■ — not only his master, but in hard fact his owner,
28 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
Avitli power of life and dealli over him. Bent
divined the Maori nature too well to refuse " fatigue
duty," as he had done in the Manawapou camp.
There would have been no court-martial in Tai-
])orohenui — just a crack on the head with a toma-
hawk. So he bent his back to the burdens with
what cheerfulness he might, and was thankful for
the good things Tito provided, tliough tliev took
no more elaborate form than a blanket and a flax
mat for a bed, and two square meals a day of pork
and potatoes.
Tito was, says Bent, a man of about forty-five
years of age, a stern, but not unkindly owner, with
a pretty young wife of seventeen or eighteen,
whose big, dark eyes were often turned with an
expression of pity on tlie unfortunate renegade
pakeha.
The ])eople watched the white man closoly,
thinking no doubt that as he was being worked so
hard he might be tem])tcd to run"'away if he got
Ihc chance. And whenever lie went out of doors
the old man who had sat opposite him in tlie meet-
ing-Jiouse on the day of liis first arrival followed
him al»oiit, never s])eakiiig a \\()r(l, with his toma-
hawk in his hand.
The news that a wliite soldier had run away to
the Hauhaus soon spread amongst the Ngati-
RuaiHii. One day a messenger from tlie large
village of Keteonetea came to Taiporohenui and
THE CAMP OF THE HAUHAUS 29
announced that ho had been sent to fetch the
strange 'pakeha to that settlement.
" What do they want with me l " asked Bent,
when Tito told him that the envoy was waiting
for him.
" They want to see the colour of your skin,"
replied Tito.
Bent, in alarm, begged Tito not to send him to
Keteonetea, for lie greatly feared that he would
be killed.
Tito reassured his white man, telling him that
the Keteonetea people were his relatives, and that
he was not to be alarmed at their demeanour,
because they would not harm him.
The messenger and his white charge tramped
away through the bush to the village, a lonely
little spot hemmed in by the dense forests — long
since hewn away and replaced by grassy fields and
dairy farms. A pahsade surrounded the kainga ;
witliin were clusters of large well-built reed wJiares,
and the inevitable Niu pole stood in the middle
of the marae.
Bent found a large number of Maoris, about
three hundred, assembled on the 7narae, the village
parade ground. The scene still lives vividly in his
memory — an even wilder, more savage spectacle
than that of his first day at Tito's 'pa. The men's
faces were painted red, in token of war — red smudges
of ochre on their cheeks and red lines drawn across
30 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
their brows ; they wore feathers in their hair ,
their only clothes were flax mats. The lone pakeha
might well have imagined himself back in the days
of ancient Maoridom, before missionaries or traders
had changed the barbaric simplicity of the aboriginal
life. The only modern note was the firearms of the
warriors ; all the men carried guns (most of them
double-barrelled shot-guns, and a few rifles and
carbines), and wore tomahawks stuck in their
broad-plaited flax belts. Most of the women were
as primitive in their garb as the men ; their clothing
consisted chiefly of flaxen cJoaks ; a few wore
shawls and blankets.
" The people looked at me very fiercely as I
came into the marae,'''' says Bent, " and I felt my
heart sinking low, in spite of Tito's assurance."
They put him into a raupo hut by himself, and
fastened the door — a proceeding that chd not at all
tend to elevate his spirits.
The ex-soldier was left to himself in the dark
whare for quite a couple of hours. He could hear
the people gathered on the village square discussing
him excitedly ; one orator after another declaiming
with frantic energy. At length a Maori unfastened
the door of the ivhare, and, taking Bent by the
hand, led him out on to the marae. The native
could speak English ; Bent afterwards found that
he had been an old whaJcr, and had lived amongst
white people for many years ; his name was Kere
THE CAMP OF THE HAUHAUS 31
(Kelly). He told the pakeha, with some show of
kindness, that he must not be frightened, that no
one would harm him, but he must go to the sacred
Niu and promise that he would never return to
the pakehas.
The first thing that met Bent's eyes on stepping
out through the low doorway of the ivhare was a
great fire blazing in the centre of the marae, sur-
rounded by a ring of short stakes. Accustomed as
he was by this time to sights of terror, this struck
a fresh note of alarm,
" Good Lord ! " he said to himself, " are they
going to burn me alive ? "'
" Friend," he said to Kere, " tell me, what's
that fire for ? "
The Maori explained that it was an ahi tapu, a
sacred fire, used in the Hauhau war -rites.
Bent was very doubtful. '' I'm afraid," said he to
liis companion, " that it's for me ! Are they going to
throw me into it ? I've heard they do such things."
" No, no, pakeha ! It's all right. You'll be
safe. But remember, do as the tohunga tells you,
and promise him you'll never go back to the pakeha
soldiers, or you'll die ! "
The Maori led the white man up to the foot of
the Niu pole, a tall ricker, with rough crosstrees
and with fiag halliards of flax rope. Bent was
told to sit down at the foot of the pole. The
people aU gathered around in a ring.
32 THE ADVENTURES OF KiMBLE BENT
A tall old warrior stood iii the middle of the ring,
facing Bent — the prophet of the Niu. He was
naked from the waist up ; his face was completely
covered with tattooing. He was a tohunga, or
priest, Bent afterwards discovered ; by name
Tu-ahi-pa, or Tautahi-ariki, a man held in much
awe by the people as a worker of inakutu (witch-
craft).
For a long time the old wizard closely eyed the
pale-faced stranger before him. Then he said,
through the interpreter, Kere :
" You behold this ring of people, the people of
Keteonetea i "
" Yes," said Bent.
" I ask you this, will you return to your people
or remain with us ? "
" I will never return to the pakehas,'' Bent re-
plied ; " 1 want to live with the Maoris and to
make them my people."
" Good ! " exclaimed theHauhau priest. " Now,
turn your eyes upon yon fire, burning there upon
the iuarae. Well, if you liad not promised to be-
come a Maori and live with us, the tribe would
have thrown you into that blazing oven. It is
well that you have spoken as you have.''
This, to Bent's great rehef, ended the ordeal.
The Hauhaus, at a cry from the priest, began their
mad march round the Niu — men, women, and
cliildren — chanting as they went their savage psalms.
THE CAMP OF THE HAUHAUS 33
rolling their eyes and lifting their arms high in
the air as every now and again they cried their
wild refrain, " Rire, rire, hau ! " — the last word
literally barked out from the hundreds of throats.
When the Hauhau ceremony was at an end, a
young woman who had joined in the march round
the Niu came to Bent, took liim away to a hut and
gave him a meal of pork and potatoes, and then
led him to her father's house. The father was the
principal cliief of the kainga, and, as it turned out,
cousin to Bent's rangatira Tito.
Here the white man spent the night, the chief's
daughter lying across the entrance just inside the
doorway, for fear — as the chief told him — that some
young desperado might take it into his head to
earn a little notoriety by tomahawking the pale-face.
Outside, the Maoris were gathered on the 7narae,
by the light of great fires, the chiefs making speeches
and taki-ing up and down in excited fashion,
weapon in hand ; now and again the fanatic crowd
would burst into a loud Hauhau chant that echoed
long amidst the black encirchng forest. So the
wild korero went on, far into the night.
CHAPTER IV
IN THE OTAPAWA STOCKADE
The return from Keteonetea — The hill-fort at Otapawa —
A korero with the Hauhaus — Bent's one-eyed wife — " The
wooing o' 't " — Bent is christened " Ringiringi."
Morning came at last, but the solitary white man
in this nest of savages had hardly closed liis eyes.
More than once he fancied some one was trying the
low door of the whare, and he looked round the
dimly-lighted hut — a small fire was kept burning
in the centre of the floor — in search of a weapon,
but found none. Bent lay there, listening intently,
and longing with an inexpressibly bitter longing for
the old camp-life, hard though it was, and for the
sound of a white comrade's voice. It had not
always been "pack-drill and C.B." in liis army life,
in spite of the tyrant sergeants. But now it was
the bush and the ivhare for the rest of his days —
or, in other woi'ds, for just so long a ])eriod as he
might be able to save his head from the tomahawk.
Daybreak — and no sooner was it light than the
Hauhaus began to gather round the pakeha^s hut,
34
IN THE OTAPAWA STOCKADE 35
while the women were hghting the hangis — the
earth steam-ovens — for the first meal of the day.
" Come out to us ! " they yelled ; " come out,
pakeha ! " They ran to and fro in front of the
ivhare, and raised barking cries that sounded fear-
fidly menacing to the pakeha sitting on his low
mat-bed, and feeling not in the least disposed to
respond to the invitation to come outside and be
kUled.
But the old chief speedily ended the uproar by
opening the sliding door and shouting angrily :
" Haere atu ! Haere atu ! " an imperative phrase
that the deserter had already learned to recognise
as one that could be exactly translated " Clear
out ! "
Thereafter there was comparative peace. The
white man was under the protection of the chief,
and was allowed to wander round the village pretty
much as he chose ; but he was warned not to go
far, or some warrior might take a fancy to his head.
Four or five days passed without incident, and
then a horse was brought up for Bent, and he
returned to Tito's kainga, escorted by the chief's
daughter and ten armed men, all mounted. Tito
seemed relieved to have his pakeha back again in
safety, and after feasting the Maori guard on the
best the village women could lay on the dinner-
mats, he sent them back to Keteonetea loaded with
new clothes and baskets of kmnara (sweet potato)
.{G THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
and iaro — another tropic root-food brought from
Polynesia by the ancestors of the Maori, but now
no longer grown by the Taranaki people.
Soon Bent Avas on the tramp again. His chief,
Tito, set off one morning, taking his white man
with him, for a fortihed village caUed Otapawa,
where the Hauhaus were preparing to offer a strong
resistance to the British troops. Otapawa was
about four miles away by a narrow and winding
forest track. A small river, the Mangemange,
had to be forded on the way, and here Bent had
a taste of some of the minor adventures of the
bush. Bent being a rather small man and Tito a
big, poweriid fellow, the Maori good-naturedly took
his pakeha on his back to pikau him across the
stream. Bent was rather heavier than Tito had
imagined, and after balancing to and fro precariously
on a shppery place in the deepest part of the ford,
the Maori's feet suddenly went from under him,
and he and his protege were capsized in the middle
of the creek. Tito, however, kept a tight grip of
the white man, and, though the stream was running
swiftly, they managed to struggle out to the oppo-
site bank in safety, and after drying their clothes as
well as they could continued their bush journey.
About midday the Hauhau chief and his com-
panion emerged from the sohtudes of the forest
to find themselves in the Otapawa clearmg. A
hill about tluee hundred feet high rose hke an
m THK OTAPAWA STOCKADE 37
island from the great rhmi and rata woods that
compassed it on every side ; at the back ran the
Tangahoe River. At the foot of the hill there was
some cultivation ; a steep winding path led to the
top ; here were a ditch and a bristhng double
stockade of tall tree-trunks set solidly in the
ground, connected by cross-rails lashed with forest
vines ; within was the Hauhau village. The only
access to the interior of the stockade was through
a low and narrow gateway, painted red.
A shawl-clad figure with a gun rose from a
squatting position just outside the q)a gate as the
two travellers walked out from the shade of the
forest and began the ascent of the mound. A loud
cry of astonishment and warning brought out the
villagers, one after the other, bobbing their heads
as they ran through the gatcAvay. Then the shout
was raised, as they recognised Bent's companion :
" Aue ! Here comes Tito with a paJceha^ ! A
pakeha ! "
Waving shawls and blankets and weapons, the
people cried their greetings to the chief, and the
white man and his protector walked in between
two hues of wondering men and women and chil-
dren, who pressed in close behind the new-comers
as they passed into the palisaded fa.
A long, low-eaved, thatched house stood near the
middle of the pa, somewhat apart from the smaller
whares. Into tliis building Tito and ' Bent were
38 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
taken, and finely woven flax mats, patterned in
black and white, were spread out for them. Tito
rose and addressed the crowd. He explained, with
a good deal of pride, as Bent imagined, how he had
become possessed of a live white man — a somewhat
unusual acquisition amongst the Maoris in that
unrestful period, for the impatient Hauhau was, as
a rule, too fond of trying his new tomahawk on a
paJceha skull to keep a prisoner long. The korero
over, food was brought in in freshly plaited baskets
of green flax — boiled pork, dried shark (a present
from a seaside tribe), boiled iaro and humara — quite
a bountiful meal for a war-time bush camp.
Up to this time the deserter's adventures had
been, if not exactly tragic, at least of a severely
unpleasant turn. Now, however, they took a
humorous twist — humorous from an onlooker's
view, though to the white man himself it seemed
rather the final pannikinful in the bucket of his
misfortunes.
A woman was brought into the ivhare. She
walked over and seated herself on the flax whariki
by Bent's side.
The white man turned and looked at her in some
surprise. Her vision still haunts the memory of
the old adventurer as that of a particularly ugly
woman. She was not old, probably not above
twenty-five, but she was blind in one eye, her lips
were of negroid thickness — such " blubber " lips
IN THE OTAPAWA STOCKADE ,'i9
as seen here and there among Maori tribes tell
their tale of an ancient Melanesian strain in the
blood of the Polynesian immigrants. She was
tattooed on the chin, and there was a deeply
chiselled blue line on the inner cuticle of her lower
lip. Her hair hung round her face in a tangled
mop. " Well," said Bent to himself, " she is no
beauty."
The woman spoke some words of greeting to
Bent, but he steadily gazed on the floor and said
nothing.
Then a Maori sitting near by, who could speak
a little English, said, " This woman wants to marry
you ! "
" Oh, Lord ! " exclaimed Bent. " What for ?
I don't want to get married."
An old man, whose name was Peneta, and who
was draped from shoulder to ankles in a red blanket,
Avalked up to the white man and, halting in front
of him, pointed to the one-eyed woman.
" Pakeha,^^ he said, with a quiet grimness in his
tone, " this is my niece, Te Rawanga. You must
marry her {me moe korua). If you refuse, you
will die ! That is all."
This was translated to Bent.
Here was a dilemna, indeed ! Bent had nothing
to say. He looked at the woman by his side, and
she smiled at him as coquettishly as her one good
eye allowed. He looked, and the more he looked
40 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
the less he hked her. Tlien he glanced at the dour
old uncle, and cast his helpless eyes around the
crowded meeting-house. The men were glum and
scowling ; one or two of the young girls seemed
to perceive the humour of the situation, for they
giggled, and then hid their faces in their shawls.
Bent eye(\ liis ])r()spec(ive unch^-in-law again.
The old man was impatient. He said again, " Take
my niece as your wife."
" yle," assented the white man, who could see
no hope of escape. " I'll take her."
So the young soldier was mated, to the satis-
faction of every one but himself. " She wasn't my
fancy, to put it mildly," he says. " But I suppose
it was her last chance, and the old man would have
tomahawked me if I hadn't taken her."
Mrs. Bent's wedding-furnishings, which she
bundled a little later, with determined air, into the
corner of the communal house assigned to the white
man, were spartan and primitive in the extreme.
They consisted solely of a large plaited ivhariki
(sleeping-mat) and a wooden pillow, which, to the
white man, seemed alarmingly like some weapon
of chastisement.
Matrimony amongst the Hauhaus was simplicity
itself.
Bent, now fully received into the tribe, had a
Maori name given to him. It was " Ringiringi," a
name he bore for two or three years, until the
IN THE OTAPAWA STOCKADE 41
war-chief Titokowaru rechristened him " Tu-iuii-a-
moa."
The origin of this name " Ringiringi " may be
explained, as an examjilc of the way in which the
Maoris so frequently acquire new names often from
very trivial incidenls. It was a contraction of
"Te Wai-ringiringi," which was one of 'I'ito te
Hanataua's nicknames, bestowed upon the chief
about two years ])i-cviously. A party of Ngati-
Maniapoto Maoris fioui the King Country were at
that time on a visit to Taiporoheniii, where a large
war-council of the rebel tribes was held. Tito te
Hanataua was one of the Taranaki orators, and as
he taki'd up and down, spear in hand, in the usual
)nergetic manner of the Maori speech-maker, he
;poke so rapidly and fluently that the Kingites
dubbed him " Te Wai-ringiringi," meaning " The
Pouring Water," because his words poured from
his lips like water. Tito was rather proud of this
nickname, and his bestowal of it upon Bent was in
a sense a mark of favour.
Bent at this time was a thin, rather weak-looking
man, and his slimness was made the subject of a
haka chorus amongst the people, a little song for
which his one-eyed wife was responsible. These
were the words :
" Ki te Jcai, e Ringi,
Kai poropnro te nutnaira,
Te I'ti to hope,
Whukapai Angorc,'
42 THE ADVENTURES OF KIiAIBLE BENT
("Eat away, O Ringi,
Eat your fill of poroporo berries
To make you strong again ;
Lest your waist be small and weak,
Eat to become a fine Englishman ! ")
The foroporo is a forest shrub which bears an
abundance of Large red berries, a favourite food of
the tui and pigeons, which become very fat on this
rich bird-fare.
The white man, however, as he told his wahine,
preferred to leave the poroporo to the tuis, and to
fill out his attenuated waist, which the people
looked upon with some amusement, with good
Maori pork and potatoes.
CHAPTER V
TE UA, PRIEST AND PROPHET
Te Ua and his gods — The Pai marire faith — " Charming "
the British bullets — Bent's interview with the prophet — His
life tapuW — Prepaiing for battle — Life in the forest pci.
About this time Kimble Bent became acquainted
with a man whose name has passed into New
Zealand history. This was Te Ua Haumene, the
founder and high-priest and prophet of the Hauhau
religion, or, more correctly speaking, fanaticism.
Te Ua came riding into the Otapawa village one
day with a bodyguard of armed men. Bent de-
scribes him as a stoutly built man of between forty
and fifty, attired in European clothing, and carry-
ing a carved taiaha — a chief's halbert or broad-
sword of hardwood, flattened at one end in a blunt
blade, and sharpened at the other into a tongue-
shaped point, and decorated with tufts of red kaka
feathers ; in a plaited flax belt round his waist was
thrust a green-stone mere.
Te Ua was the man who taught the Taranaki
rebels the karakia, or incantations — some of them a
curious medley of Maori and English — which they
43
44 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
chanted in their wild marches rounrl the sacred
Niu in their villafje squares. Tliese incantations
and chants he professed to have heard from super-
natural visitants, the spirits who came on the four
MM*nds, and from the angel Gahriel, who spoke in
his ear as he lay asleep in his raicpo hut and bade
him go abroad and spread a new religion, which
should band together the tribes of the Maori nation.
Many strange tales Bent had heard about the
prophet and his wondrous mava. Te Ua had
succeeded in imbuing his fanatic disciples with an
unquestioning Moslem-like faith in the potency of
the Hauhau cult and its accompanying charms and
magic formulae. He was the Mahomet of the
Taranaki people, and exercised an influence over
the bush-fighters of Ngati-Ruanui and allied tribes
almost as great as that which Te Kooti, the Chatham
Islands escapee, commanded a few years later
amongst the warriors of the East Coast.
The absolute faith the Hauhaus reposed in Te
Ua's precepts and his pretences to supernatural
power has parallels in the records of the Mahdi's
wars in the Soudan, and in other campaigns waged
under the banner of Islam, and more recently still
in the Zulu rebellion in Natal. He assured his
followers that when they went into battle the
bullets of the white soldiers would be turned aside
in their flight if they but raised their right hands as
if warding tho ball off, at the same tijne repeating
TE UA, PRIEST AND PROPHET 45
the words '^ Hapa / Pai mariref' ("Pass over me!
Righteousness and peace ! ") The expression " Fai
marire " was adopted as one of the designations of
the Hauhau rehgion ; and the sign of the upraised
hand became the outward sign and symbol of the
warrior faith. To-day, should you visit the large
European-built house of the late Te Whiti, the Pro-
phet of the Mountain, at Parihaka, you will see a
picture of Te Ua on the wall of the speech-hall, his
right hand raised to his shoulder, palm outwards,
as if in the act of invoking his gods to turn the
pakeha bullets aside — '' Hapa ! Fai 7narire I "
And many a deluded Hauhau fell to the rifles of the
wliite men before the Maori confidence in the effi-
cacy of the charm was shaken. But Te Ua had a
very good explanation to offer for any casualties —
that if the pakeha bullet refused to be waved aside
and insisted on entering the body of a " righteous and
peaceful " son of the faith, it was because the
stricken man had lost faith in the karakia — the
ritual — and, very properly, suffered for his unbelief.
A subhmely simple explanation, and one that
was perfectly satisfactory to the prophet and
every one concerned, except perhaps the Hauhau
who had happened to stop the bullet.
Even when the glacis of the Sentry Hill redoubt
was strewn with the dead bodies of Hepanaia and
fifty of his red-painted braves, the best manhood
of Ngati-Ruanui and Nga-Rualiine — who fell in a
46 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
mad attack upon the walled fort in open daylight
chanting their " Hapa ! Pai mar ire ! Hau ! " —
the faith in Te Ua and his charms was but little
abated. And, unlike the Moslem warrior, who
fought to the death in the certain hope of a speedy
translation to Paradise, the Maori fanatic expected
no heavenly reward for his faith and his death-
despising ferocity. No houris with welcoming
arms ; no eternity of fleslily bliss. No, it was just
utter blind bravery, a sheer trust in a mad creed
of Death-to-the-Whites and Maori Land U)y the
Maori Race.
So the visit of the high-priest of Hauhauism was
a great event in the bush pa. The prophet was
received with a powhiri, or chant and dance of
welcome, by the people of the village ; then the
tangi and the doleful hinn of weeping for the dead.
'I'he tangi over, the prophet addressed liis disciples
in the meeting-house ; and hearing that there
was a white runaway soldier in the pa, he sent
for Bent.
It was a curious interview. The white nuin no
longer appeared in the soldier's uniform, which ho
had woiii for some time after deserting, but had
taken to the garb of the savage. He was bare-
headed and bare-footed. His sole garments were a
sliirt made of pieces of blanket and a flax mat tied
round his waist. He entered the crowded council-
house and stood before the prophet.
PATARA, A HAUHAU PROPHET.
TE UA, PRIEST AND PROPHET 49
"^ noho ki raro " (" Sit down "), said Te Ua,
pointing to the floor-mat in front of him.
By the prophet's side was a flax basket contain-
ing some potatoes and pork, with which he had
been breaking his fast after his journey. This
food being appropriated to his use was, of course,
tapu in the eyes of the assemblage. Te Ua took
a potato from the basket, broke it into two pieces,
and gave one piece to Bent and told liim to eat
it ; the other half he ate himself.
" Now," said the prophet, " you are tapu — your
life is safe ; no man may harm you now that you
have eaten of my sacred food. Men of Tangahoe !
This pakeha is my pakeha ; and if any other white
men should come to us as this man has done, fleeing
from their people and forsaking the pakeha camps
for our pas, you must protect them, for the gods
have sent them to us."
" You are a Maori now," added Te Ua to Bent,
" and you must have a woman to cook your food
for you."
Bent, in his imperfect Maori, informed the
prophet that he had already been supplied with a
wife by the Maoris, but, like a prudent man, made
no comment on her imperfections.
" That's aU right then," said the prophet. And
he gave Bent a large cloak of dressed flax, called a
tatara. " Wear this," he said ; " it is a tapu garment
and sacred to you ; no other man may wear it."
4
50 THE ADVEi^^rURES OF KE.VIBLE BEJ^r
During the next few days, before Te Ua returned
to his home at Opunake, on the coast, Bent had
further interviews with the prophet, who treated
liim with kindness, and gave liim what was to the
runaway a very welcome present — some pakeha
tobacco. Though something of a madman, like
most Maori prophets, Te Ua was of more benevolent
spirit than his acolytes, Kereopa and Patara, and
their kin, who had been sent to preach the gospel
of Pai marire to the outer tribes. Had Kereopa,
for instance, come to Otapawa, Bent would, in all
probability, have fallen under the tomahawk as
a sacrifice for the savage ritual of the Niu, and
his head would have been smoke-dried and carried
over forest-trails from distant tribe to tribe, or
stuck up like a scarecrow on a palisade-pole.
Bent learnt a good deal of the personal history
of the prophet, and of his peculiar delusions. Te
Ua had fought the white soldiers at Nukumaru
about a year before this, when a force of Hauhaus
made a desperate attack on the camp of two thou-
sand British troops, under General Cameron, and
killed and wounded nearly fifty soldiers before they
were driven off with the loss of about thirty killed.
The outward and visible sign or incarnation
{aria I of Te Ua's deity was a ruru, or owl. This bird
is sacred amongst Taranaki Natives ; they will
not kill or harm one ; they say it is an atua, a god,
and has a hundred eyes.
TE UA, PRIEST AND PROPHET 51
An incident which Bent relates as occurring in
another bush settlement where he and Te Ua both
happened to be staying is illustrative of the prophet's
peculiar respect for his owl-god. Just at dusk,
when the evening meal was over, and the night
creatures began their roamings, an owl flew softly
from the trees and settled above the window of the
house in which Te Ua was sitting. " Ha ! " said
the prophet, when he saw it ; " there is my atua.'^
He recited an incantation, caUing the ruru by name,
and when the karakia was ended the bird as noise-
lessly Hew back to the forest. Te Ua said notliing
more tiU the next morning, when he announced
that he would leave the place at once, because liis
owl-god had appeared to him as a warning to return
to his home.
Soon after the wandering prophet rode out of
Otapawa, word reached the 'pa by a spy who had
been in the British camp that the troops under
General Chute were preparing for an advance
against the Hauhaus, and that it was probable the
hill stronghold, being so close to the wliite men's
base of operations, would shortly be attacked.
Ail was excitement in the pa when tliis became
known. The pahsading of the pa was strengthened
with stout timbers from the torest ; trenches and
rifle-pits were dug within the wads. The natives
worked away like mad, and Bent with them. He
had caught the fever of the moment, and in all but
52 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
skill was a Maori, lie was not at all happy, how-
ever, at the news that his old regiment, the 57th,
was expected to march on Otapawa, and he heartily
wished liimself far away from these scenes of
constant commotion and terror. But for the
present he was safer with the Hauhaus than with
the men of his own colour and tongue.
Day after day passed, and the Maoris lay behind
their strong stockade waiting for the attack. The
underground food-stores were well supplied ; water
was carried in in UiIki, or calabashes, made by scoop-
ing out the soft inside of the /me gourd ; bullets
were cast and cartridges W'ere made. Then, as no
troops appeared, and the scouts who kept constant
watch on the forest outskirts reported that there
was no sign of immediate action on the part of the
enemy, the tension of garrison life relaxed, and
the ordinary avocations of the kalnga were resumed,
In a clearing hewn and biu'iit from the heart of
the woods were the cultivation grounds. Here all
the able-bodied men of the fort were set to work,
turning up the rich black soil and planting potatoes,
kumara, and taro. Planting over, the lengthening
days were spent in hunting wild pigs, and in gather-
ing wild lioney, which was plentifid in hollow trees
in the forests ; or in strolling, pipe in mouth, about
the fa ; playing draughts {kaimu) on the marae in
Maori fashion ; singing songs and narrating old
stories and legends. Night and morning there were
IE TTA, PRIEST AND PROPHET 53
long Haiihau prayers, led by the priest of the 'pa,
old Tiikino, wlio was one of Te Ua's apostles.
Life in this bush-fort presented to the lonely
pakeha a picture of barbaric simplicity. Few of the
people had European clothing ; the men's working
garb was just a rough flax mat hanging from the
waist to the knees. They lived on the wild foods of
the forest until their crops were ready for digging ;
snared kaha (parrots) and the sweet-tongued Tcori-
mako, or bell-birds ; tui, or parson-birds, and the
swarming wood-pigeons, and shot or speared the
pigs that abounded in the dense woods. They
lived to a large extent, too, on aruhe, or fern-root,
which they dug up in the open patches of fern-
land ; and in the bush they gathered the berries
of the hinau-tree, steeped them in water to rid
them of their astringency, dried them in the sun,
and then pounded them into cakes, which made a
sustaining if not very palatable food. Another
food-staple was kaafiga-jnrau, or maize steeped in
water until it was quite decayed. "The smell of
this Indian corn," says Bent, with an emphasis
begotten of unpleasant memories, " was enough to
kill a dog. Nevertheless, I had to eat it, and in
time I got used to it."
" I had at this time," continues the deserter,
recounting his wild days in Otapawa, " no boots,
no trousers, no shirt — just Maori flax mats to cover
me, and a mat and blanket for my bed. I had
54 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
managed to procure some needles and thread,
together with paper and pencil (I kept up a sort
of diary now and then), and one or two other little
things which I kept in a kit, thinking that, though
I had nothing to sew with the needles and thread,
and very little to do with the other belongings, they
might come in useful before very long. One of
my greatest troubles was the want of salt ; as for
bread, I had not tasted any for many months."
CHAPTER VI
THE STORMESTG OF OTAPAWA
British forces attack the stockade — The bayonet charge —
riirrht of the Huuliaus — Througli the forest by torchlight —
Doctoring the wounded — Tlie Tangi by the river.
Summer was on the forest. The beautiful mid-
summer of Maori Land, with its soft airs and bril-
hant sunshine, its blaze of crimson blossom on the
grand old rato-trees, and its showering of scented,
white, peach-like flowers on the tliickets of ribbon-
wood. Birds flooded the outskirts of the bush
with song ; the early morning chantings and
pipings and chimings of the tui and the korimako
made a feast of melody to which the brown forest
men were in no way deaf, for they dehghted as
much as any pakeha in the sights and sounds of the
free, wild places, and the call of the creatures of the
bush. "Te Waha-o-Tane;' literally "The Voice
of the Tree-God " — the Song of Nature — they called
these morning concerts of the birds ; it was their
poetic expression in the classic tongue of old Poly-
nesia for the sounds that betokened the daily
55
56 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
awakening to light and life of the deep and solemn
forests of Tane-mahuta, Pigeons, kti-ku-mg to
each other, with blue necks and white breasts
gleaming in the sun, went sweeping across the
clearing on softly winnowing wings, and flapped
from tree to tree and shrub to shrub in search of
the tenderest leaves, for it was not yet the season
of the choicest bush fruits, the big blue tawa berry,
the sweet yellow Jcoroi, and the aromatic miro.
Life went easily in the pa when the early harvest-
ing was over. There was little to do but eat and
sleep and lie about in the sun, or join in the daily
prayers and the procession round the Niu pole,
where the brightly coloured war-flags hung.* There
was abundance of food in the camp — potatoes,
maize, potted birds, pork, and dried fish sent as
presents from the coast tribes. Early morning, and
again in the warm, golden evenings, long, straight
columns of pale blue smoke arose from tlie cooking-
ovens of the village, and mingled with the thin
vapours that crept about the tree-tops ; then
* These flags, displayed (ni tlui war-jxilcs in (ho Uauliau
villages in 18G5-70, carried many a strange device. The ground
was white calico, on which red patterns and lettering were
sewn or painted. Favourite designs were a red half-moon, like
the crescent of Islam, a five-pointed star representing Tmnera,
" the bright and morning star," and what was called a Kororin,
in shape; like the half of a mcrc-pounamu, or greenstone club,
cut longitudinally. These colours had been made in the Waikato
during the war, and had been sent round after the manner of
the Highlanders' fiery cross to the various tribes in the Island.
THE STORMING OF OTAPAWA 57
little clouds of steam curled up as the women, with
lively chatter, uncovered the harigis and arranged
the well-cooked food in little round flax baskets,
which they presently carried off, women and girls
in a double line, keeping time with a merry old
dance-song — the lilt of the " tukii-Jcai," the " food-
bringing " — as they marched on to the green marae
and laid the steaming meal before their lounging
lords.
It was all very pleasant and idyllic from the
point of view of the brown bushmen. But " Ringi-
ringi," the pakeha-Msiori, though he led by no
means a hard life now that the heaviest work of
the year was over, had an uneasy mind. He was —
or had been — a civilised man, and he could not
forget ; moreover, he often woke from unpleasant
dreams. One was a vision of a British regiment
charging him with fixed bayonets and pinning
him against the palisades of his pa. Fervently he
hoped that he would not be in the fort when the
troops marched to the assault, and that the Hau-
haus would not compel him to level a tupara against
his one-time comrades, the old " Die-Hards."
This peaceful state of things did not endure for
long. In a few days^ — it was early in the year 1866
— the long-expected attack on Otapawa was de-
livered. Before the troops came, however, the
prophet of the pa ordered all the old people and
most of the women and children to retire to the
58 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
forest in rear of the fort, and told " Bin^'rin^' " to
accompany them. News had just been brought
in that the scouts out in the fern country had
noticed signs of an impending movement in the
British camp. The white man and the tribal
encumbrances pushed back into the bush for about
three miles, and camped in a quiet little nook by
a creek-side, with high, forested hills towering
around. The weather now became cold and bleak,
and there was little food to sustain the refugees,
for the principal stores of hai had been left in the pa.
Early one morning the sound of cannon was
heard in the distance, then heavy rifle-volleying,
followed by desultory firing.
The Queen's soldiers were storming the fort.
Here -I may give a more detailed description of
the defences of Otapawa than has appeared in the
preceding pages, to enable the reader to realise the
sort of place the white general was attacking.
Curving round under the rear of the pa and partly
protecting it on the flanks, flowed the Tangahoe
Biver. The hill-top where the pa stood was flat,
and the rear dropped precipitously to the Tangahoe,
The only access to the interior of the stockade was
Ilii()\igh a low and narrow gateway. Just within,
the entrance was blinded by a short fence, so that
an enemy could not charge straight, even if the
gate were open, but would have to turn first to the
left for a short distance and then to the right, exposed
THE STORMING OF OTAPAWA 59
to a fire from between the palisades, before the
open marae was reached. The pa was defended
by two rows of palisading, with a ditch between,
and another shallow trench inside the inner stock-
ade. The outer stockade, the peJcerangi, was about
eight feet high, and was the lighter fence of the two.
The principal timbers were six or eight inches
thick, but the stakes between were smaller and
did not quite reach the ground ; they were fastened
with bush-vines and supplejack to the sapling
rails that ran along the stockade. The open spaces
at the bottom of the fence were for the defenders
in the outer trench to fire through. The inner
fence, the tuwatawata,, was a stouter structure, of
strong, green tree-trunks set solidly in the ground,
and with openings here and there for rifle-fire.
And finally — an important thing in Maori eyes —
there was the " luck-stone " of the fort, the green-
stone whatu. This was buried under the foot
of a large stockade post, close to the right-hand
corner nearest the river, as one approached from
the pa gate.
It was soon after daylight that the ^Kt, was at-
tacked. The assaihng British force was assisted
by some Colonial troops and a contingent of
" friendly " Maoris, or Kupapas, chiefly men from
the Wanganvii district, under the afterwards
celebrated bush-fighter, Kepa te Rangihiwinui
(Major Kemp). General Chute commanded the
60 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
operations. An Armstrong gun was brought to
witliin a short distance of the hill-fort, and several
shells were fired into the stockade. Then the
general gave the order for the assault.
As the storming party of Imperial soldiers, with
bayonets fixed, doubled eagerly up the hill face to
the front stockade, the Hauhau chiefs, Tukino and
Tu-ahi-pa, cried to their men, crouching in the
outer trench with levelled guns :
" Sons ! Be steady, and wait till they come close
up, then let them have it ! "
As the first files of the soldiers dashed up to
the stockade, " PuMa ! "— " Fire ! "—shouted the
chiefs, and under the thundering volley many
whites fell. Another volley, and then the soldiers
were at the stockade, firing through the gaps in
the obstruction, and slashing at the ties of the
fence. Hand-gienades were carried by some of
the stormers, and one of these bursting in the
outer trench wounih'd fierce old Tu-ahi-pa, who
had just killed a soldier in the act of cutting away
at the pekerangi in an endeavour to force an en-
trance.
The Maoris did not wait for the bayonet. The
wild rush of the maddened troops was irresistible.
Leaving seven of their men kiUed in the trenches
and about the palisades, the defenders gathered
their wounded and fled. Tlie trenches led to the
steep bank overlooking the Tangahoe River. Down
THE STORMING OP O^^APAWA Gl
the trendies they ran, and sliding down tlie bank,
they took to the bush, scrambhng up along the
river-side as hard as they could go. Kepa, with his
Whanganui friendlies, pursued the flying Hauhaus
and shot two or three.
As Bent had expected, it was Iiis old regiment,
the 57th, that stormed the pa. The 57th were led
by Lieutenant-Colonels Butler and Haszard, and
were supported by the 14th regiment, who were
very jealous of the famous old " Die-Hards."
Eleven whites fell and twenty were wounded.
One of those who received his death-wound was
Lieutenant-Colonel Haszard. It was generally re-
ported afterwards that he was shot by Kimble
Bent, but this was mere camp gossip. Gudgeon's
" Reminiscences of the War in New Zealand," gives
currency to the report, but it is strongly denied,
and with every appearance of truth, by Bent.
When the pa was attacked he was at least three
miles away, on the northern side of the Mange-
mange stream. "It is false to say that I killed
my old officer," says he, " or that I ever even
fired at him. I never fired a shot against the
wliites all the time I was with the Hauhaus."
This is confirmed by the Maoris, who say that
Bent was not allowed to handle a gun in an engage-
ment for fear he might use it against the Hauhaus
themselves.
62 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
The refugees in the bush-camp with Bent waited
anxiously lor news of tiie fight. Was it a victory
or a defeat ? Soon, the first of the defenders of
tlie pa dropped into camp, blood-stained and
angry. And then, as the afternoon went on, the
rest straggled in. Many were wounded, and seven
dead bodies were carried in on hastily made litters
of supplejack vines lashed to poles. Then the full
story of the battle was told.
It was a sad and angry camj), that remote pocket
between the hills. Most of the Hauhaus came in
nearly naked, just as they had jumped up when the
first shot was fired in the grey dawn. They were
desperately sullen and grief-stricken over theh dead
and the loss of tliek* stronghold, M'hich to them had
seemed almost impregnable, for it was the strongest
stockaded position they had yet "built. Many a aark
look was bent upon the white man as he sat by one
of the fires, not daring to speak a Avord.
That night the camp was suddenly abandoned by
order of the Hauhau leader, who feared pursuit, not
by the Imperial soldiers, who had no relish for '' bush-
wiiacking " at night — or, indeed, at any other time —
but by Kepa's Government warriors, hereditary
enemies of the Taranaki men. Hurriedly packing
on their shoulders what few belongings they had
managed to save from the 'pa, they set off in single
tile through the thick forest, making for the banks
of the Tangahoe Kiver, which they reached before
THE STORMING OF OTAPAWA 63
daylight, and there halted. The wounded who were
unable to walk were carried with difficulty through
the tangled bush, where it was often necessary to
cut away at the supplejacks and aka vines, so in-
tricately interlaced and festooned across theh path,
before a passage could be made for the litter-bearers.
There was no moon ; it was an intensely dark night,
rendered more Cimmerian still by the unbroken roof
of foliage overhead. The Hauhaus made torches of
pieces of dry pinewood, bound together with scraps
of flax torn from their scanty mat garments, and
with these they managed to dimly light their way
through the forest — a wild and savage band ; the
warriors in front and rear, then- cartouche-belts over
their naked shoulders, and guns slung across their
backs, or carried in their left hands ; in their right
they gripped then- tomahawks and slashed a^^'ay at
the twuiing impediments of the jungle.
A camp was made near the banks of the Tangahoe,*
and here, as soon as it a\ as light, the Hauhaus nius-
* There is an interesting Maori proverb concerning tiiis
rapid 'langaho6 stream and the Tangahoe tribe who hved on
Its banks. This is tlie proverb, or pfijeliu :
" Tanyuhue tunyuta, e haere ;
Tanyuhoe ia, e kore e haere."
This, being interpreted, is :
"iMen oi Tangalio6 depart ;
JtJut the current of Tangahoe remains."
A pepeha which recalls Tennyson's " Brook " :
"Men may come and men may go.
But 1 go on ior ever,"
64 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
tered and reckoned up their losses. There were
about three hundred and fifty of them now in camp
— men, women and children. With wonderful
celerity the forest-men cut a little clearing, and
built wharau, or rough huts, of saplings, thatched
with the long fronds of the nikau palm and the
mamaku tree-fern. Here the wounded men were
attended to as well as the primitive methods of the
bush allowed. Women were sent out to search the
river-banks for flax-plants ; the flax-roots were dug
up, boiled, and the resultant mucilaginous juice
poured over the gunshot and bayonet wounds. This
was the Maoris' most favoured method of treating
injuries of this character, and it generally bore good
results.
" Ringiringi" himself took a hand in the bush-
surgery, for he had watched army surgeons at
their work, and the Hauhau wounded, though most
of them preferred tlieir own people's doctoring,
were grateful to the white man for his efforts to
ease their sufferings.
• A picked band of the fugitives scouted back
through the forest and cautiously reconnoitred
their captured fort, which had been set on fu-e by
the troops, and was now a heap of blackened ruins.
The Government force had by this time passed on
to the attack of other pas, and the scouts re-
entered their destroyed fortress and searched for
their dead.
THE STORMING OF OTAPAWA 65
The scene in the camp by the Tangahoe waters
when the ^ar-party returned from Otapawa was
one that " Ringkingi " never forgot. It was the
first great tangihanga, or wailing over the dead, that
he had witnessed. The people gathered in the
middle of the little clearing, and for hours the sound
of lamentation rang through the forest, often rising
into a wild, heart-breaking shriek as some blanket-
draped or mat-kilted woman, her long hair un-
bound, and her cheeks streaming with tears, cried
her keening song for her slain. The chiefs taki'd up
and down, weapon in hand, and told of the deeds
of those who had fallen ; each ended his mournful
speech with a chanted dirge. When the song was
a well-knoAvn one, the whole tribe would join in and
sing the lament with an intensity of feeling that
made theu' very bodies quiver. It was the full and
unrestrained outpouring of the soul of the savage.
CHAPTER VII
BUSH LIFE WITH THE HAUHAUS
Wild days in the forest — The Hauliau hunters — Maori wood-
craft — Bird-snaring and bird-spearing — The fowlers at Te
Ngaere — The slayer of Broughton — Another runaway soldier,
and his fate — The tomahawking of Humplirey Murphy.
For some weeks the fugitives remained in their
well-hidden camp by the Tangahoe's stream. When
the wounded were able to travel, " Ringiringi " and
his Maori companions took them a few miles through
the bush to a place called Rimatoto, the overgrown
site of an olden village. All the able-bodied men
of the tribe now set to work to build a new settle-
ment. Thatched 7iikau-ipsdm. houses were quickly
run up, and the forest rang day after day with the
axes of the bush-fellers, clearing the ground for
potato-planting.
As it was intended to make this a permanent
Tcainga — always providing Kepa's dusky forest-
rangers did not find their way to it in their scouting
expeditions — a large clearing was made. The felled
trees were allowed to lie for about three months until
they were dry enough to be fired ; then the potatoes
BUSH LIFE WITH THE HAUHAUS 67
were set in amongst the half -burned stumps and logs.
In the meantime the forest was scoured for food,
and foraging parties were sent out to Turangarere
and other villages on the outskirts of the forest and
returned laden with pork and potatoes, strapped
across their shoulders in the usual Maori pikau
fashion.
Four miles away by a rough bush track, a track
hardly discernible to any but a Maori, was the Maha
village. There the white man was taken by his
rangatira Tito, after the bush-felling work was over,
and three or four peaceful months were passed,
varied only by occasional armed scouting expedi-
tions to the forest edge, and by long fishing, birding,
and pig-hunting trips into the great Avilderness of
jungle-matted timber that hemmed in the lonely
village on every side.
Bent had now been a year with the Maoris, and
had thoroughly settled into the native life. He had
quickly picked up the language of his adopted
people, and there was nothing of the pakeha about
him but the colour of his skin, and that was browning
with constant exposure and outdoor labour. A
waist-shawl or a flax kilt was his single article of
everyday clothing ; in cold weather a shoulder-mat
or a blanket was added. In this village of the woods
there were few emblems of civilisation except the
weapons of the warriors. Stories of battle and
skirmish now and again reached the bushmen by
68 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
messengers from the plains ; and the M'hite general's
great march through the forest from Ketemarae by
the Whakaahurangi track around the eastern side
of Mount Egmont to Mataitawa and New Plymouth —
when the soldiers fell so short of food that they had
to shoot and eat their pack-horses — was discussed
many a night in the village wharejmrii, the com-
munal council-room and sleeping-house.
Bent's half-Indian temperament soon adapted
itself to this wild life in the forest. No drill day
after day, no parades, no sentry-go, no buttons to
polish, and no uniform to mend — surely this savage
life had its compensations. When the Maoris had
urgent and laborious work on hand they worked
like fury, and compelled — with the spur of a toma-
hawk — the white man to toil with equal industry,
if not willingness. Fort-building, trench-digging and
timber-felling were undertakings in A\liicli the whole
strength of the community laboured from dawn
till dark, and the chiefs as hard as the common men
and slaves. It was warrior's work. But there Mere
periods of halcyon, lazy days in Maoridom, AA'lien
" Ringmngi " and his ragged comrades of the bush,
their work over, could just " lie around " and smoke
and eat, and take no thouglit for the morrow so long
as they could procure a pipe-full of strong torori
(tobacco) and a square meal of potatoes and pork.
Tito proved a not unkind master, Avhen he found
that his white man neither attempted to escape
BUSH LIFE WITH THE HAUHAUS 69
from the tribe nor shirked the often heavy tasks
imposed upon him.
The paheka soon became an adept in the wood-
craft of the Maoris. He accompanied the young
men of the tribe on their forest expeditions, bird-
A BRITISH COLUMN ON THE MARCH.
(^Froiii a iral'T-colnur sketch hij Major von Tciiipski/, 1866.')
snaring and bird-spearing ; these camping-out trips
sometimes lasted for a week or more. Far into the
solitudes of the great woods the little hunting-parties
penetrated, always armed, for they never knew when
or where the Government Maori scouts might be
encountered. The days were spent in birding and
pig-hunting, and the lo7ig nights by the blazing
70 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
camp-fire, when the white man learned from his
Hauhau comrades many a wild legend and folk-
story, hair-raising tales of witchcraft, and mournful
tangi-aongs and love-ditties without end.
Powder and shot were too valuable to waste on the
birds of the forest in those days. One of the Maori
snaring methods, as practised by " Ringiringi "
and his companions, was to cut out wooden waka,
or miniature canoes or troughs, fill them with water,
and place them in some dry spot in the forest where
pigeons and tui were plentiful. Just over these
troughs flax-snares were arranged, so that when
the birds, thirsting for water after feasting on the
bush-berries, flew down to drink, and stretched their
heads through the running loops, they were tightly
noosed. Other snares were set on the wiro- trees,
of whose sweet berries the pigeons and hii were
particularly fond. " Ringiringi " quickly learned
the art of setting snares of flax or cabbage-tree leaf
with cunning slip-loops in the branches of the fruit-
laden miro ; in a clump of these pines he sometimes
caught in a single day as many as three hundred or
four hundred birds — kaka parrots, tui, and pigeon —
for the forests were alive with feathered creatures,
and in the autumn time, when the \\'ild fruits were
ripe and abundant, they were to be taken with little
trouble ; the noisy kaka parrot was the most easily
lured of all. The only forest l)ird that was not wel-
comed by the hunters was the owl, or ruru ; should
BUSH LIFE WITH THE HAUHAUS 71
one happen to be killed it was never eaten, because
in Maori eyes it was an atiia, a spirit or the incar-
nation of a tribal deity.
Bird-spearing was another forest art widely prac-
tised in those times. Long slender limber spears
of tawa wood, twelve feet long and more, were
used.
In making the ))ird-spears, the pole from which
each was cut was scorched with fire till very dry, then
it was scraped and scraped down with ^jaw^a-shells
and scorched again, and once more scraped and
shaped with great care and industry, until it had
been reduced to the size desired and was perfectly
smooth. These spears were armed with barbed
tips, often of bone, sometimes of iron. The villagers
trailed the weapons after them as they travelled
through the forest, until they came to some tree
where tui and pigeon perched in numbers ; then
the spear was slowly and cautiously pushed upwards
until close to the unsuspecting bird, and a sudden,
sharp thrust impaled it on the barbed point.
The pakeha was carefully schooled in the art of
using the spear, and was enjoined, above all, never
to strike the pigeon full in the breast, because the
bone would often snap the barb-tip off ; it must be
speared in the side. In the late autumn the pigeons
were " rolling fat " ; and many hundreds of them
were preserved or potted in iMaori fashion by the
birding-parties in taha, or cabalashes (the hue
72 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
gourd), Avhich were hermetically sealed ^ith the
fat of the cooked bkds.
One foraging expedition which Bent accompanied
was farther afield than usual, up northwards to the
great Ngaere swamp, a huge morass near where the
present township of Eltham stands, and where dairy
cattle now graze on fields that in those days of '66
were seemingly irreclaimable bogs and wildernesses ;
lagoons, where millions of eels crawled, snake-like,
in the ooze, and where coinitless thousands of wild
fowl and water-birds fished and screamed and
squabbled all day long. To the edge of the great
swamp came the food-hunters ; they waded across
to the two islets which rose from the middle of the
bog — ancient refuge-places of fugitive tribes — and
camped there, catching and smoke-drying huge
quantities of eels for w inter food in the home kainga,
and snaring many ducks and other birds. In this
primeval spot the beautiful kotuku, the white heron
so famous in Maori song and proverb- — noAv never
seen in the North Island — then abounded ; the
white man often admired this graceful bird as he
stood on silent A\atcli on the marge of some sedgy
pool, then, like lightning-flash, darted his long spear-
bill on his prey. The birds were tame, and easily
caught, and many were snared and eaten by the
foragers. " Ringiringi " captured some on the shores
of the lagoon by the simple expedient of a bent
supplejack and an arrangement of flax loops, set
BUSH LIFE WITH THE HAUHAUS 73
near the kotuku^s daily haunts ; a day seldom passed
without a heron being found flapping and choking
tightly noosed in the snares of the fowlers.
One day in the spring of 1866, when Tito and
his hapu, their bird-hunting expeditions over for
the season, were gathered in their bush-village Rima-
toto, three strange Maoris, fully armed, entered the
settlement. They had travelled overland from the
King Country, far to the north, on a mission from
Tawhiao, the Waikato King, who, after the con-
quest of the Waikato Valley by the white troops,
had taken refuge with the Ngati-Maniapoto tribe.
The envoys had been sent down to recover some
Waikato war-flags which were in the possession of
the Taranaki Hauhaus.
In the crowded ivharepuni that night, when the
Waikato warriors made theu" errand known, one
of them caught sight of the white man, sitting
silently in his corner, and asked who he was. When
Tito explained, the visitor asked,
"Why don't you kill him ? "
" He is my pakeha,'' said Tito, " and I will pro-
tect him, because our prophet Te Ua has tapu^d him,
and ordered us not to harm him."
" That is indeed a soft and foolish way to deal with
pakehas,'" exclaimed a fierce-looking young warrior,
one of the Waikato trio. " We don't take any white
prisoners in our country. You ought to have his
head stuck on the fence of your 2>«."
74 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
Tito laughed. " Ringiringi is going to be
useful to us," he said. " Besides, he is a Maori
now."
Next morning Tito despatched the white man and
an old Maori named Te Waka-tapa-ruru through
the forest to Te Putahi, a stockaded vUlage some
ten miles away, on the banks of the Whenuakura
River, with a message to the people of that qwb re-
questing them to return the colours for which the
king had sent. This mission accomplished. Bent
stayed a while in Te Putahi, wheie he was treated
with much kindness, because of his association A\ith
Tito.
On the morning after his arrival a man came to
his sleeping-hut and, without saying a word, placed
on the mat before him a couple of blankets and a
watch.
The history of the watch was after\\ards explained
to him by Te Waka-tapa-ruru. This warrior was
a typical old bush-fighter. He had a very big
head ; he was tattooed on the cheeks ; he was
wiry and wonderfully quick on his legs. He told
Bent, with a devilish grin on his corrugated face,
that the watch had belonged to a white man,
called Paratene, whom he — Te Waka — had shot
the previous year at Otoia, on the Patea River.
This pakeha was Mr. C. Broughton, a native in-
terpreter who had been sent on a special Govern-
ment mission to the Hauhaus, and was barbarously
BUSH LIFE WITH THE HAUHAUS 75
murdered while in the act of lighting his pipe in
the village marae.
Broughton's slayer, despite his repulsive ante-
cedents, became a friend of Bent's, and they were
close comrades until 1869, when the old man was
killed in the act of charging furiously on the Armed
Constabulary at the attack on the Papa-tihakehake
stockade.
At Te Putahi " Ringiringi " was astonished to
find another white man, clothed like himself in a
blanket. This man walked up and greeted him, and
the fakelia-M?bori recognised the long-haired, rough-
bearded fellow as an old fellow-soldier. His name
was Humphrey Murphy ; he, too, had been a
private in the 57th, and had become as dissatisfied
with the life as Bent had done, and deserted to the
Hauhaus. Bent sums him up as " a bad lot."
Murphy was an evil-tempered Irishman, faithful to
neither white man nor Maori. He belonged to two
chiefs, Te Onekura and Whare-matangi, who lived
in the -pa at Te Putahi.
Murphy, it appeared from his own story, had been
taken over as a taurekareka, a slave, by one of the
Hauhau chiefs when he deserted, and had been
sent as a food-carrier to Te Putahi by his owner,
who treated his " white trash " with scant considera-
tion. At Te Putahi he had been taken over by the
two local chiefs. The deserter bragged to Bent,
as they sat side by side on the village 7riarae, that
76 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
he would shortly return to his old Maori " boss,"
as he called him, and kill him, and take what money
he could find as payment for his enforced labour.
While Murphy was speaking, a young Maori girl
sat by quietly listening.
When the runaway soldier rose and walked off
to his hut, the girl said :
" Ringi, I heard Avhat that taurekareka white
man was saying. I have learned enough of the
pakeha's tongue to know that he is going to kill his
rangatira and steal his money."
" Kaati ! Don't .say a word about it," cautioned
Bent.
But the girl rose up in the meeting-house one
night after " Ringhingi " had departed to his home
at Rimatoto, and repeated the threat she had over-
heard from Murphy's lips.
That settled the taurekareka' s fate. Bent, some
time later, inquiring after Murphy from one of
Tito's men who had been on a visit to Te Putahi,
was told that he had been killed. The Hauhaus
had a short way with such as he. He was quietly
tomahawked one night as he lay asleep, and his
despised remains dragged out and cast into the
Whenuakura River that ran below the village.
At this time there were at least four white men living
with the Hauhaus in South Taranaki. One came
to Rimatoto to see " Ringiringi," and remained with
him for a week. His name was Jack Hennessy, and
BUSH LIFE WITH THE HAUHAUS 77
he had, like Bent, deserted from the 57th Regiment.
He was in fact the " shut-eye sentry " who had seen
Bent steal off from the Manawapou camp in 1865.
He gave himself up to the white forces some time
later, thed of life with the Hauhaus, and was court-
martialled and sent to prison.
CHAPTER VIII
THE HAUHAU COUNCIL-TOWN
Life in Taiporohenui — A gi'eat praying-house — The ritual
of the Niu — Singular Haiihau chants — " Matua Pai-marire " —
Bent's new owner, and his new wife — The tattooers— Another
white renegade
Another summer came, and the crops were gathered
in, and the men of Tito's Jiapv, after nearly a year
of comparative peace, wearied for the war-path
again. Rimatoto and other small bush-hamlets
were deserted, and the tribes gathered in, bearing
their food supplies to the Hauhau council-village
of Taiporohenui — close to where the to^^■n of Hawera
now stands. Taiporohenui was a famous name —
a \v()rd of inana, as the Maori would say — amongst
all the tribes from Whanganui to Waikato. The
name, say the wise men of Taranaki, goes back far
beyond the days of the later Maori migration to New
Zealand, in the canoes Aotea, Tokomaru, Tainui,
and other Polynesian Viking ships. It was that of
a great temple in Tahiti, in the tropic isles of the
Hawaiikian seas, countless generations ago. And
in this latter-day Taiporohenui the Maoris, mindful
of tiieir ancient traditions, built another temple.
78
THE HAUHAU COUNCIL-TOWN 79
This Hauhau praying-house and council-hall, con-
structed of hewn timber with rau})0-reed walls and
7iikan-tha,tch roof, is described by Bent as the largest
building of native construction that he had seen.
It was about one hundred and twenty feet in length,
and Avas of such exceptional size that the ridge-pole
was supported by four pontoko-manawa, or pillars,
instead of one or two, as in the ordinary Maori
meeting-house ; there were five fires burning in it
at night, in the stone fireplaces down its long central
aisle ; on either side were the mat-covered resting-
places of the people. The timbers of the house were
of the durable totara pine. The inside was lined with
beautiful tukutuku work, of kakaho reeds and thin
wooden lathes artfully fastened with kiekie fibre,
arranged in many handsome geometrical patterns.
Beneath the first large poutoko-inanawa in the house
was buried a large piece of greenstone in the rough,
the whatu, or " luck-stone," of the sacred house. It
w^as the Maori custom when the centre-pole of a
large meeting-house or the first big palisade-post of
a fort was set in position, to place a piece of green-
stone, often in the form of an ornament, such as an
ear-drop or a carved tiki, at its foot.*
* We have survivals of this widespread ancient custom
amongst ourselves, in the practice of placing coins, etc., under
the foot of a mast of a new ship, and under the foundation-stone
of a church or other important building. The cult is found
amongst many savage nations in its primitive form. Here is
an instance narrated by Mr. T. C. Hodson in an article in Folk-
Lore (Vol. XX., No. 2, 190!*) on " Head-iiunting amongst the
80 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
In front of the great house on the marae, or village
square, stood the sacred A^m-pole, a totara pine
flagstaff, nearly fifty feet in height, with a yard
about fourteen feet long ; the staff was stayed like
the mast of a ship. The war-flags of the Hauhaus
were flown from the Nhi, and the people daily
marched around its foot in their " Pai-marire ^^ pro-
cession, intoning the chants their prophet had taught
them. This N'iu was one of the first worship-poles
planted in Taranaki by the Hauhau prophet's com-
mand, and it was the centre of many a wild fanatic
gathering. At its foot there was planted a large
piece of unA\'orked greenstone — as was done when
the first house-pillar was set up — as the ivliatu of
the sacred pole ; this block of pounamu is still there,
says Bent.
Round this staft" of worship, w here the bright war-
flags hung, the people marched daily in their strange
procession, chanting their wild psahns. Tito te
Hanataua was one of the priests of the A^iu, and he
led his tribe in the services after the Hauhau religion.
Hill-tribcs of Assam " : " Tlie head-man of a large and powerful
village (on the frontier of the State of Manipur) was engaged
in building himself a new house, and to strengthen it had
seized this man (a Naga) and forcibly cut of? a lock of his hair,
which had been buried underneath the main post of the house.
In olden days the head would have been put there, but by a
refinement of some native theologian a lock of hair was held
as good as the whole head."
It was the olden Maori custom to jjlace a human head beneath
the central pillar of a sacred building, and to have a human
sacrifice at the opening of a new house.
THE HAUHAU COUNCIL-TOWN 81
Some of the chants Mere amazing mixtures of English
and Maori ; some were all pidgin-English, softened
by the melodious Maori tongue. Here is a specimen
of the daily chants, intoned by all the people as they
marched round and round the holy pole. The priest
shouted, " Porini, hoia .^ " (" Fall in, soldiers ! ") ;
then " Teilmna ! " (" Attention ! "), and they stood
waiting. Then they chanted, as they got the
order to march :
Translation.
Kira .
. Kill
Wana
. One
Tu
. Two
Tin .
. Three
Wha—
Four —
Teihani !
Attention
Round the sacred flag-staff they went — men,
women, and children — chanting :
Rewa
River
Piki rewa
Big river
Rongo rewa .
Long river
Tone .
Stone
Piki tone — .
Big stone —
Teihana !
Attention !
Rori .
Road
Piki rori
Big road
Rongo rori .
Long road
Puihi , . ,
. Bush
Piki puihi —
Big busli —
Teihana !
Attention !
Rongo puihi
Long busli
Rongo tone .
Long stone
;2 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
Hira .
. Hill
Piki hira
. Big hill
Ronijo hira —
Long hill —
Tcihana !
Attention !
Mauteni
Mountain
Piki mauteni
Big mountain
Rongo mauteni
Long mountain
Piki niu
. Big staff
Rongo niu —
Long staff —
Teihana !
Attention !
Nota . .
. North
No te pihi .
. North by East
No te hihi
N. Nor'-east
Norito mino.
. N.E. by North
Noriti
North-east
Koroni —
Colony —
Teihana !
Attention !
Hail .
. Hi !
Kamu te ti .
Come to tea
Oro te mene .
All tlie men
Rauna .
Round
Te Niu— .
. The Niu—
Teihana !
Attention !
Hema .
Hliem
Rurawini
Rvile the wind
Tu mate wini
Too much wind
Kamic te ti —
Come to tea —
Teihana !
Attention !
And so on, a marvellous farrago of Maorified
English words and phrases. It ^\•as Te Ua's " gift
of tongues," they imagmed, that had descended
upon them.
Night and morning, too, the sound of Hauhau
prayers rose from the great camp. Here is one,
THE HAUHAU COUNCIL-TOWN
83
the " Morning Song " ("* Waiala mo te Ata "), in
imitation of the Engliir^h Prayer-book :
Koti te Pata, nuii marire ;
Koti te Pata, mat tnarire ;
Koti te Pata, mai marire ;
To rire, rire !
Koti te Tana, mat marire ;
Koti te Tana, mai marire ;
Koti te Tana, mai marire :
To rire, rire !
Koti te Orikoti, mni marire
Koti te Orikoti, mai marire
Koti te Orikoti, mai marire
To rire, rire !
To mai Niu Kororia, mai
nuirire ;
To mai Niu Kororia, nuti
marire ;
Translation.
God the Father, have mercy on
me ;
God the Father, have mercy
on me ;
God the Father, have mercy
on me ;
Have mercy, mercy (or peace,
peace) !
God the Son, have mercy on
me ;
God the Son, have mercy on
me ;
God the Son, liave mercy on
me ;
Have mercy, mercy !
God the Holy Ghost, have
mercy on me ;
God the Holy Ghost, have
mercy on me
God the Holy Ghost, have
mercy on me ;
Have mercy, mercy !
My glorious Niu, have mercy
on me ;
My glorious Niu, have mercy
on me ;
To m,ai Niu Kororia, m,ai My glorious Niu, have mercy
marire ; on me ;
To rire, rire ! Have mercy, mercy !
The more warlike cliants ended in a loudly barked
" Hau ! " the watchword and holy war-cry of the
84 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
rebel biishmen. Very wild they were, these savage
hymns, haunting in rhythm, and stii'ring the people
to a frenzy of fanatic fire.
Kimble Bent joined in these Hauhan war-rites
like any Maori, and marched, chanting witli his wild
comrades, round and round the Niu.
Several skirmishes between the whites and Maoris
occurred in the winter and early spring of 1866, and
one of these had some concern for the exile. About
three miles away from Taiporohenui was a village
called Pokaikai, to which " Ringiringi " was sent
awhile by his chief. While he was there the prophet
Te Ua arrived. He dreamed a dream, one of bad
omen, and he straightway counselled '" Ringiringi "
to return at once to Taiporohenui. " Ringi "
obeyed. Three days, or, rather, three nights after-
wards, a force of colonial soldiers under Colonel
McDonnell unexpectedly attacked Pokaikai and
rushed the village, killing several Hauhaus. In some
way the Forest Rangers under McDonnell had heard
that the deserter Kimble Bent was in Pokaikai,
and they were eager to capture or shoot him. Some
of them surrounded one of the irhares in which they
imagined Bent was sleeping. A young volunteer
named Spain had just previously, unnoticed by
them, gone into the irhare to bring out a dead
Hauhau, and while he was there the Rangers —
hearing some one say there was a white man w ithin —
fired a volley into the hut, which unfortunately
THE HAUHAU COUNCIL-TOWN 87
mortally wounded Spain. This young soldier was
the only pakeha killed in the fight.
When " Ringiringi " heard of the Pokaikai affair
from the fugitives who fled through the bush to
Taiporohenui, he felt that the Hauhau prophet
had indeed been his good angel, for it was only Te
Ua's injunction to return to the main Hauhau camp
that had saved him from the vengeful bullets of his
fellow-whites. And thenceforward the white man
was a dreamer of many a strange dream, and he came
to believe almost as implicitly as the forest-men
themselves in the omens that lay in the visions of
the night, and in warning voices from the spirit-
world.
About this time "Ringiringi" changed hands,
much as if he were a fat porker or a keg of powder
or any other article of Maori barter. Rupe (" Wood-
pigeon "), a chief of Taiporohenui, made request
of Tito — to whom he was related — for his jmkeha
mokai, his tame white man. He had never owned
a pakeha, he explained, and would like one all to
himself, and he knew that " Ringiringi " would be
a handy man to have around, to keep his armoury
of guns, of miscellaneous makes and dates, in repair,
and to make cartridges for him. So " Ringiringi "
was passed over to his new owner, whom he served,
with the exception of some short intervals in the
war-time and in the period of exile on the Upper
Waitara, until 1878,
88 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
Soon after " Ringiringi " had become one of
Rupe's household, his chief's son, a young lad named
Kuku (another name for the wood-pigeon), fell
seriously ill. The white man doctored and care-
fully nursed the boy, and under his treatment he
recovered. Rupe's gratitude to his mokai took a
chieftain-like form. As payment, or uhi, for curing
his son, he led up his daughter, a young girl of fifteen
or sixteen, and presented her to " Ringkingi " as
his wife.
" Indeed, she was a pretty gu'l," says the old
'pakeha-M.dion, recalling the dead past. " I'll never
forget her. She had handsome features, almost
European, though she was of pure Maori blood.
Her lips were small, her hair was wavy and curly,
instead of hanging in a straight, black mat, and she
had what was very strange in a Maori, blue eyes —
the first blue-eyed native I have ever seen. She
was a very gentle girl — she never kaiuja'd or said
unpleasant things about others, never quarrelled
with the other women. She did not smoke either,
which was unusual. Her chin was tattooed, but
not too thickly or deeply. She had, too, the ra'pe
and tiki-hope patterns engraved on her body, the
hip, and thigh, tattooing which was in fashion in
those days, and which the girls and women were
proud of displaying when they went out to bathe."
With this agreeable young wife, whose name was
Rihi, or Te Hau-roroi-ua, Bent lived for nearly three
THE HAUHAU COUNCIL -TOWN 89
years. She bore one child, which died, and soon
after she, too, died, to the 'pakeha-M.siori''s great
sorrow. His one-eyed wife, the lady of Otapawa,
had left her unwilling husband some months before
he took Rilii in Maori marriage.
Amongst the primitive arts of the Maori with
which " Ringiringi " became familiar about this
time was that of moko, or tattooing. The kauae
tattooing — on chin and lips — w^as still universal
amongst the native women, though few of the men
now submitted their faces to the chisel or the needle
of the tattooing artist. A popular form of tattooing
amongst both sexes was that technically known as
tiki-hope, the scroll-patterns on the thighs and other
parts of the body usually concealed by the waist-
shawl. The white man saw numbers of women
as well as men decorated in this fantastic fashion.
In fact, he was so thoroughly Maori by this time
that he was about to undergo the operation himself,
in the winter of 1867, when living at the village Te
Paka, near the old fort Otapawa. He had the
ngarahu, or kapara, the blue-black pigment, ready
for the dusky engraver, and would shortly have been
made pretty for life in Maori eyes had not the
tattooing been peremptorily forbidden.
"I wanted my face tattooed," says Bent, "for
I was as wild as any Maori then. I intended to have
the curves called tiivhana, or arches, tattooed on my
forehead, over the eyes, and the kaivekaive lines on
90 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
the cheeks, extending to the corners of the mouth.
What a curiosity I would have been, though, when
I caitie out of the bush ! I would have been able
to earn my living in my old age, going on exhibition,
like the bearded lady in the circus ! "
It was Te Ua the prophet who forbade the tattoo-
ing. He happened to be in residence at Te Paka
just then, and he reminded " Ringiringi " that he
liad kijnid him, and explained that to moko his skin
would be a violation of that particular brand of tapu.
To the white man this was not quite clear ; never-
theless, he agreed to obey the prophet's Mosaic
command " to make no cuttings " in his flesh, and
remained a plain, undecorated 'pakeJm.
However, he acquired some skill himself with the
tattooing instruments, and exercised it in printing
names and sundry devices on the persons of the
villagers. He learned, too, how to manufacture
the indelible rigarahu, or kapara, pigment. In
making this tattooing-ink the soot from fires of
white-pine {kahikatea) wood was used. A cave-like
hole was dug in the side of a bank, with an opening
resembling a chimney in the top. A large fire was
kindled in the cave, or rua, and for several days was
constantly fed with the resinous timber of the
kahikatea. Above the earth-chimney were arranged
a number of twigs of the karamu shrub (a coprosma),
with the bark stripped off, set up in the shape of a
tent, and covered with a layer of leaves. The dense
THE HAUHAU COUNCIL-TOWN 91
smoke from the fire deposited a thick soot on the
karamu sticks. For some days the fire was kept up ;
then the twigs were removed, and the soot scraped
off into wooden receptacles. It was mixed with
water, and worked into little round balls. The soot-
balls were then placed on a layer of 'poroporo leaves
in an umu, or earth-oven, and steamed for about
three hours, when they were taken out and set to
dry. In later times, after the war, Bent cften em-
ployed himself in the manufacture of this tattoo-
dye ; and was, he says, accustomed to receive ten
shillings for a ball of figarahu the size of a peach.
To Te Paka vUlage there came one day another
renegade white man, an Irish soldier named Charles
Kane, or King. He had been a private in the second
battalion of the 18th Royal Irish Regiment, and
had, like Bent, revolted against army discipline,
and deserted to the Hauhaus. The Maoris had
christened him " Kingi." He lived in Bent's whare
in Te Paka for some time. He was exceedingly
bitter against his old officers, and, in fact, against
his fellow-whites in general ; so much so, that he
boasted of his intention to fight against them, and,,
as will be seen later, actually did so in the attack on
the Turuturumokai redoubt. Like most of the
soldiers who traitorously deserted their colours in
those war-days, he fell at last a victim to the toma-
hawks of his Hauhau companions.
CHAPTER IX
A FOREST ADVENTURE
The two eel-fishers — Bivouac in tlie Inisli — A nuiriicrous
attack — The Waikato's tomaliawk — " Riiigiringi's " escape.
Far away to the east and north of the great Hauhau
council-camp stretched the forest, clothing hill and
valley with one endless wavy garment of unvarying
green. For weeks one might tramp through these
vast, jungly woods and not see or hear sign of man,
or of any living thing but the twittering birds in the
tree-tops and a stray A\ild jug rooting in the soft,
fern-matted earth or scampering away through the
thickets. The free, unspoiled wilderness of Tane-
Mahuta.
Climbing to the wooded crest of some of the steep
little hills that rose from the gently undulating plain,
one might here and there, through the gaps between
the towering tiers of foliage, catch narrow glimpses
of the surrounding country ; and })orhaps far away
to the nor'-west see between the branches, set like
a picture m its forest-frame, the pure white snow-
cone of tent-shaped Taranaki.
Deep in these bush solitudes one day, when the
'J2
A IFOREST ADVENTURE Oli
spring had come, the voice of man broke upon the
silences. The wild boar stopped his root-foraging to
listen, and then turned and crashed off through the
supplejacks. A band of brown men, some clad in
nondescript articles of European clothing, some
wearing only a shoulder-cape of flax and a shawl or
blanket-kilt, wound in single file through the bush,
striking due east. There were fourteen or fifteen
of them. Most of them carried weapons — double-
barrelled guns and short-handled tomahawks, stuck
in the waist-belt of flax ; all had large flax baskets,
some containing gourd-calabashes, strapped across
their backs. Some sang little lilts of Maori song,
and some called now and then to the others, or
mimicked the tui and the kaka parrot that cried
above them in the trees.
Mid-line in the file was a fairer-skinned young
forester, bare-footed like the rest, clad only in a
" home-made " shirt that seemed to have been
cut out of a blanket and a coloured shawl strapped
round his waist. He had a thick beard, and his hair
was so long that it would have fallen down over his
shoulders had it not been caught at the back of his
neck and tied with a piece of flax. This was " Ringi-
ringi," the 'pakeha-MRori, wearing as little clothing
as his Hauhau companions, and to all appearance
as seasoned a bushman as they, as he bent along
the jungly way with the easy, noiseless jog of the
Maori scout.
94 THE ADVENTURES OP KIMBLE BENT
This party had been despatclied from Taiporo-
henui by Rupe, to work inland through the bush
to the upper w aters of the Patea River, and scour
the country for food supplies for the assembled
tribes. They were ordered to bring home wild pork
and wild honey, and to catch as many eels as they
could carry. They travelled far into the heart of
the bush, and then divided into small parties of twos
and threes for eel-catching in the creeks.
The white man's companion on the eel-fishing
excursion was an old Maori from the " King "
Country, a Ngati-Maniapoto man, who had joined
the Taranaki Hauhaus ; he was a short but strongly
built fellow, with a big head and of dark and sullen
visage, made more forbidding still by the blue-black
tattoo with which cheeks and brow and nose were
scrolled and lined. The couple, leaving the others
after arranging a general rendezvous for the follow ing
day, selected a small creek, winding in a slow, brown
current beneath the roof of verdure which the out-
stretching branches of the rata and the pines nearly
everywhere held over it. It was a tributary of the
Upper Patea above Rukumoana. They fished with
short rods and flax lines, with worms for bait, and
by the evening had caught between them about
sixty good-sized eels.
The eel-fishers bivouacked where the t\\ilight
found them, in a tiny nook near Orangimura, where
there was just room to build their camp-fire and
A FOREST ADVENTURE 95
spread their bush-couches of fresh-pulled tree-fern
fronds, between the buttressed raius and the creek-
side.
" Ringiringi " had a little cold food in his pikau
kit, potatoes and kopaki corn ; that is, maize in the
sheath. He was about to grill some of the fat eels
on the fire when his Maori companion stopped him.
*' E tama ! " he said. " Don't you know it is
unlucky to cook the tuna in the night-time ? Do
not touch those eels until the morning ; should you
disobey, it will surely bring heavy rain."
The superstitious old warrior was so insistent that
" Ringiringi," to please him, agreed to his wishes ;
he contented himself with the little he had in his kit,
and then, filling his pipe with torori tobacco, lit it,
and smoked as he lay beside the camp-fire. His
Maori mate squatted smoking on the other side.
The warmth of the fire, and the low, murmurous
singing of the little river — the wawara-wai, the
babble of the waters, in the musical Maori tongue —
pleasantly lulled the tired pakeha. He lay there,
with his scanty bush-ranging garments wrapped
about him, listening, half -asleep, to the lazy run of
the creek, and to the songs that his savage old com-
panion recited to himself in a monotonous chant.
War-songs of Waikato, songs that he and his Kingite
comrades had shouted in many an armed camp
before the white man drove them out beyond the
Aukati line, the frontier of the Waikato. In one
OG THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
of these chants the eel-fisher's voice was lifted in a
quick burst of passionate remembrance — a defiant
Aa^-song the Hauhaus of Taranaki, too, had
adopted as a composition exactly expressing their
opinion of pakehas in general, and of the pakeha
Governor in particular. It likened Governor Grey
to a bush-bullock devouring the tender leaves of
the raurekau shrub — a Maori simile for the land-
hunger of the A\hites :
" A he kau ra.
He kau ra !
U II !
He kau kauxma koe
Kia miti mai
Te raurekau.
A he kau ra.
He kau ra !
A u u !
(" Ha ! A beast art thou,
A beast that bellows —
Ooh ooh !
A beast art thou, O Governor,
That lickcst in
The leaves of the raurekau.
Ho ! A beast, indeed,
A beast art thou !
Oo on ooh 1 ")
The old Hauhau, warming to the haka, almost
yelled the virulent words. The chant broke the
white man's drowsing, and he sat up and listened
as his companion r('])cated the vigorous dance-
song.
A FOREST ADVENTURE 97
" Well, pakeha ! " he said ; " that is our Waikato
iigeri, our A\'ar-cry. That is what we think of the
Governor — and of all pakehas I I hate all white
men ! They are thieves and pigs. I could cook
and eat them all ! All, every one ! I would not
leave a white-skin alive in this island ! They are
slaves, taurekarekas — like you ! Now go to sleep,
for we must rise w^hen the kaka cries."
And the old man curled up by the fire, Awhile
" Ringiringi " found uncomfortable reflection in
the fact that he ^^'as here alone, far in the heart of
the forest, with a murderous old savage who was
armed with a war-tomahawk, while he, the weaker
man, though the younger, had nothing with which
to defend himself. But by this time he Mas familiar
with the face of danger, and worked and slept in
the midst of alarms ; so simply remarking to the
Maori, "Friend, I am sleepy," and throwing some
fresh fuel on the fire, he lay down again on his
ferny ivhariki.
However, he had his suspicions of the old savage,
and presently he glimpsed the Maori eyeing him
dangerously through his narrowed lids and handling
his tomahawk restlessly. When he lay down to
rest, the white man had drawn his blanket partly
over his face, as if he were asleep, but he kept one
eye lifting. Once the Maori half rose and looked
cunningly over at his companion, with his hand on
his war-axe, then he sank down again.
98 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
The little dark brook went singing on beneath
the forest ; the fire gradually burned lower and
lower as the night wore on ; the niorepork noA\' and
then cried his sharp complaint of " Kou-kou ! " fioni
the shadoAA's. The two fishers lay silent ; to all
appearance both were asleep. But in the Maori's
heart was black, treacherous murder.
Utu — payment, satisfaction, revenge — summed
up in a word the darker side of the Maoii character.
The lone •pakeha's head would be indeed a trophy
to bear back through the wilderness to his tribe.
He would be a hero ; he could brag to the end of
his days how he slew a white soldier in single combat,
and none could contradict him. He saw himself
already taki-mg and prancing up and down the
home marae before his admii'ing clan, the pakeha's
head in his hand, his tomahawk — the victor's toma-
hawk ! — flashing in air. Ah ! That, indeed, would be
utu — though long-deferred utu — for his kinsmen who
fell to the pakeha bullets at Rangirii'i and Orakau !
It must have been nearly midnight, and " Ringi-
ringi " was half-asleep with fatigue, in spite of his
fears, when suddenly all his senses were awakened.
Through his half closed eyelids he saw tlie Maori
rise, tomahawk in hand ; he rose from his blanket
noiselessly, then cautiously stretched one foot across
a tawa log that lay on the fire, with its end pro-
jecting. His eyes blazed, his face was frightful, with
intent to murder ])l;tiii upon il in tlic firelight.
A FOREST ADVENTURE 99
He Avas just in the act of stepping over tlie log,
with his little axe upraised, when the white man
suddenly threw off his blanket and leaped for the
savage.
The old fellow flew at him with his upraised toma-
hawk glittering in the little light that the bivouac-
fire yet threw^ out.
But " Ringiringi " was too quick for him. He
ducked dexterously, and caught the Maori by the
ankle, and, with a lightning twist that he had learned
from his Taranaki people, threw him to the ground.
The murderer-in-intent fell on his back and
almost on the fire, and the tomahawk dropped
from his hand.
" Ringiringi " pounced on the furious old savage
as he fell, and with a knee on his bare chest, and one
hand on his throat, reached out with the free hand
for the tomahawk, which lay just within his grasp.
The Maori would have continued the struggle,
and in the rough-and-tumble would probably have
got the better of the white man, had not " Ringi-
ringi," now roused to murderous mood himself,
threatened to split his head in two if he moved,
and emphasised his words by bringing the weapon
down until the blade was within an inch of the old
fellow's ugly, tattooed nose.
The Maori sulkily promising to lie quietly in his
sleeping-place for the rest of the night, the pakeha
relinquished liis grip of the old man and backed to
UM) THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
hi.s own side of the bivouac. He fed the fire ^ith
dry branches of pine, and presently the little glade
was a blaze of light again, and the black tree-
shadows danced like forest-ghosts to the rising and
falling of the flames.
The old Maori pulled his blanket over his face
and pretended to go to sleep, but " Ringiringi " did
not take his eyes ofif him the rest of that night. He
sat by the fire till daylight, the captured tomahawk
between his knees.
In the morning the two enemies silently packed
their takes of eels in their kits, and slung them on
their backs by flax-leaf straps, for the home-journey.
The little river had to be forded. It was about
knee-deep. The Maori hung back, waiting for Bent
to cross first ; but the white man knew that if he
did so his enemy would spring upon him or trip
him up and try to drown lihn in the creek.
" Now, you go first," ordered Bent, when he had
settled his pikau on his shoulders and stood, toma-
hawk in hand, facing the Maori, " and walk in front
of me all the way home, or I'll kill you ! "
So the old fellow sulkily stepped into the stream
and waded across. Bent following liim, and in this
order they travelled.
So they made their way homewards, striking west
through the pathless forest, wading watercourses
and climbing and descending hills, until they einerged
on the fcni country. "' Ringu'ingi," immensely re-
A FOREST ADVENTURE 101
lieved, and weary beyond words, reported himself
to his chief.
Rupe was furiously angry when he heard the story
of the Waikato's attack on his jjakeha.
" The kohuru ! " he cried, as he leaped to his feet.
" The murderer ! I shall slay him this instant, on
the marae, though all Waikato come down to avenge
him ! " And seizing an axe from the wall, he ran
out in chase of " Ringiringi's " night antagonist.
The old fellow, when the chief rushed out at him
like a madman, turned and fled from the village,
and ran for his life until he disappeared in the shelter
of the bush. Rupe did not pursue him far ; his fit
of anger was soon spent, and he returned to his ivhare,
and made his white man relate again, with Maori
wealth of detail, the story of the eel-fishing bivouac.
" Ringii'ingi's " would-be slayer was never heard
of again ; at any rate, he did not venture back to
the camp of the Hauhaus ; and whether he ever
succeeded in taking a pakeha head in settlement of
his uhi bill no man knows.
CHAPTER X
THE WAR-CHIEF AJSfD HIS GODS
The war-chief Titokowaru — Ancient ceremonies and religimi
revived — Uenviku, the god of battle — Titokowaru's mana-tapa
■ — Bent makes cartridges for the Hanhaus — A novel weapon.
The year 1867 was one of little activity amongst
the Hauhaus with Avhom " Ringiringi " lived, except
in respect of theu' interminable meetings and Niu-
parades and prophesyings. Hostilities had been
suspended by both sides for the time, but the tem-
porary peace was only the prelude to the fiercest
fighting of the Ten- Years' War.
The Avhite man worked for his master Rupe all
that year, digging and planting, carrying wood and
water, and performing, in fact, the duties of a
household slave. But it was a slavery that had
its privileges and its compensations, and there were
long days of abundant food and little work, in the
intervals between the seasons of communal labour
in the potato-fields and the periodical birding and
eeling and pig-lumling expeditions.
It was while living at Te Paka that " Ringiringi "
became well acquainted with the celebrated Tito-
102
THK VVAII-CHIKJ^^ AND HIS (H)I)S 103
kowaru, the great war-chief of tJie Hauhaus. Ti-
toko, as his name was usually abbreviated, came
riding into the little bush-village one day at the head
of an armed band of Ngati-Ruanui and Nga-Ruahine
men, and held a meeting in the marae, urging the
people to renew the war. He was travelling from
village to village, haranguing the Hauhaus, and ex-
plaining his new plan of campaign, which briefly
was to make surprise attacks on small isolated
redoubts garrisoned by the white soldiers, and to
lay ambuscades. He declared, too, that his tactics
would be, not to build any more stockaded forts in
positions where the Europeans could easily reach
them, but to entice the troops into the midst of the
forest, where the Maori warrior would have the
advantage. This scheme met with general approval,
and the tribespeople signified their intention of
joining Titoko and fighting his battles for him when-
ever he gave the word to begin.
Titokowaru was the most brainy, as well as the
most ferocious, of the Taranaki chiefs who led the
Hauhaus against the whites. It was his strategy
that was responsible for the most serious defeats
inflicted on the Government forces in the war of
1868-9. In appearance he was a stern, commanding
man, with a countenance disfigured by the loss of
an eye — reminder of the Battle of Sentry Hill. He
was not tattooed. "When roused," says Bent,
" he had a voice like a roaring lion." In his attke
104 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BEN^r
he wa.s often quaintly pakeJia, for he frequently
appeared in a black " hard-hitter " hat and a full
suit of European clothing. He carried no weapon
but his sacred taialm, his tongue-pointed staff of
hard\\ood, ornamented A\itli a plume of red kaka
feathers.
The war-chief revived many a half-forgotten
savage practice in the campaign that followed.
Besides being a Hauhau "prophet," he was a tohunga,
or priest, of the ancient Maori religion.
Before despatching a war-party he invariably
recited the customary spells {karoMa) to ensure
their success, and the ^^'orship, or rather placation
and invocation of Uenuku, the war-god, was re-
suscitated in every armed camp and on every battle-
field.
Titoko possessed, in a strong degree, Avhat the
Maoris termed mana-tapu — personal ta'pu, or sacred
prestige, heritage from his priestly forefathers of
Ariki rank. His body was sacred in Maori eyes,
and he A\as accredited A\ith many a singular super-
natural attribute : " Even the A\inds of heaven are
his," said the Hauhaus. When the ichakarua, the
north-east breeze, blew, it was a fitting time for
the war-parties to set out, for the ichakarua was the
breath of Uenuku, Titoko's deity, and his familiar
spirit, and it was an omen of success in battle.
Bent gives some curious instances of Titokowaru's
mana-tajM. Once, wlien tlir wliito man Mas travel-
THE WAR-CHIEF AND HIS G0D8 105
ling through the forest with Titoko and his band
of Hauhaus, the chief's shoulder accidentally struck
against a flax kit containing some cooked potatoes
which an old man was carrying on his back, Titoko
immediately ordered the man to throw the potatoes
and basket away, for the food had become infected,
through contact with the priest, with the mysterious
and deadly microbe of the tapu, and consequently
unfit to be eaten. So the old fellow had to cast
his day's rations into the bushes and go fasting.
Titokowaru would suffer no rivals in the 'pa. Now
and then it happened during the war-days that some
budding tohunga would arise and prophesy things,
in bold opposition to the chief, and announce that
his familiar spirit, or his ancestral gods, had con-
ferred priestly powers upon him. Titoko had "a
short way with dissenters." His usual and most
effective method of silencing the pretender was to
take a basket of potatoes in his hand and seek out
his rival.
" What," he would say, " have you then an atnu,
a god of your own ? " Should the Hauhau be so
imprudent as to answer " Yes," Titoko would lift
his potato-kit and set it on his rival's head. " That
for your atua ! " It was enough. The other's tapu
— if he ever had any — would be immediately de-
stroyed by such an act, for the head of man must
not be touched by food, and any self-respecting
atua \\ould desert a toy>i<-less Maori without delay.
urn THE ADVENTURES UE KLMHLE BENT
But no man dared, by way of retaliation, to tiv tlie
potato-basket trick on Titokowaru.
" Ringiringi " had noAv been nearly thrt'c yeai-s
with the Maoris, and s})oke their language well.
" I lived exactly like a Maori," he says ; " worked
like a nigger, and always went about bare-footed.
They would not give me a gun, nor did they make
me fight — for Titokowaru made me tapu, and would
not permit me to go out on the war-path — but I had
to make cartridges for them. They managed to get
plenty of gunpowder ; I have often seen it brought
in in casks and in 25 lb. weights. They got a good
deal of it from the neutral and so-called ' friendly '
tribes, who procured it from the pakehas. The Puke-
tapu tribe, and some of the Whanganuis, helped vis
in this way. I know there was a white man, Moffatt,
living on the Upper Wanganui River, who made a
coarse powder for the Hauhaus there, but I don't
think any of it came our way. I had a w'ooden
cartridge-fille]', and we always had plenty of old
newspapers to make the cartridge-cases. Bullets
were plentiful, too, as a rule ; but sometimes in the
bush, when the Hauhaus ran short, they A\'ould use
old iron, stones, and even pieces of hard Mood. I
have sometimes loaded my cartridges wdth bits of
supplejack, cut to size, when I had no lead bullets."
in those bush-whacking days the Hauhaus made
use of some I'enuvrkable devices against their enemies.
One of these Maori engines of war was called a
THE WAR-CHIEF AND HIS GODS 107
tawhiti, or trap. It was a sapling of some tough
and elastic timber, matipo for choice. When a
suitable one, about ten feet long or so, was found
growing in a likely position outside a pa or along-
side a bush-track by which the enemy were ex-
pected, it would be stripped of its branches, and
bent doAvn and back without breaking it, untU it
was lying in as near as possible a horizontal position,
so that it would sweep the road. The end was
fastened with flax in such a way that any unsus-
pecting person marching along the track or ap-
proaching the village and touching the trap. Mould
cause the flax to slip, and release the tawhiti. The
tree in its rebound could inflict a terrible blow.
In 1866 Bent saw ten or twelve of these tawhiti
set on the tracks just outside Te Popoia, a small pa
near Keteonetea. The place was attacked by the
Government forces in the night, and in the darkness
several of the Ku papas, or Government Maoris,
who formed the advance guard, were injured by the
unexpected release and rebound of these savage
traps.*
* Compare this with the ingenious form of " spring-gun "
which an EngUsh exploring expedition found in use in 1910
amongst the Negrito pigmies on the slopes of the Snow Moun-
tains, in New Guinea. This spring-gun is made by setting
a flattened bamboo spear against a laent sapling, fastened to a
ti'igger in such a way that it is released by the passer-by stiunbling
against an invisible string stretched across a game-track. These
hardened bamboo spears inflict serious wounds, as they are
launched with consideraljlo force.
CHAPTER XI
THE BEAK-OF-THE-BIRD
The stockade at To Xgiitu-o-te-Manii — In the Wharc-
kura — Singular Hauhaii war-rites — Tlie " 'J'wehc Apostles "
— The enchanted tainha — Tlie heart of the pakeha : a human
Ijurnt-offering — An ambuscade and a cannibal feast.
Early in 1868 " Ringiringi " and his Hauliau com-
rades took up their quarters in the stockaded village
of Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu ("The Beak-of-the-Bird "),
soon to be the scene of the sharpest action of the
war. This settlement was deep in the rata forest,
about ten miles from where the town of HaA\era
now stands, in the direction of Mount Egmont.
Out on the fern-lands on the edge of the bush were
the European redoubts of Waihi and Turuturu-
Mokai ; the smaller of these, Turuturu, was singled
out by Titokowaru as a position wliich could ap-
parently be easily stormed ; he therefore laid his
plans to attack it, and gathered in his best fighting-
men in the forest-fort.
Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu was now the headquarters
of tlie Ngati-Ruanui and Nga-Ruahine belligerents,
and all hands were set to work to fortify the village
108
"THE BEAK-OF-THE-BIRD " 109
and to gather in food-supplies for the hapus who
crowded the " Bird's-Beak " pa. The front of the
village faced a cleared stretch of fern-land, but the
forest surrounded it on the other sides ; at the rear
ran a little creek. There were no trenches or earth-
parapets ; the principal defences were stout pali-
sades, solid tree-trunks and split timber, eight to
ten feet high, sunk firmly in the ground, and con-
nected by cross-ties of saplings, fastened to the posts
with forest vines. Close to the palisades were some
great ?'ato-trees, very ancient and hollow ; several
of these the Hauhaus converted into miniature re-
doubts. Some of the hollow trees Avere cunningly
loopholed for rifle-fire, and within them stagings
were made for the musketeers ; rough stages, too,
were constructed up among the rata branches, where
the dense foliage and the interlacing boughs formed
a perfect shelter for the brown-skinned snipers.
One of the tree-platforms, just inside the pa walls,
was used as a taumaihi, or look-out tower.
At one end of the village was the large Hauhau
meeting-hall and praying-house called Whare-kura
("House of Learning," or "Red-painted House"),
after the olden Maori sacred lodges of priestly instruc-
tion. This building, built of sawn timber in semi-
European style, was about seventy feet in length.
It was erected by Titokowaru's working-party in
six days — in obedience to the Scriptural command
" Six days shalt thou labour " ; they finished it on
no THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
the sixtli day, and religiously rested on the seventh
— and for many days thereafter. The Whare-kura
was consecrated by Titokowaru in the ancient
heathen fashion ; it was the temple of the Hauhau
ritual, and here the high chief assembled his men
when he wished to select war-parties for assaults
and ambuscades. At the rear end of the great
house was his sacred seat and sleeping-place, laid
with finely woven flax mats and hedged by the
invisible but potent barriers of tajpu.
As often happened in Maori warfare, the first
intimation the Hauhaus gave of their intention to
rencAv the fighting was the murder of two or three
incautious pakehas on the frontier.
Titokowaru's war-parties despatched on special
missions usually numbered sixty men. Though
consisting of this number they were termed the
Tekau-ma-rua, or " The Twelve."
This term, though applied to the ^\'hole war-party,
really belonged to the first twelve men, the advance-
guard, who were usually the most daring and active
warriors of all, but who had been selected in a peculiar
manner which will be described. These t^^ elve were
ta2ou, and were all tino toa — tried and practised
fighting-men. They numbered twelve because of
the mystic force or prestige supposed to attach to
that number. Titokowaru and all his Hauhaus
were students of tlie pakeha Scriptures — Titokowaru
mIicu a young man liad been a ])U|)il in a mission
" THE BEAK-OF-THE-BIRD " 111
school — and " The Twelve " were so named and
numbered for several reasons : one was that there
were tAvelve Apostles in the Bible ; and another
that there Avere the twelve sons of Jacob ; then, also,
there were twelve months in the year. Clearly to
the Maori mind there was much virtue in twelve.
In Maori belief none of the Tekau-ma-rua proper
could be touched by a bullet in a fight if they but
obeyed the instructions of Titokowaru.
Singular heathen ceremonies were practised in
the selection of these war-parties. The spirit of
ancient Maoridom was but slightly leavened by
pakeha innovations and missionary teachings ; and
the savage gods of old New Zealand took fresh grip
on the hearts of these never-tamed forest-men.
" Ringiringi " on several occasions witnessed the
rites of the Whare-kura what time the one-eyed
general picked out the soldiers of the Tekau-7na-rua.
On the day before an armed expedition was to
set forth from " The Beak-of-the-Bird," Titokowaru
summoned the people by walking up and down
outside his great tvhare chanting a song which
began :
Tenet hoki an
Ki te Ngutu-o-te-Manu.''''
(" Here am 1
In tlie Beak of tlie liinl.")
Then the people would all file into the sacred house
and seat themselves on the mat-covered floor, the
112 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
figliting-inen of the pa in front. The war-chief took
his seat cross-legged on his sacred mat that was
spread on an elevated stage at the rear of the Whare-
kwa, with a short rail in front ; this dais was tapn
to him. The men all chanted together a wild haka
song, and then sat silent as death, waiting the will
of Titoko's war-god and the divination-by-tow//«.
The chief stood, grim and stern, facing his people,
his sacred carved hardwood taiaha, called " Te
Porohanga," in his hand. His wild eyes glittered
as he recited in quick sharp tones his invocation of
the war-god Uenuku and the battle-spirit breathed
on the wings of the whakarua breeze. Then, balanc-
ing his long plumed weapon in a horizontal position
on his thumb and forefinger, the tongue-shaped point
directed at the warriors, he stood stiff and motionless
as in a trance. He was awaiting the message of his
atua, the guiding-breath of Uenuku.
Suddenly, apparently of its own volition, and
without any visible movement or effort on the part
of the chief, the weapon would move. It \\ould
slowly, slowly turn^ — watched A\itli intense, breath-
less earnestness by hundreds of fanatic eyes— until
its tongue pointed so as to indicate some particular
man. Ha ! 'Twas the breatli of Uenuku, deity
of blood and fire, that gave it its impulse ; Titoko
was but the medium of the gods !
The warrior indicated would be questionefl by
the war-chief, and asked wlidlici' liis "hciiit was
■TH1<: IJKAK-OF-THE-BIRD " 115
strong " within him. If liis answ er were deemed
satisfactory, he would be told off as one of the
Tekau-ma-rua, the sanctified advance-guard.
Again and again this strange method of divination
was repeated, the balanced weapon indicating- — to
the perfect satisfaction of the superstitious Hauhaus
— the men whom the Maori war-god desired as the
instruments of vengeance on the whites. Name
after name the priest and chief pronounced, as his
taiaha pointed along the squatting ranks, until the
tale of bare-legged warriors was complete.
Then, when the taua, or war-party, had filled
their cartridge-belts and seen to their weapons,
there was a ceremony of a livelier sort. The women
and girls of the pa attired themselves in their waist
piuphi of coloured flax, decked their hair with
feathers, dabbed ochre-paint on their cheeks, and
lined up on the marae for the poi-dd^nce, to send the
warriors off " in good heart," as the Maori has it.
Hakas, too, were danced by the men and boys of the
village, and the merry poi-aongs and the loudly
yelled war-chants put a brisker jig into the feet of
the brown soldiers as they marched out of the
settlement and struck into the forest, hunting for
pakeJias.
As the men of the Tekau-ma-rua left the stockade,
Titokowaru himself would loudly farewell them,
shouting in his teii'il)le gruflf voice the ferocious
injunction :
llfi TUK ADVRNTURKS OF KTMBLE BV.WV
" Fatuu, kaimja ! Palua, kainga ! E kai nuiti !
Katia e tukua kia haere ! Kia mau ki tou ringa.''^
(" Kill them ! Eat them ! Kill them ! Eat them !
Let them not escape ! Hold them fast in your
hands.")
Should the Tekau-7na-rua meet with success in
theii" murderous raids, it was usual for the leader
of the party to chant in a loud voice, as the home-
palisades were neared, a song beginning, " Tenei te
mea kei te mou ki tokn ringa,^'' meaning that he had
in his hand a portion of the flesh of a slain pakeha.
This was called the maice ; it A\as an offering to the
f';od of war. The mawe was almost invariably a
human heart, torn from the body of the first man
of the enemy killed in the fight.
On tw o or three occasions Kimble Bent witnessed
the ceremony of the offering of the mawe, the ancient
rite of the Wliangai-hau. The heart (manawa) or
other piece of human flesh, was brought into the
marae and given to a man named Tihirua, who was
the priest of the burnt sacrifice. He w'as a young
man about twenty-five years of age, belonging to
the Ngati-Maru tribe, of the Upper Waitara. " He
would take the heart in his hand," says Bent, " and
strike a match, or take a firestick and singe the flesh.
When it was slightly scorched he would throA\' it
away ; it was tapu to Uenuku. This was an ancient
war-custom of the Maoiis ; Tilokowaru adopted
it Ix'caiisc he believed it \\(MiI(I cause the jxike/ias
" ^IH K BEAK-OF-THE-BIRJ) " 117
to lo8C strength and courage, and become unnerved
ill time of battle. After the fight at Papa-tihake-
hake, in 1868, I saw this man Tihirua cut a white
man's body open outside the viarae, tear out the
bleeding heart, hold lighted matches underneath
it until it was singed, and then throw it away." *
A more frightful scene still that the sun looked
down upon in that forest den was a cannibal feast.
On June 12, 1868, a party of about fifteen Hauhaus
from, the pa, prowling out in the direction of the
Waihi redoubt, cut off and shot and tomahawked
a trooper of the Armed Constabulary, a man named
Smith, who had incautiously ventured out to look
for his horse beyond rifle-range of the redoubt.
An Armed Constabulary officer, who happened to
be walking across the parade ground at the time,
heard and saw the firing, and with his field-glasses
distinctly saw the flashing of the tomahawks as the
Hauhaus cut the man to pieces An armed party w as
immediately sent out at the double, but all they
found when they reached the spot was half the body !
The legs and hips were lying on the trampled and
blood-drenched ground amongst the fern ; the head
and the upper part of the body doAvn to the waist
had been carried off by the savages, w^ho had
vanished into the forest as quickly as they had
come. The remains of the poor trooper were cooked
and eaten by the people in Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu,
* Tihiiua died at Oliangai, near Hawera, iji 11)07.
US THK Al)Vb:NTURI^:S OF KIMBLE BENT
after the heart liad been offered to Titokowaru's
god of war by the young priest Tilriiiia.
Titokowaru, according to Bent, did not eat liiiiiian
flesh himself, but a boastful letter sent by him a few
days later to a Y>\\i\.o-pakeha chief at Mawhitiwhiti,
seems to indicate that he was a cannibal of the most
ferocious sort, unless, as is quite possible, he was
speaking of his people generally when he used the
first person singular. In this letter, addressed to
Puano, and dated " Whare-kura, June 25, 1868," he
wrote this emphatic warning :
" Cease travelling on the roads, cease entirely
travelling on the roads that lead to Mangamanga
(Camp Wailii), lest ye be left upon the roads as food
for the bii'ds of the air and for the beasts of the field,
or for me. Because I have eaten the M^hite man ;
he was cooked like a piece of beef in the pot. I have
begun to eat human flesh, and my throat is con-
tinually open for the flesh of man. Kua hamama
to7iu toku korokoro ki te kai i te tafigata. I shall not
die, I shall not die. When death itself shall be dead,
I shall be alive {Ka mate ano te mate, ka ora ano
ahau). — From Titoko."
CHAPTER XII
THE ATTACK ON TURUTURU-MOKAI REDOUBT
Hauwliemia's war-jjarty — A niglit march — Attack on Turu-
turu-Mokai Redoubt — A lieroic defence — The heart of the
captain — Tovich-and-go — Rehef at last.
One biting cold evening in July, 1868, the whole
population of the " Bird's-Beak " fa gathered on
the marae to watch the departure of a fighting-
column launched by Titokowaru against the whites.
It was a night fitter for the snug ivhare than for
the war-path, but the omens were propitious for
the expedition, and the war-god's sacred breeze, the
whakarua, breathed of Uenuku, blew across the
forest.
The sixty warriors of the Tekau-ma-rua took the
trail with the lUt of the dance-girls' poi-ohs^nt in
their ears, and the war-choruses yelled by their
comrades in the village gritted theu" batUe-spu'it.
They vcqyq fittingly and thickly tajm'cl for the night's
work, karakia'd over with many liardening and
bullet-averting karakias, and thoroughly Hauhau-
bedevilled for the fight.
110
120 THE ADVEN^J^URES OF Kl.MBLlO BIONT
Some of the warriors, belted and painted, carried
long Enfield muzzle-loaders, some double-barrelled
guns, some stolen or captured carbines, and a variety
of other fire-arms. Each rifleman's equipment in-
cluded a short tomahawk thrust through his flax
girdle ; a few — the storming-party — were armed
with long-handled tomahawks, murderously effective
weapons in a hand-to-hand combat. Though a
Avinter's night, most of them were scantily clad, as
befitted a war-party. Some wore shirts and other
part-European dress ; some only flax mats and
waist-shawls.
Up and down the village square, as the Hauhau
captain, Hauwhenua, led his band out into the
forest, strode Titokowaru, in a blaze of fanatic
exaltation, crying his commands to the ^\'arriors.
Waving his plumed taiaha, he shouted, " Kill them !
Eat them ! Let them not escape you ! " And as
they disappeared in the darkness he returned to
his place in the great council-house, where on his
sacred mat he spent the night in connnune w ith his
ancestral spirits and in reciting incantations for the
success of his men-at-arms.
In single file the Hauhau soldiers struck into the
black woods. As they entered the deeper thick-
nesses of the forest, where not a star could be seen
for the density and unbroken continuity of the
roof of foliage above them, they chanted this brief
karakia, a charm invoking supernatural aid to clear
THE ATTACK ON TURUTURU-MOKAI liM
tlieii- t'orcst-path of obstructions and smooth tlicii'
A\ ay :
" \\'<(l>i /(intldid c — •/,
il/c tuku k'i tc Ariki
Kiel taoro atu c — i,
N<ja jmkepukc i noa.''
Away through tlie bush they tramped, lightening
the march with Hauhau chants, until their objective
\\as neared — the little redoubt of Turuturu-Mokai.
One \Aord of ^^arning Titokowaru had given the
Tekau-ma-rua when he chose them for this expedi-
tion. Kimble Bent, squatting with his fellows in
the big house, had watched the divination-by-
taiaJm and the demon-like red tongue of the high
priest's sacred weapon turning now to one silent
warrior, now to another. He heard Titokowaru's
injunction to the chosen of the war-god :
" Kami e haere ki te kuivaha o te pa ; kei reira
te raiana e tu ana ! Ka pokanoa koutou, ka ngaua te
raiana ia koutou!'''' ("Do not charge at the gate
way of the fort ; there stands the lion ! Should you
disregard this command, the lion will devour you ! ")
This caution was designed to restrain the more
impetuous of the young warriors, for Titokowaru
was a crafty general, and did not believe in wasting
good fighting-men. He had learned by dear ex-
perience at Sentry Hill in 1864 that to dash straight
and blindly at the foe, though valiant enough, ^^'as
not alw^ays sound tactics.
122 1^HE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
The leader of the taua, old Hauwhenua, mu.st have
been nearly seventy, but he was as active and agile
and keen-witted as any young man of his fighting
band. He was a product of the ferotdous old can-
nibal times when every tribe's hand was against its
neighbour's, and when year after year Waikato
armies besieged the stockaded holds of Taranaki.
In person he was not the ideal of a Maori warrior,
for he was short of stature, a stoutly built man, with
short grey beard and no tattoo-marks on his face.
But he had fought against Maoris and against
whites for many years of his life, and no war-captain
surpassed him in the many stratagems of bush-
warfare, and particularly in the artful laying of
ambuscades.
Marching with the savages of the Tekau-ma-rua
was the white man — Charles Kane, or King, called
by the Maoris " Kingi," the deserter from the 18th
Royal Irish. He was armed with a gun, intending
to assist his Hauhau friends in theu- attack on his
fellow- whites. Kimble Bent, it was 'reported after-
wards in the pakeha camps, also accompanied the
warriors, but he denies this, asserting that he did
not stir from the pa all night ; this is confirmed
by the Maoris. "Kingi," he says, was a fiercely
vindictive man, and swore to have a shot at the
white men from whom he had cut himself off
for ever.
Emerging from the forest, the warriors stole
THE ATTACK ON TURUTURU-MOKAl 12.3
quietly doMii over the fern-slopes, and crossing the
Tawhiti creek, which wound dowji through a valley
close to the present towji of Hawera, they worked
round to the front of the little parapeted fort that
stood in a singularly unstrategic position on a gently
rising hillside, close to the celebrated ancient 'pa,
Turuturu-Mokai. Hauwhenua passed round the
word to hide in the fern and remain in cover there
as close up to the redoubt as possible, until he yelled
the " Kokiri ! " cry — the signal for the charge.
The Turuturu-Mokai redoubt was but a tiny work,
so small that the officer in charge, Captain Ross,
had to live in a raupo hut built outside the walls.
The entrenchment, consisting of earth-parapet and
a surrounding trench, was being strengthened by
its garrison of twenty-five Armed Constabulary, and
the work was not quite finished when the Maori
attack was delivered.
The night dragged on too slowly for the impatient
and shivering warriors. Some wished to rush the
white men's pa at once, but Hauwhenua and his
sub-chiefs forbade it till there was a little more
light. Several of the younger men began to crawl
up through the fern towards the wall of the little
fort. The form of a solitary sentry was seen,
pacing up and down outside the walls. He could
easily have been shot, but the Hauhaus waited.
The sentry was relieved at five o'clock in the morn-
ing. The new sentinel was not left in peace very
124 THE ADVENT UHEtS OF KlMliLE JiEiNT
long. Five miiiiites after he went on duty, while he
was walking smartly up and down to keep warm, he
heard a suspicious rustle in the fern. He stopped
and peered into the dimness. Yes, he couhlirt l)e
wrong ; those dark forms crawling towards him
through the fern were Maoris ! He raised his carbine
and fired, then turned and raced for the redoubt,
shouting out, " Stand to your arms, boys ! "
The darkness — it was not yet dawn — was instantly
lit up by the blaze of a return volley, and, with a
fearful yell, the host of half-naked Maoris leaped
from the fern and rushed for the redoubt.
The white soldiers, roused by the firing, rushed
from their tents and manned the parapets and angles
of the work, so furiously assailed by the swarming
forest-men.
Captain Ross had leaped from his sleeping-place
at the first alarm. He ran out from his ivhare,
armed with his sword and revolver, and clothed
only in his shii't. He just managed to cross the
ditch by the narrow plank-bridge ahead of the
enemy, who missed the plank in the darkness.
The captain quicldy called for volunteers to de-
fend the gate.
" I'll make one, sir ! " cried Michael Gill, an old
Imperial soldier.
"All right. Gill," said the captain ; it was pitch
dark, but he knew Gill's voice. " Any more ? "
Yes ; they rushed for the gate — Henry McLean,
THE ATTACK ON TURUTURU-MOKAT 125
George Tulliii, !S\\ ords, Gayiior, and (Jill. The others
manned the two flanking angles.
Private George Tuffin, one of the garrison — who is
stUl alive, in Wanganiii — was up Avith the others
at the first alarm. He fired his revolver into the
mass of Maoris outside the gateway ; then, dropping
tlie revolver, he got to Avork with his carbine. He
had fired one shot out of his carbine, and stooped
under the shelter of the parapet to slip in another
cartridge. Just as he was rising to fire again he
was struck in the head by a Maori bullet, and fell
to the ground unconscious. He could not have
been in that condition very long, for Avhen he came
to, Captain Ross Mas still alive and fighting to keep
the Maoris out of the gateway.
" Hello, old man ! " cried the captain ; "are you
hit ? "
Young Tuffin lay there, unable to reply.
" Where's your rifle ? " asked the captain ; he
was reloading his revolver while he spoke.
Tuffin pointed to where his gun was lying on the
muddy ground beside him.
" Come on, boys ! " yelled the captain ; " they're
coming in at the gate ! "
Those were the last words Tuffin heard his com-
manding officer utter. A few moments later, in
that fearful confusion of attack and defence in the
darkness, the gallant Ross was struck down, de-
fending the gateway to the end with liis sword.
12G THE ADVENTURK8 OF KIMBLE BENT
A liauhau eliarged right into the redoubt, and
killed the captain with his long-handled tomahawk
Making a clean cut in his breast, he tore out the
heart, a trophy for the terrible ceremony of the
maive offering. Then he darted back as quickly
as he had come, yelling a frightful cry of triumph.
And another heart was torn from a white man's
body even before it had ceased to beat. This was
the corpse of Lennon, the keeper of the store and
canteen. He had been killed alongside his little
hut, just outside the redoubt, when the fight began.
He was tomahawked almost to pieces and his heart
cut out.
And in the very midst of that battle in the dark
the pagan ceremony of the whangai-liau was per-
formed, the oblation to the god of war. The priest
of the war-party offered up one of the paheha hearts
■ — some Maoris say it was Captain Ross's, althougli
Lennon's would really be the heart of the mata-ika,
the "first-fish" slain, which was usually the one
offered to the gods. The savage tohunga lit a match
(he carried pakeha matches for this dreadful purpose)^
and held the bleeding heart over the flame. Im-
mediately it began to sizzle and smoke, he cried in
an exultant voice, " Kei au a Tu ! " ( " I have Tu ! "),
meaning that Tu, the supreme god of war, was with
him, or on his side. Then he threw down the burnt
sacrifice, and, clutching his long-handled tomahawk,
rushed into the figlit again. Tlu' captain's heart
THE ATTACK ON TURUTURU-MOKAl 127
was difscovcrccl after Ihc light was over lying on ilio
blood-stained ground outside the trench.
For two hours it was desperate work. The Hau-
haus charged up to the parapets, and many of them
jumj^ed into the ditch, whence they attempted to
swarm over the walls, but were beaten off again and
again by the little garrison. The endeavour to
rush in force through the gateway of the redoubt
did not succeed. The impulsive young men, how-
ever, disregarded Titokowaru's warning about the
"lion " in the path, and it was in this tomahawk
charge at the fort gate that most of those who Avere
killed fell.
After the captain's death Gill and McLean took
up their posts in one of the angles, and fought there
till daylight. Theii" Terry carbines gave them a
good deal of trouble. After a few rounds had been
fired the breech-blocks jammed, and were difficult
to open and close.
Unfortunately, all hands did not show equal
bravery. At least four — Michael Gill says five —
men bolted for the redoubt, some of them jumping
from the parapet, soon after the fight began. Gill
called to them to stop and help to protect the
Avounded. But they fled and left their comrades.
One of the pluckiest men in the redoubt was
Cosslett Johnston (now of HaAvera), a military
settler. Mr. Johnston's intrepid example put fresh
coMiagc into his desj)airing comiades on that terrible
12S THE ADVENTURES OF KTMBLE BENT
morning. Michael Cill was an old Imperial soldier ;
he had served in the 57th Regiment, the old " Die-
hards " — Kimble Bent's regiment — and his coolness
did a lot to steady his fellow-soldiers. Gill was re-
commended for the Victoria Cross for his bravery,
but did not get it. He, like his comrades, certainly
deserved that decoration or the New Zealand Cross,
but did not get either.
When the Captain fell, Tuffin crawled, more than
half-dazed with his wound, to one of the angles.
There he received four more bullet A\ounds. In the
angle there were five other men ; of these two were
killed.
Failing in their first attempt to take the redoubt
by assault, some of the Hauhaus took post on the
rising ground a little distance off, where they could
fire into the work, and one after another the defenders
dropped, shot dead or badly mounded. The ditch
was full of Maoris. Only the narrow parapet
separated them from the whites, and they yelled
at the defenders and shouted all the English " swear-
words " in their vocabulary. The pakehas '' talked
back " at them, says one of the few survivors of
the heroic garrison, and cried "Look out! The
cavalry are coming ! " })ut the Hauhaus only laughed
and said, " Gammon, pakeha — gammon ! " Then,
finding that any Maori who showed his head
above the parapets was quickly shot down, they
started to dig away at tlic wall witli llicii' toma-
THE ATTACK ON TURUTURU-MOKAI 129
hawks, and succeeded in undermining the parapet
in several places. By this time half the garrison
had been shot down. One of the first killed was
Corporal Blake, who fell in one of the angles. Private
Shields, the captain's orderly, wan killed in one of
the angles ; Private George Holden was shot dead
behind the parapet ; Gay nor Avas killed at the gate.
Then Sergeant McFadden fell while bravely helping
to hold an angle against the swarming enemy.
Private Alexander Beamish, who fell mortally
wounded while helping to defend an angle of the
fort, told his brother, John Beamish (now a resident
of Patea), who was fighting by his side, just before
he died, that he believed it was a white man who
shot him. Bent says that the deserter Kane, Avhile
taking part in the attack, was wounded in the right
cheek by a pakehoj bullet, and then retired from
the fight. John Beamish was struck by an Enfield
bullet and severely wounded about the time his
brother was shot, but though then unable to shoulder
his carbine, he opened packets of ammunition and
passed cartridges to Gill, the only unwounded man
in his angle of the redoubt, untU the end of the
combat.
Here is John Beamish's story of the fight, as he
told it to me some years back :
" The Maoris surrounded the redoubt and tried
again and again to swarm over the wall, and they
kept it up till broad daylight. We could not see
9
I.'JO ^rHE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
iniicli at first but the flasliing of guns all around us.
Presently some of the Maoris set fire to the whnres
outside the redoubt. They were armed with muzzle-
loading Enfields and shot-guns, and we could now
and then see the ramrods going up and down as they
rammed the charges home. Then sometimes we
would see the flash (A a tomahawk and catch a
glimpse of a black head above the parapets. One
of our troubles was that there \Aere no loopholes in
the parapets, otherwise ^\'e could have shot many
of the Maoris in the ditch. We were exposed to
the fii'e of the enemy on the rising ground close by,
and this was how so many of the men in our angle
were hit.
" Then they started to dig and cut away at the
parapets Avith thek tomahawks. We could plainly
hear them at this work, and I heard one Maori ask
another for a match. I suppose he wanted to try
and fire our buildings inside the walls. One after
another our men dropped, shot dead or badly
wounded. I had very little hope of ever getting out
of the place alive. But we well knew what our fate
would be if the Maoris once got over the parapets,
so we just put our hearts into it and kept blazing
away as fast as we could load. We had breech-
loading carbines which had to be capped. One in-
cident I remember was a black head just appearing
over the parapet in the grey light, then came a body
with a bare arm gripping a long-handled tomahawk.
THE ATTACK ON TURUTURU-MOKAI 131
Quietly the Hauhau raised himself up, and was just
in the act of aiming a blow at one of our men who
did not see him when we fired and brought him
down.
" My younger brother was fighting not far from
me. He fell mortally wounded, and before he died
he told us he believed it was a white man who shot
him. I was wounded about the same time. An
Enfield bullet struck me in the left shoulder. It
took me with a tremendous shock, just as I was
stooping down across a dead man to get some dry
ammunition. The bullet slanted down past my
shoulder-blade and came out at the back. This
incapacitated me from firing, or, at any rate, from
taking aim, so I had to content myself with passing
cartridges to Michael Gill — one of the men in my
angle — who kept steadily firing away, and A\ith
levelling my unloaded carbine as well as I could
with my right hand whenever I saw a head bob up
above the parapet. When the fight ended Gill was
the only unwounded man in our angle of the redoubt ;
out of the six who manned it when the alarm was
given, three were shot dead and two were wounded.
One man, George Tuffin, was wounded in five places.
" Daylight came, and those of us who could
shoulder a carbine were still firing away and won-
dering whether help would ever reach us. We knew
they must have heard the firing and seen the flashes
of the guns at Waihi redoubt, only three miles away.
132 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
Suddenly the Maoris ceased firing and retired into
the bush. Their sentries had given them warning
that troops were coming. As they dropped back
we rushed out of the redoubt and gave them the
last shot, and then Von Tempsky and his A.C.'s
arrived at the double, and the fight was over. My
wound kept me in the hospital for five months.
The only wonder is that any of us ever came out of
that redoubt alive."
The sun had risen before the fight A\as over. A
few minutes more and the Hauhaus ^\■oldd have
succeeded in undermining the parapets sufficiently
to force an entrance, and the defenders Mould have
fallen to the last man, and the whole of theii* arms
and the post-supplies have been carried off to Tito-
kowaru's fort in the forest.
The little redoubt was a frightful sight. Dead
and wounded men A\ere lying all over the place
in pools of blood ; two of them were shockingly
mutilated with tomahawks. Out of the twenty-one
defenders of the redoubt, ten were killed and five
were wounded ; only six came through the fight
without a wound.
Hauwhenua withdrew his disappointed Tekau-
ma-rua, carrying those of their wounded who were
unable to walk, and marched back to Te Ngutu-
o-te-Manu. The " lion " of Titoko's speech, though
sore wounded, had in truth closed his mouth on
some of their most daring braves. Takitaki, a
THE ATTACK ON TURUTURU MOKAI 133
bold, athletic young Hauliau, who was in the Tekau-
ma-rua, was one of those who attacked Captain
Ross at the gateway. The Captain shattered Taki-
taki's left arm with a bullet from his revolver before
he fell.*
* Of this Hauliau Colonel W. E. Gudgeon wrote in the
Polynesian Society's Journal, No. 59 (Sept. 1906) : " Had there
been but ten men of the stamp of Takitaki the redoubt must
have been taken ; but luckily there were not, and therefore a
mere handful of men held the redoubt to the end."
CHAPTER XIII
THE KILLING OF KANE
Bent and Kane brought before Titokowaru — Kane's flight —
Captured by tlie Hauhaus — A traitor's end.
When the renegade Charles Kane, or "' Kingi,"
fled from the Tunituru-Mokai fight after receiving
his bullet-wound, he made his way to the Turanga-
rere village, and announced that he would not
return to Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu. The Maoris, how-
ever, took him back to Te Ngutu, and he and Kimble
Bent were brought befoie Titokowaru, who was
sitting in the Whare-kurn. Bent now appears, from
his own account, to have wearied of his terrible life
amongst the Hauhaus.
The war-chief fiercely questioned "Kingi," whom
he suspected of an intention to return to the
European camps.
Then turning to " Ringiringi," he said :
" E Ringi, speak ! Do you ever think of leaving
us and running away to the pakehas ? "
Bent confessed that he now desii'cd to return to
the men of his own colour, adding " But I will
never take arms against you."
134
THE KILLING OF KANE L35
TitokoMarii glared at his Avhite man, then he went
to the door of the council-house and called to the
people in the marae to enter.
When they were all in the big ivhare, Titokowaru
ordered them to close the door and the sliding-
windoA\'.
In the gloom of the praying-house the people
sat in terrible silence, and the white men trembled
for their heads.
Titokowaru, fearfully stern and menacing, ad-
dressed the pakehas.
" Whakarongo mai ! Listen to me. If you per-
sist in saying that you wish to returii to the white
men, it will be your death ! I will kill you both
with my tomahawk, now, in this house, unless you
promise that you will never leave the Maoris ! I
wiU slay you, and your bodies will be cooked in the
hangi ! "
" Ringiringi," in real fear of his life, made answer
that he would remain with the Hauhaus if Titoko
would protect him, for he dreaded some of the chief's
fiercer followers. " Kingi," too, hastened to give
the requii'ed promise — a promise which he, unlike
his ieMow-pakeha, broke at the first opportunity.
When the peoj)le had left the Whare-kura, Titoko
spoke to " Ringiringi " in a more friendly and re-
assuring tone, saying that he wished the pakeha to
remain with him in the pa, and that, in order to
assure his life against the \rildbr spii'its in the tribes
136 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
gathered under his command, he A\ould tapu him,
as Te Ua had done two years before. For his tapu,
he explained, was a far more effective and binding
one than that of the Opunake prophet ; a spell that
no man dared break on pain of death.
Not many days later the Irish traitor " Kingi "
deserted from the j)a, taking with him a watch, a
revolver, and some clothing which he had " com-
mandeered " from the natives.
For some little time nothing was heard of him.
At length the warriors of the Tekau-ma-rua, while out
scouting one day in the direction of Turangarere?
discovered on the track leading to the settlement a
note addressed to the white soldiers' commander
at Waihi, stating that the writer (Kane) and Bent
were at Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu, awaiting a favourable
opportunity to tomahawk Titokowaru, cut off his
head, and bring it in to the Government camp. Kane
was evidently clearing the way for his return to
civilisation, and this note — which he had left in a
spot where he hoped the white troops would come
across it — was obviously intended to serve as a
palliative in some measure of his military offences.
The deserter's letter was brought to the " Bird's-
Beak " pa, where it was translated by an English-
speaking Maori. " Ringiringi," questioned, dis-
claimed any knowledge of it, and as to the in-
criminating reference to himself, he assured Titoko-
waru that " Kingi " was lying.
THE KILLING OF KANE 137
Titokowarii immediately despatched the white
man and four armed Maoris after " Kingi." They
found him at Te Paka village ; he disappeared that
evening, but was later caught by a party of seven
Maoris and confined in a rauyo hut at Te Paka.
They killed him there that night.
Bent was lying half-asleep in a whare in the settle-
ment when the seven Maoris, who had brought
" Kingi " in, entered, in an intensely excited state,
sat down, and asked him if he had heard of the
judgment on his fellow- white. Then one of them
said, " Kingi is dead."
Another man, leaning forward until his passionate
face almost touched Bent's, exclaimed :
" Ringi, had you done as Kingi has done, we would
not have killed you in the ordinary way. Your
fate would have been burning alive in the oven on
the marae ! "
Then the seven, after a conversation between
themselves in a strange language the white man could
not understand, listen as he would — the Maoris some-
times improvise a secret tongue, by eliding certain
syllables in words and adding new ones— the exe-
cutioners rose and left the whare.
It was not until next day that " Ringiringi "
learned the details of the deserter's end.
" Kingi," after being given a meal, was left alone
in his hut, but was watched through crevices in
the wall until he sank to sleep, fatigued with his
138 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
enforced tramp. He lay A\ith a blanket partly
drawn over his head. One of the Hauhaus, a man
named Patumutu ("' The Finishmg Stroke "), stole
quietly into the whare, and attempted to deal him
a fatal blow with a sharp bill-hook. The blow,
however, only gashed his nose, and he leaped up
and grappled with his assailant.
The Maoris outside, hearing the noise of the scuffle,
rushed in. An old man — Uru-anini of the Puketapu
— seized the white man by the leg, brought him
down, and dealt him a terrible blow with an axe
as he lay on the floor.
The other Hauhaus completed the work with
their tomahawks, and the dead body of the renegade
Irishman, cut almost to pieces, was dragged out
and thrown into a disused potato-pit on the out-
skirts of the village.
CHAPTER XIV
ADVENTURES AT TE NGUTU-0-TE-MANU
In the midst of dangers — Bent stalked by Hauliaus — Old
Jacob to the rescue — " Come on if you dare ! " — The white
man's new Maori name — Government forces attack and burn
Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu — A new use for hand-grenades.
When Bent returned to the " Bird's-Beak " stockade
he found himself in a position of extreme peril.
The Hauhaus, excited by the news of Kane's
treachery and summary execution, were fiercely
hostile in demeanour, and some of the young bloods
came dancing about the white man, as he walked
into the village, with menacing shouts, emphasised
by savage thigh-slapping, pukana-ing, and grimacing
with out-thrust tongue and rolling eyes, and similar
demonstrations of derision and hatred.
A council of the people was held on the marae,
and the killing of Kane was narrated in minutest
and barbaric detail. Then several Hauhaus rose in
turn and demanded the death of " Ringiringi," on
the principle that all pakehas were unreliable, and
that it was a foolish policy to keep one in the camp
who might sooner or later betray them. " Let us
13i)
Uo THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
lead him outside the jm and shoot him," proposed
one truculent young warrior of the Tekau-ma-rua.
" Kaati ! " cried Titokowaru, in his great roaring
voice, as he rose with his spear-staff in his hand.
" ' Ringiringi ' is my pakeha. I have tapu'd him,
and I have told him that his life is safe. If you
want to shoot him — well, you must kill me first ! "
Then, turning to the white man, the war-chief
took him by the hand, led him to his own house,
and shut the people out. He told " Ringhingi "
that in the present temper of the tribesmen he had
better remain as much as he could in the irhare, and
that, at any rate, he must not venture far from the
door unless he, Titoko, were with him or in view.
Some days later, " Ringii-ingi," imagining from
the more settled and pacific attitude of the Hauhaus
that he no longer ran any risk in taking his walks
abroad, wandered a short distance outside the
stockade into the forest, and, seating himself on a
fallen tree-trunk, filled his pipe for a quiet smoke.
Suddenly he heard a cough. He looked about l)ini,
but saw no one.
" Who's there ? " he called out.
A voice close above him icj)licd, " It is I —
Hakopa."
" Ringiringi " looked up quickly, and saw an old
tattooed man named Hako])a (Jacob) te Matauawa,
perched on the lowest branch of a rato-tree, with a
double-barrelled gun in his hand. Hakopa was a
ADVENTURES AT TE NGUTU-0-TE-MANU 141
tall, lean, straight old fellow, a veteran of the ancient
fighting type. Bent had a thorough admiration
for him as a man of singular courage, without the
braggadocio of the young toas ; Hakopa had for a
long time exhibited a kindly leaning towards the
white man, and had been a firm friend of his all
through the troubled days in the pa.
" Quick, c^uick ! " he said, in a low, cautious voice.
" Hide yourself, Ringi ! When you walked out
of the pa I heard two men who were watching you
say that they would follow you up and kill you as
they had killed Kingi. They went to their whares
for their weapons, and I followed you quickly to
warn you. I saw you standing there, and climbed
on this branch to see what those men are doing.
E tama ! Conceal yourself ! They are coming."
The white man hastily selected a hiding-place.
He lay down behind a big log near by, a fallen
pukatea-tree ; the log and the creepers and ferns
that grew about it quite concealed him from the
view of any one approaching from the jm.
Hardly had he hidden himself than two villainous-
visaged young Hauhaus walked c^uickly along the
track from the pa gateway. Both swung toma-
hawks as they came, and one carried at his girdle
a revolver — trophy taken from some slain white
officer.
Seeing Hakopa descending from his tree-perch,
they stopped and asked :
42 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE JM^:NT
" Where is the pakeka ? Did you see him pass ? "
" Why do you ask ? " said the old man.
" We have come to kill him," replied one of the
men. " Where is he ? "
Hakopa instantly put his cocked twpara to his
shoulder and levelled it at the foremost of the
Hauhaus, the man with the revolver.
" Haere atu ! " he said sharply. " Go ! Leave
this spot at once, or I will shoot you. ' Ringii-ingi '
is my friend."
The old fellow's determined au- quite overawed
the pakeha-huntev^, and they sulkily and silently
returned to the pa.
Jacob watched them off, and when the white man
had risen from his hiding-place he escorted him
back to the ?ja, walking in front of him with his gun
cocked, on the alert for any attack on his protege.
He took " Ringu'ingi " to his house, and then re-
ported the affair to Titokowaru.
The chief showed genuine anger. He assembled
the fighting-men, and sternly ordered them to molest
the white man no more. " If you harm him," he
said, " I shall leave the pa and return to my own
village. Listen ! ' Ringu-ingi ' is henceforth my
moko-puna — my grandchild — and I now give him
another name, the name of one of my ancestors.
His name is now Tu-nui-a-moa."
And behind Titokowaru leaped up old Hakopa,
a bright tomahawk in his hand. Making sharp, quick
ADVENTURES A1^ T K NGU1TT-0-TE-MAN U 14.']
cuts in the air with liis tomahawk, he cried, as lie
danced to and fro :
" Yes, and if any one attempts to touch the wliite
man, he will have to kill me too ! Kill me and Tito-
kowaru ! Who will dare it ? Come on, come on ! "
Thereafter Bent was not molested. He went by
his new name, and " Ringiringi " he was called no
more; at any rate, not by Titokowaru's tribe.
The " Bird's-Beak " soon received its baptism of
blood and fire. Colonel McDonnell, with a force of
about three hundred Armed Constabulary and
volunteers, under Majors von Tempsky and Hunter,
attacked the pa on August 21, 1868. The whites
charged right into the village under a heavy fire,
and the Maoris fled to the bush, losing several killed.
Bent, fortunately for himself, was not in the jm ;
he had gone over to the Turangarere settlement, a
few miles away, to procure gunpowder and paper
for the manufacture of cartridges, and most of the
other men were out cattle-shooting in the bush.
Titokowaru retired to his praying-house when the
firing began, and sat there muttering incantations,
and it was only with great difficulty that he was
persuaded by his people to leave the ivhare and
retire. The great house was set fire to by Colonel
McDonnell when the pa was captured, and the sacred
whare-kura, where the high-priest had so often
exhorted his people and with enchanted taiaka told
off the warriors of the Tekau-ma-rua, was soon a
lU THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
mass of flames. The Government troops lost four
men killed and eight wounded in the engagement.
Most of these casualties occurred in the march back
to Waihi, which became a heavy rear-guard action,
for the main body of the Hauhaus came up in time
to attack the troops l)riskly as they retu'ed through
the thick bush. Then they drew off and returned
to their half-demolished pa, to weep over theii' dead
and the ashes of their great ivhare-kura and rebuild
their ruined homes.
The troops had placed a number of hand-grenades,
small shells filled with powder, in the thatch of the
ivhares when they fired the village ; but some of
the houses were not destroyed, and on the return
of the Hauhaus, they found some of these grenades
unexploded. The dangerous shells were given to
Bent to handle. He pulled out the fuses — which
the Maoris called wiki, or wicks — and emptied the
precious powder into flasks. In this way a sufficient
quantity of powder to make eighteen gun-cartridges
was obtained from each hand-grenade.
CHAPTER XV
A BATTLE IN THE FOREST ; AND THE DEATH
OF VON TEMPSKY
The second fight at To Ngutu-o-te-Manu — Titokowaru's
prophecy — Tutange and his sacred war-mat — Bent's narrow
escape — Government forces defeated — How von Tempsliy fell
— A terrible retreat — Colonial soldiers' gallant rearguard fight.
Early one warm spring afternoon in 1868, when
the vast forest lay steeped in cahn and Taranaki's
sentry-peak rose like a great ivory tent out of the
soft blue haze that bathed its spreading base, the
sharp, cracking sound of rifle-shots broke the quiet
of the wilderness.
The shots came from the mountain side of " The
Beak-of-the-Bird," the opposite one to that by
which the white troops had advanced the previous
month. Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu was being taken in
the rear this time. Colonel McDonnell had set out
from the \^^aihi Redoubt before daylight in the
morning, with a force of about two hundred and sixty
whites, composed of three divisions of Armed Con-
stabulary (many of them ex-Forest Rangers), the
newly joined Wellington Rifles and Rangers, and
10 145
146 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
a few veteran volunteers, besides about a hundred
Kupapas, the friendly Maoris from the Whanganui
and Ngati-Apa tribes under Kcpa te Rangihiwinui,
Fording the swift Waingongoro River (the " Waters-
of -Snoring "), the Colonel's force, guided by the
woman Takiora, marched through the native village
of Ma^\hiti^\hiti, \\hich was found deserted, then
turned into the dense forest, searching for the Hau-
hau stronghold, which was now reported to be at
Te Rua-ruru ("" The Owl's Nest "), situated some-
where in the rear of Te Ngutu-o-te-IVhinu. A disas-
trous search, for it ended under the palisades of the
" Bird's-Beak," the savage beak that closed savagely
on many a gallant pakeha before the sun A\'ent down
in the western sea that day.
McDonnell had hoped by his early start to take
the Hauhaus by surprise. But wary old Titoko-
waru was seldom caught napping.
On the [previous night— as the old warrior Tutange
Waionui tells me — Titokowaru gathered all his men
in the big house {ir/iurc-kiim), which had now been
rebuilt. Then, when the Hauliau prayers and
chants were over, the chief arose and cried :
" E koro ma, kia tupato ! He po kino te ])o, he ra
kino te ra ! '" (" O fi-icnds, be on your guard!
This is an evil night — a night of danger, and the
morrow will be a day of danger ! ")
This oracular warning seemed to the superstitious
A BATTLE IN THE FOREST 147
people to be a message from the gods, of whom Tito-
kowaru was the living medium. That night was a
night of preparation for battle. Armed men slipped
out along the trail in front of the stockade, and lay
in wait for the expected enemy.
Long the grim old chief sat on his sacred mat that
night in the whare-kiira, his enchanted tongue-
pointed taiaha lying in front of him. Karakia after
karakia he recited in a low monotone, incantations
and charms, ancient pagan and latter-day Hauhau
karakia, for success in the conflict that he felt was to
envelop his pa on the morrow in a ring of smoke and
blood.
In his owai little thatched whare that day sat
Kimble Bent, the pakeha-VLsiOv\. He, too, was busy,
squatting there on an old flax ivhariki mat. By his
side were a keg of gunpowder and a bag of bullets,
and in front of him a pile of old pakeha newspapers
and leaves torn from looted books. He was making
cartridges for the Hauhaus. Round a wooden
cartridge-filler he deftly rolled a scrap of paper,
forming a cylinder, which he tied securely with
thread or with fine strips of flax ; then, withdrawing
the filler, he poured in the gunpowder. The cart-
ridges loaded, he slipped them into the cartouche-
boxes and holders, a number of which had been
brought to the whare by the men of the Tekau-ma-
rua ; when the boxes Avere full, the remainder of
the ammunition he stored carefully in a large flax
148 THF. ADVENTURES OF KlMBLb] BP]NT
basket. Most of the receptacles for the ammunition
■ — liamanu tlie Maoris called them — were primitive
affairs smacking of the bush. In size and shape
they resembled the ordinary military leather car-
touche-boxes, but they Avere simply blocks of light
Avood, generally pukatea timbci', slightly curved in
shape so as to sit well on tlie hcdy when strapped,
and neatly bored with from ten to eighteen holes,
each of which held a cartridge. A flap of leather
or skin — in the earlier days it was often a piece of
tattooed human skin — covered the cartridges ; and
straps of leather or of dressed and ornamented flax
were attached to the hamanu, which were buckled
or tied round the waist or over the shoulders. A
w^ell-equipped fighting-man usually wore two ha-
manu, by belts over the shoulders ; and at his girdle
he carried his pouches for bullets and percussion-
caps.
Such was the lone white man's occupation in the
forest stockade that day before tlie looming battle.
Next morning, after the first meal of the day had
been set before the warriors by their women and
had been quickly eaten, the \\ar-chief came out of
his house, taiaha in hand, and walked out on to the
village square in front of the sacred praying-house.
" Friends," he cried, as he stood there on the
marae, " I salute you ! You have eaten and are
content ; for the proverb says, ' When the stomach
A BATTLE IN THE FOREST 149
is filled, then man is happy and satisfied ' (' Ka ki te
puku, ka ora te tangata '). Now, rise up and grasp
your weapons, for I wish to see you dance the haka
and the tutu-waewae of war,"
When the men were assembled on the parade
ground, in their dancing costume of a scanty waist-
mat, Titokowaru cried in a loud voice and pro-
phesied, saying :
" Kaore e tu te ra, kaore e titaha te ra, ka tupono
tatou kia to tatou whanaunga " — of which the meaning
is, " The sun will not have reached its zenith, the sun
will not have declined, before we have joined issue
with our relatives "^ — the white soldiers.
" Then," says Tutange, " we danced our haka with
the fire of coming battle in our hearts, and we hard-
ened our nerves for the fight. For we knew that
Titoko was a true and powerful prophet {poropiti
ichai-mana, tino kaha), and we believed that that
day would see blood shed again around Te Ngutu-o-
te-Manu."
Tutange Waionui, who was now to distinguish
himself as a daring young warrior, was but a boy.
He was not more than fifteen or sixteen years old,
but was a strong, athletic youngster, full of fire and
courage, and as agile as a monkey. He was of the
momo rangatira, or " blue blood " of Taranaki, tracing
a direct descent through a line of high chiefs and
priests from Turi, the great sailor who navigated his
long mat-winged canoe Aotea to the black iron-sand
150 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
beach of Taranaki from the far-distant Hawaiki, the
beautiful pahn-fringed island of Rangiatea (Raiatea,
as its people call it now) in the Society Group. His
father, the old warrior, Maruera Whakarewataua,
had carefully schooled him in the business of arms,
the handling of the spear-tongued taialia, most
beautiful of Maori weapons, the quick and fatal use
of the tomaha^^k, both the terrible long-handled
one and the short hatchet, or 'patiti, as ^\■ell as the
musket and shot-gun and rifle of the pakeha. So
here, no\\', was young Tutange on his first war-path.
That morning, when the very air seemed full of
rumours of battle and death, Tutange ^^as gu'ded
with the sacred war-mat, the maro-taua.
" My father's sister," says he, " called me to her,
together with certain other young men who were (»f
rangatira rank, and who had not yet fought the white
man. She was a chieftainess, by name Tangamoko ;
she was of ariki l)irtli in tlie Ngati-Ruanui tribe.
and being possessed of inana-tapu and of a know-
ledge of charms and incantations, she was as a
priestess amongst the people. She called us to her,
and t()ld us that she was about to make us tamariki
tapii, that is, sacred children, for the coming battle.
She girded us each with a fine waist-garment, the
koroivai, made of soft dressed and closely woven
white flax, with short black thrums, or cords, hang-
ing doMii it. These flax vestures, falling from our
waists to our knees, she had made herself. They
TUTANGK WAIONUr, A HVUHATI
WARRIOR.
This photo, taken in 1908, shows, Tutange—
xvlio was one of Titokowaru's bc.-t fighting men
—stripped and armed for tlie war-path as he
was in 1868.
151
A BATTLE IN THE FOREST 153
were the garments of war ; she had karakia^d over
them and charmed them so that the bullets of the
enemy should not touch them, and so that we, their
wearers, might conquer in the fight. And very
proud and confident tamariki tapu we were now,
parading the ]xi in our bullet-proof koroicai, and
dancing our weapons in the air as we leaped with
our elders in the haka and roared out the great
chorus of the war-song beginning, ' Kia kutia — au —
au ! ' and that other one which our fathers had
chanted when first they set up the Maori Land
League, ' E kore Taranaki e makers atu ! '
(' Taranaki will not be cast away from us ! ')
" One of the songs which we chanted as we wildly
danced was this :
" ' Whakarongo ai au
Ki te koroki manu
Whakaorooro ana i te ngahere.
I na-wa e ! '
(' I'm listening for the voices,
The singing of the birds.
Sounding, echoing in the forest ! ')
The ' singing of the birds ' was a figure of speech for
the voices of the soldiers on the march.
" That maro-taua was all the clothing I wore in
the fight. Round my brows I bound a handkerchief,
which held in place my tipare rangatira, my chief-
like war-feathers. My weapons were a double-
barrelled gun (tupara), and a short-handled toma-
154 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
hawk, which I carried stuck in my belt. Round
me I had strapped a cartridge-holder. E iama !
Now I was ready for my first battle."
Meanwhile, what of the pakeha-Ma,ov\ in this nest
of Hauhaus ?
That morning, after he had supplied the men with
ammunition, he sat on the marae watching the A\'ar-
dances. The morning went, but there was no sign
from the outlying Hauhau piquets. Most of the
women and children had been sent a\\'ay into the
bush at the rear of the pa in charge of the old chief
Te Waka-takere-nui, in anticipation of the predicted
attack. The pakeha-WojOvi was also a non-com-
batant, but he remained in the pa with Titokowaru
until the firing began. There were not more than
sixty fighting-men in Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu, but nearly
all of these were tried and experienced warriors,
and even those who, like young Tutange, were still
to be blooded, were moie than a match for the
average white soldier in bush-warfare.
It was well on in the afternoon before tlie first
shots were heai'd. The Maoiis had ex})ected attack
from the seaward or Waihi side, but to their surprise
the sound of the firing came from inland, indicating
that the troo|)s had worked round to the rear of
" The Beak-of-tlie-Bird. " The Maori advance-
guard of Colonel McDonnell's column had en-
countered the Hauhaus in the bush and fired into
them.
A BATTLE IN THE FOREST 155
When the first sharp rifle-cracks echoed through
the forest, Titokowaru went up to his pakeha, with
a flax kit in his hand.
" Friend," said the stern old captain, " take this
kete of mine in your charge. It contains some of my
tapu treasures ; take great care of it, for I may not
see you again ; I may fall with my tribe. Take it
and leave the pa, and join Te Waka-takere-nui if
you can find his camp in the forest."
The white man took the carefully strapped kit
and hurried out of the stockade. Te Waka's camp,
he knew, was somewhere away in the rear ; the firing
was in that direction, and he was m danger of falling
into the enemy's hands. However, he struck out
into the bush from the rear fence, expecting to steal
through the thick timber on the flank of the troops,
who, he guessed, were advancing by the track which
led in from the east.
He managed to elude his fellow-countrymen as
it happened, but it was "touch-and-go" with him.
Scarcely had he run out from the stockade and
entered the hollow, through which a little creek
wound through the bush at the rear of the pa, than
the advance-guard of the white column also reached
the creek, and crossed it to attack the pa. A heavy
fke was at this moment opened on the troops by the
Hauhaus, and bullets flew thick around the pakeha-
Maori.
Two or three of the Armed Constabulary came
156 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
almost upon him just as he mounted the farther
bank of the creek, near where a little burial-ground
clearing broke the continuity of the thick under-
growth ; it was here that the Hauhaus had interred
those of then" number killed in the previous attack
on the 'pa.
The Colonial soldiers must have mistaken Bent
for a Maori, for they immediately fu-ed at him but
missed, and next moment he ducked into the jungle,
and on all-fours scrambled down into the creek bed,
where he followed down the little stream as hard as
he could go.
There was small wonder the A.C.'s took Bent for
a Maori, for it would have been difficult in the half-
light of that bush, at the distance of a few yards,
to have detected nmch resemblance to a white man
in the dark, shaggy -headed, bare-footed fellow with
an old and dii'ty blanket strapped around his Maist,
a ragged jacket about his shoulders, and a red hand-
kerchief tied round his head.
Scrambling along, stooping low to avoid being
hit, the pakeha-Maori went down the creek until he
came to a large hollow ^nahoe-tree standing by the
side of the watercourse. He squeezed into the hollow
trunk of the tree, and there he remained for a few
minutes listening to the cracking of the rifles and
the loud reports of the Hauhau smoothbores and
the yells of the combatants. Soon the firing came
nearer, and bullets began to zip through the leaves
A BATTLE IN 1HE FOREST 157
and come ])lunk into the mahoe, in whose hollow
heart the white man hid.
" The bullets are finding me out," said Bent to
himself. "I'm in a fix still ; anyhow, here goes,"
and he cautiously crept out from his place of con-
cealment and took to the jungle-fringed creek again.
Following down the creek, crawling, scrambling,
running, he presently began to feel his head more
seciu^e on his shoulders, for the sound of the firing
grew fainter. He left the creek, and, striking
through the bush, found a familiar track which
led him to the little nook in the forest where old
Te Waka and the anxious women and terrified
children Avere camped. There he remained that
night.
From Te Waka's people he heard the account of
the morning's work. The Government Maori forces,
Kepa's men, came upon the camp of refugees and
killed two children ; one of these, a boy of about
nine years of age, was the son of the Hauhau Avarrior,
Katene Tu-Whakaruru. The other child, a little
girl, they most cruelly slew by throwing her up into
the air and spitting her on a bayonet as she fell.
Another child, a little boy, was captured, but was
saved by a Whanganui Maori, who carried him out
of the forest on his back. He was a son of Te
Karere-o-Mahuru ("The Messenger of Spring").
This boy became a protege of Sir William Fox, who
had him educated, and he is to-day a well-known
158 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
and gifted representative Taranaki man ; his name
is Pokiha (Fox) 0-Mahuru. When the camp was
surprised a woman ran away into the forest in
terror ; as she was never again heard of, it is
believed that the soldiers shot her.
For the rest of the story of that battle in the bush,
from the Maori side, my chief authorities are Tutange
Waionui, who gave me his narrative in 1908, and
Whakawhiria, of Taranaki. Of the disaster from
the European side there are numerous accounts, no
two of which agree. The truth is, it was a lament-
ably bungled aflfaii', redeemed by numerous acts of
personal heroism, and particularly by the gallant
rear-guard action fought by a portion of the column
under the brave young Captain Roberts during the
terrible retreat which followed the repulse of the
troops.
The Government force outnumbered the Hauhaus
in Ihe pa by more than five to one. Of this, how-
ever, McDonnell and his officers and men were
ignorant, otherwise there might have been a very
different story to tell. In the obscurity of the
dense bush, where the savage forest-men were in
their familiar haunts, eveiything was strange and
terrible to the recruits, and the imagination magni-
fied the numbers of the foe, who poured bullets from
their well-masked fastnesses.
Yet many of the whites were old and seasoned
MAJOR VON TEMPSKY
(From a /'/»(/y, ]8U5.)
159
A BATTLE IN THE FOREST 101
bushmen, who had served in Uie Forest Rangers
and other corps ; they had carried theii' carbines
on many a dangerous forest trail, and fought the
Hauhaus again and again, and they were led by
officers of ability, coolness, and bravery. Under
McDonnell there was, for one, that soldier of fortune,
Major Gustavus von Tempsky, most picturesque of
guerilla fighters, the central figure in many stories
of daring and adventure, the adored of his bush-
whackers and the terror of the Maoris.
" Wawahi-waka," the Waikato Maoris called him
— " The Splitter-of-Canoes " — because of his ex-
ploits in w^ar. " Manu-rau " — " Hundred Birds " —
^\•as the name by which he was known amongst the
Taranaki Hauhaus. The name had been given him
because of his activity in rushing from place to
place, fighting here and fighting there, as swiftly
as the forest-birds that flitted from tree to tree.
Every Maori knew of " Manu-rau," and many of
those in arms had been chased by him at one time
or another during the three years of war since he
led his Forest Rangers to the assault at Otapawa
stockade.
Von Tempsky was of aristocratic Polish blood.
He had begun soldiering life as a Prussian chasseur,
had served under the unfortunate Emperor Maxi-
milian in Mexico, and fought in several little wars
in Central America ; had been a gold-digger on the
great tented fields of Victoria and the Hauraki ;
11
162 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
he was a clever artist in A\ater-colours and a good
miniature painter, and lie had written a book of
travels in Mexico, " Mitla," illustrated with his own
sketches. In the Waikato War he and Captain
William Jackson had led their Forest Rangers in
several sharp skirmishes, and in Taranaki he was
in the thick of the bush-fighting, and had tramped
with his veterans through the forest in General
Chute's great march from Ketemarae northwards
to Mataitawa and New Plymouth, round the back
of the Mountain.*
He was a good shot, a finished swordsman, and
could throw a bowie-knife with deadly accuracy.
It was in Mexico that he learned the use of the
knife, and he never tired of impressing on his men
its advantages in bush fighting.
Swarthy of visage, with long, black, curling haii',
upon which a forage cap was cocked at a defiant
angle, his grey flannel shirt carelessly open at the
neck, his trousers tucked into long boots that came
nearly up to his knees, a bowie-knife in a sheath
and a revolver at his belt, a naked sword, long and
curved, in his hand — this was von Tempsky on the
war-path, a picturesquely brigand-like figure, upon
whom the soldiers' eyes rested with wonder and a
good deal of admu'ation.
Of that disastrous attack on "The Beak-of-the-
* See voii 'rciii|)sk\"s skftoli, isho\\ing General C'liute's culumii
sotting out on this march.
A BATTLE IN THE FOREST 103
Bird " stockade many accounts have been given,
but the many discrepancies in detail that an examina-
tion of each account reveals are hardly to be won-
dered at, considering the confusion and misunder-
standings that arose and that largely wrought the
defeat of Colonel McDonnell's column. The dense
and roadless forest, with its intricacies of under-
growth and interlacings of supplejack, and the
inequalities of the ground made it difficult for the
Colonial soldiers to keep in touch with each other,
and the extraordinary activity and mobility of their
savage assailants, who were perfectly at home in
their jungly woods, more than compensated for
the difference in numbers. The forest trees were the
Hauhau redoubts. Amongst these trees, their naked
brown skins nearly blending in colour with the
trunks, they were almost invisible, and in most
cases only the puffs of smoke, or brown arms moving
up and down using the ramrods, indicated their
lurking places. They darted from one cover to
another with the quickness of monkeys, and though
their weapons were mostly muzzle-loading smooth-
bores, they managed to fire and reload with astonish-
ing celerity. Too many of McDonnell's force were
newly joined, raw young fellows, who now for the
first time met the Maori warrior in the bush, and
the hidden foe, with theu' merciless fire and their
terrible yells of hate and defiance, struck terror to
many a recruit's heart.
164 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
Some of the large rata and j^ukatea trees groM ing
close to the stockade were hollow, and in several
of these the Maoris had cut loopholes, which they
used for musketry fire. Some of the trees, too, spat
leaden death. Brown figures flitted like forest-
demons from cover to cover. At these and at the
naked arms and shaggy heads that showed them-
selves for a moment the coolest and best shots of
the Constabulary sent theii' bullets, and every now
and then a Hauhau came crashing to the ground ;
but for every Maori that was hit five white men
fell.
The forest rang with the sharp cracking of the
rifles and the bang-banging of the heavily charged
nuizzle-loaders, and within the stockade the women
that remained encouraged their warriors with shrill
yells.
" Kill them ! Eat them ! " they screamed, as
they waved their sha^\ Is and mats. " Fight on,
fight on ! Let not one escape ! "
White men diopped quickly, wcunded or shot
dead. McDonnell evidently over-estimated the
strength of the enemy, fcr he concluded that it
would be impossible to rush the pa or to hold it if
it was successfully rushed, for the enemy were now
all round him. Had he only known the real state
of affairs, that there were barely sixty armed Hau-
haus, of whom only about twenty remained within
the stockade, the story of Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu would
A BATTLE IN THE FOREST 105
have been far less saddening, at any rate to the
pakeha.
McDonnell, considering the position too strong
to be carried by assault, determined to strike out
to the left through the forest and retu-e. Von
Tempsky and Major Hunter pleaded with him to
let them charge the stockade, but the Colonel would
not consent, and presently ordered the retreat.
Moving off, he sent a message to von Tempsky
telling him to collect his men and form a rear-guard.
He sent the wounded on with Major Hunter and
Captain Newland, and followed with about eighty
men, cutting a way through the undergrowth.
Von Tempsky remained, angry and disgusted at
being refused permission to storm the pa, but too
good a soldier to disobey orders. With him were
most of the men of his two Armed Constabulary
Divisions, No. 2 and No. 5, with Sub-Inspectors
(Captains) Brown and J. M. Roberts, a few Patea
Rifle Volunteers under Captain Palmer, the Wel-
lington Rangers under Lieutenants Hastings and
Hunter, and about twenty-five Taranaki Volunteers
under Lieutenant Rowan.
Sword in hand, von Tempsky moved restlessly to
and fro, regardless of the bullets that hummed about
him. He ordered those nearest him to take cover
but himself remained erect, angrily cutting at the
undergrowth with his sword. And there he was
when a Hauhau bullet found him.
1G6 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
Now I will let the Maoris tell their story of how
von Tempsky and his comrades fell. Tutange
Waioniii says :
" When the attack on our pa began, two or three
of us, including Hotu and Tihirua, climbed up on
an old partly hollow ra/a-tree that grew in a slanting
position near the centre of the stockade, in order
to see whether it would be a good place from which
to fire at the pakehas. A little way up it forked
into two large branches, and it was from this fork
that we intended to fire. However, we found that
it did not suit us, as we could not see anything of
the soldiers who were hidden in the thick bush out-
side the stockade, so Ave rushed out into the forest,
seeking our enemy.
" There were two large rato-trees outside the
stockade, but the statement made that von Tempsky
was shot from a rata is incorrect. I have seen a
picture which purports to show him being shot down
by a Maori perched in a tree. This is altogether
contrary to fact, as I will explain to you.
" When we rushed out to the rear of the pa the
soldiers were rapidly approaching the stockade.
We crouched down amongst the undergrowth, close
to the little creek, and directed our shots at the
thicket which grew between the jxi and the creek.
Some of the soldiers, crossing the creek, were in this
part of the bush, and soon I saw Manu-rau (von
Tempsky). Heavy firing was going on all this time,
A BATTLE IN THP: FOREST KiT
and many white men had fallen. Presently many
of the soldiers withdrew, carrying their wounded,
but Manu-rau remained with his men, his draA\n
sword in his hand — the long curved sword which
had already become famous amongst the Maoris.
He came out into clear view of us, within a very
short distance of \\ here ^\'e were crouching — I should
say less than half a chain. I fired with the others.
One of our bullets struck him — -I have always be-
lieved it was mine. One of his fellow-soldiers, who
was close by, ran to pick him up, and he too fell,
shot by one of my companions. Others ran out to
rescue the fallen jjakehas, and they were shot down
by us and by the other Maoris, until soon there were
nine white men lying dead or wounded around
Manu-rau.
" When the Government forces had fallen back
before a kokiri, a charge, led by Katene Tu-Whaka-
ruru, the Hauhau leader and scout, I ran out to
where Manu-rau was lying dying on the ground.
He seemed to be still living when I reached him.
I snatched out my tomahawk from my girdle and
dealt him a cut with it on the temple, to make sure
of him, and kUled him instantly. Then I took from
him his uniform cap, his revolver and sword, and a
lever watch which he had in his pocket.
" The sword, revolver, watch, and cap which I
took from the soldier-chief's body I carried into the
fa and laid before our war-chief Titokowaru. That
168 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
was one of the rules observed by TitokoAvarii's war-
parties ; tlie spoils of war must be taken to the chief
for division. I was given the revolver, and used
it afterwards in the A\ar.
'' That is the story of h<nv A^on Tenipsky was
killed. I hope you will, when the opportunity
conies, tell the jiakehas that the picture which re-
presents Manu-rau as being shot by a Maori who
was perched up in a rata-tree is not correct. You
pakehas will not regard my action in tomahawking
Manu-rau as a kohuru, a murder ? Well, then, as
you say, it was in the course of ^\'ar, and it was quite
tika and correct. I was but a very young man then,
just a boy, and it was my first battle."
By the side of this I will put Whakawhiria's
account. Whakawhiria lives at the big native
village of Pariliaka, the old-time town of the prophets
Te Whiti and Tohu. His narrative was given in
May, 1909, to the Rev. T. G. Hammond, of Opunake,
Wesleyan missionary to the Taranaki Maoris, who
has sent it on to me to supplement the other versions
of the fight. Whakawhiria's story is generally
accepted as authentic by the Taranaki Maoris ;
most of the survivors of the fight agree that it was
his father Te Rangi-hina-kau, as he says, A\ho shot
von Tem])sky.
Whakawiiiiia was a young man of eighteen or so
at the time of this engagement, but though so young
he was already a veteran on the war-path. He had
A BATTLE TN THE F0RE8T 16'J
seen the smoke of battle in 1860, at Waii'eka, v\hen
the Taranaki settlers, for the first time met the
Maori on the field of war.
His estimate of the strength of the garrison in
Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu is even lower than Tutange's,
for lie says there Mere not more than forty-five
fighting men in the i)a wlien it was attacked.
Te Rangi-hina-kan, Whakawhiria, and a party of
others sallied out from the stockade and met their
enemy skirmishing in the bush. In the rear of the
IM ran a little stream, the Mangotahi. On the
banks of the creek the eight Hauhaus took cover,
Whakawhu'ia and his nearest companions crouching
under a karaka-t^ee, and it was from that point that
they shot von Tempsky and his men. The eight
warriors were Te Rangi-hina-kau, Whakawhiria,
Ika-wharau, Tutange Waionui, Te Whau, Heheu,
Umu-umu and Wau'au. They fired at von Tempsky
at very close range, not more than twenty paces,
just across the little creek.
" It was Te Rangi-hina-kau who shot von
Tempsky," said Whakawhiria. " He dropped on
one knee, and, taking careful aim, fired and shot
von Tempsky. He shot him through the head,
and afterwaids cut out his heart as an offering to
the Maori war-gods." (Kimble Bent's and
Tutange's versions given me contradict this.)
" Young Tutange," continued Whakawhiria, " acted
a very brave part, but it was not he who actually
170 THE ADVENTURED OF KLMBLE BENT
shot the major. Tutange obtained von Tempsky's
watch as his share of the loot, and Wliakawhiria
got his gun and pistol."
During the engagement Titokowaru remained in
the j)a, shouting to his men, urging them to con-
tinue fii'ing, and yelling such battle-cries as " Whaka-
whiria ! Whakawhiria ! '" ("Twist them round
and round ! " or " Encircle them ! ") It was from
this cii'cumstance that the warrior Whakawhiria
assumed his present name.*
* The following account of Major von Tempsky's death, given
in Auckland by ]\Ir. James Shanaghan, who fought at Te-Ngutu-
o-te-Manu as an A.C. private, and was wounded while attempting
to rescue the major's body, is worth placing beside the Maori
story for purposes of comparison. It is the most circunastantial
narrative of von Tempsky's end ever given by a European
survivor of the bush-battle :
" Our brave old major was walking to and fro with his sword
in hand, furious at being caged as he was. I met him and he
spoke to me in his kindly, thoughtful way, and asked why I
did not take cover. I answered by putting the same question
to him. He then said, ' I am disgusted. If I get out of this
scrape I will wash my hands clear of the business.' He then
sent me to take ujd a position and keep my eyes open, as the
bullets were coming thick. I left him to obey the last order he
ever gave. I had not gone far when a man of our Company was
shot. The major went to his assistance and was shot, the
bullet entering the centre of his forehead. He fell dead on top
of the man to whose assistance lie was going. That w-as how
von Tempsky died.
" A Frenchman nanuHl Jancoy and 1 wont to the major and
lifted him up and laid him on his back, and just as we did so a
bullet struck Jancey on the side and travelled across his breast-
bone, and another struck the cartridge-box lie had on his back.
I left von Tempsky and picked \\\) Jancey, carrying him out
across the clearing. I then met ]>Jeutenant Hunter (of tho
A BATTLE IN THE FOREST 171
On von Tempsky's fall, Captain J. M. Roberts,
a cool and gallant young Constabulary officer,
ordered his bugler to sound the " Halt " and the
" Officers' Call," and tried to form the rear-guard
into some order. Collecting as many of the wounded
as he could, he began his retreat through that
terrible death-haunted forest.
All through the fighting Titokowaru remained
within the stockade, dii'ecting the defence and
reciting incantations and chanting sacred waiatas
to his gods for success in the fight. With him was
the priestess Tangamoko, the woman who had that
morning garbed the young warrior Tutange with the
sacred war-mat.
When von Tempsky fell and the retreat of the
survivors began, Titokowaru ordered a kokiri, or
charge, in pursuit, which, as Tutange has mentioned,
was led by the warrior Katene Tu-Whakaruru.
Wellington Rangers), and when we were about ten paces from
von Tempsky's body Hunter was shot dead. I got hold of
him and started to pull him back. Then I said to one of our
men, ' Come along for Major von Tempsky's body.' This
man refused, but Captain Buck (Wellington Rifles) came up
and asked if I knew where von Tempsky was. I said, ' Yes,'
and he said, ' Come along, lad, let's get him out.' When we
came to the body I was hit by a bullet on the left thumb, which
was shot nearly off. Just as I changed the carbine to my other
hand a bullet went through my left hand and struck the carbine-
stock, knocking me backwards. Then Buck was shot dead,
and as I got up a bullet took my cap off. I got away from the
clearing, leaving von Tempsky and Buck dead together. There
were four of us who went for von Tempsky's body ; Jancey and
I were wounded, and Hunter and Buck were killed."
172 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
Those of the Hauhaiis who were in or near the stock-
ade gathered under Katene and danced in their
ferocious joy a dance of victory, and tliis is the
ngeri (war-song) they shouted all together as they
leaped in that terrifying tutu-waewae :
" Kia kut'ki —
Au — au !
Kia wherahia —
Au — au !
A kia rere atu
Te Kawana hi tatvhiti,
Titiro mai ai f
Ac — ae — au ! "
(" Squeeze close —
Au — au ! (imitating the bark of a clog)
Spread out —
Au — au !
See the Government soldiers flee away,
And turn and fearfully gaze at me.
Yes, yes — au / ")
The pnfty clonds of smoke now drew away from
the 'pa, as the Hauhaus followed their defeated foes
into the dark forest. With appalling yells they
rushed at their white enemies, tomahawking those
who had fallen to make sure of them, as Tutange had
done with von Tempsky.
" Ka horo ! Ka horo / " they yelled. " They
are beaten ! " And thrusting theii" bloody toma-
hawks into their belts they recharged their guns,
and, leaping from tree to tree, fired heavily and
incessantly at the gallant little rear-guard who were
MAJOR VON TEMPSKV.
173
A BATTLE IN THE FOREST 175
struggling througli tlie tangled bii^li, caps gone,
uniforms torn, nearly every man either wounded
or blood-stained from his comrades' wounds.
The sun had just set. The ghostly tree-shadows
lengthened, and it was already dark in the deeper
thicknesses of the bush.
Just after the retreat commenced one of Captain
Roberts' steadiest men. Corporal Russell, dropped
his carbine and fell ; a big-calibre bullet had
smashed his thigh-bone.
" Shoot me, boys — shoot me ! " he begged his
comrades. " Don't leave me to be tomahawked."
He knew as well as they did that his smashed
leg meant death. The rear-guard was already
encumbered with wounded and could carry no more,
" No, we can't shoot you, old man," said a big,
tall volunteer sergeant, who was a tower of strength
to Roberts' little band, shooting with deadly aim
from his post in the rear of the retreat. "Take
this," and he shoved into the wounded man's hand
a loaded revolver.
Then the sergeant (James Livingston) pickea up
the corporal's empty carbine, and swinging it by
the barrel, hot with much firing, smashed it against
a tree-butt. " Old Tito '11 never use that gun,
anyhow," he said.
Bursting from the trees, the brown, nearly naked
savages came yelling at the rear-guard. Hastily
slipping fresh cartridges into their carbines, the
176 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
gigantic volunteer and his comrades sent a volley
at the enemy. It was taking iitu for the corporal
in anticipation. Then they sorrowfully turned and
went on into the dusky forest, leaving their comrade
stretched there on the mossy ground, gazing stern-
mouthed, unflinchmgly down the way of death.
Out from the ferns and supplejack leaped the
foremost of the Hauhaus, a tattooed, blanket-girded
man, with wild eyes rolling in blood-madness. His
double-barrelled gun he had shifted from his right
hand to his left, and he drew his shining toma-
hawk from his flax belt.
With an ear-ripping cry and the bound of a tiger
he came on, hatchet in air.
The corporal stiffened his ])ack, levelled his re-
volver, and fired.
The Maori fell, and lay with his face touching the
soldier's boot.
A yell of '' Patua ! Patua ! '''' came from the
trees, and more bare figures with crcssed cartridge-
belts came rushing on, war-axe in hand.
Gripping his revolver hard, his trigger-finger
steady, the corporal fired again, and another of his
foes fell.
Now they stood off and shot the brave corporal
dead, and so, after all, he died like a soldier and not
under the frightful tomahawk.
McDonnell's column, tlie slroneer one, was in the
A BATTLE IN THE FOREST 177
meantime fighting its May out through the forest to
the Wai-ngongoro, hard beset by the Hauhaus, who
had by this time been reinforced by others from the
nearest villages. The Maoris followed closely m the
rear and kept up a heavy fire, to which McDonnell and
his officers and men could only return occasionally ;
then- ammunition was getting very short. With
McDonnell marched a French Roman Catholic priest,
Father Jean Baptiste Rolland, the padre of the
forces, \\ho had been described only a few weeks
before, in a letter written by von Tempsky, as "a
man without fear." Whenever a soldier fell, whether
he was Catholic or Protestant, the kind-faced father
was by his side in a moment, tending his wounds, and,
if dying, soothing his last moments with a prayer.
He took his turn, too, at carrying the wounded.
Three holes, drilled by Hauhau bullets, ornamented
the padre's old wide-brimmed soft felt hat when
he reached the Waihi camp that night.
It was just dark when the snoring Wai-ngongoro
was reached, and the bridgeless river, running high
and swiftly, was forded with some difficulty under
fire. At ten o'clock at night the redoubt was reached,
and here it was found that a mixed party of fugitives
from the battle-field, numbering about eighty
Europeans besides the Kupapas, had already
arrived, and had reported all the officers, McDonnell
included, killed or wounded and left on the field.
12
178 THK ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
And how fared Captain Roberts' little rear-guard
of sixty men ?
Extending his force in skirmishing order, the
young officer pushed on as well as he could, carry-
ing his wounded — one in every six. When darkness
came on he halted, for it was hopeless to try to
force a way through the jungle-matted woods in
the blackness of the night. It was a cold frosty
night, and the wounded were in agonies of pain,
which their distressed comrades were helpless to
relieve. There on the damp and freezing ground
they crouched till the moon rose at two o'clock in the
morning. Now, guided by five brave fellows of the
Maori contingent, Whanganui and Ngati-Apa men,
who stood by Roberts and his A\ounded to the last,
the rear-guard recommenced the retreat. Struggling
wearily on through the tangling kareao and the
densely growing shrubs, stumbling over logs and
splashing through little watercoiu'ses, they emerged
at last thankfully on to the open country, and soon,
bearing their wounded and dying comrades across
the dark flooded Wai-ngongoro, were greeted by
the joyful cheers of their comrades. European and
Maori, under Ke])a te Rangihiw iiuii, who had set out
from the Waihi Redoubt to their rescue when
daylight broke.
Only then was the full story of the repulse pieced
together — a story of a fight that in point of numbers
A BATTI.E IN THE FOREST 170
was only a skirmish, as battles go, but that was the
most serious set-back the A\hite man had yet suffered
at the hands of the brown warriors of the Taranaki
bush. Of the twenty-four whites killed five were
officers, men who could badly be spared in that
frontier ^^■arfare. The wounded numbered twenty-
six, whose rescue from the tomahaAvks of the Hauhau
was carried out in a way truly heroic.
CHAPTER XVI
THE CANNIBALS OF THE BUSH
After the battle — The slain heroes of Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu —
A terrible scene on the marae — What Bent saw from his prison-
hut — The sword of " Manu-rau " — A funeral pyre — Priestly
incantations — A soldier's body eaten — Why the Hauhaus
became cannibals.
On the morning after the battle, Kimble Bent and
his companions, who had been informed by a mes-
senger the previous night of the result of the forest
engagement, hurried back to the stockade.
The news of the repulse of the white troops had
spread with incredible swiftness all over the Maori
country-side, and the Hauhaus from the neighbour-
ing villages gathered in Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu to hear
the story of the fight and to share in tlie distribution
of the loot taken on the battle-field.
The village w^as crowded with Hauhaus, all in a
fearful state of excitement, a delirium of triumphant
savagery.
Yelling like furies, shouting ferocious battle-songs,
wavmg their weapons in the aii", the victorious
warriors were there with their spoils — carbines,
swords, revolvers, soldiers' caps and belts.
180
THE CANNIBALS OF THE BUS?I 181
More frightful still was the sight of which Bent
had just a glimpse as he entered the gateway of the
jxi.
Laid out in a low row in the centre of the marae,
side by side, were bodies of many white soldiers,
nearly twenty of them, all stripped naked — the
fallen heroes of Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu.
Just a glimpse the white man had as he entered
the blood-stained square. The next moment he
was surrounded by a howling mob of Hauhaus,
grinning, yelling, laughing fiendishly, shaking their
weapons in his face, all in sheer hate and contempt
of anything with a white skin.
Two or three of the Tekau-ma-rua men whom
Bent knew came bounding up. One of them said
to him :
" Tu-nui, you must come with me. It is Titoko's
command." The Maori led Bent to a small thatched
hut on one side of the marae. Here he shut the
white man in, and fastened the low sliding-door on
the outside.
For a little while the white man sat in the gloom
of the windowless whare, listening to the demoniac
shouts of the Hauhaus outside, and wondering
what would come next — whether, indeed, his own
body would not soon be added to the terrible pile of
slain soldiers on the marae.
At last, hearing Titokowaru's great voice raised in
commanding tones, Bent's mingled curiosity and
182 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
fear impelled him to search for a loophole from
which he could see what was going on.
Discovering a small crack in the reed-thatched
walls of the hut, he enlarged it sufficiently to gain
a good view of the assemblage on the village square.
There they squatted, men, women, and children,
their faces smudged with charcoal or with red ochre,
the paint of the war-path. They were seated on
the ground in a great half-circle, facing the staring
white corpses of the slain pakehas. The frightful
clamour of the savages had given place with strange
suddenness to a dead silence, as the}^ listened to
their war-chief's harangue, and watched him pacing
quickly to and fro, with his sacred taiaJia in his hand,
now carrying it at the trail in the taki attitude, now
dandling it high in the air as he intoned a chant to
his battle-god Uenuku.
" Bring out my -pakeha Tu-nui-a-moa ! " cried
Titokowaru, when he had ended his speech.
A Maori rose, and, unfastening the tvhare door,
led Bent out on to the assembly -ground.
He was taken up to the corpses of the slain
soldiers, and one of the Hauhau chiefs asked him
if he knew any of them.
Bent walked slowly past the dead, scrutinising
each body carefully. He recognised two of them.
One was an old soldier vv^ho had been a comrade of
his in the 57th Regiment, and who had afterwards
joined the Colonial forces.
THE CANNIBALS OF THE BU.SH 183
The other dead soldier he identified was von
Tempsky. The major's body lay there naked, with
a deep tomahaAvk cut on the right temple, and the
long, curly black hair matted with blood. The other
bodies \\ere hacked about the head with tomahawks;
this was the work of the Maori women, who de-
lighted in mutilating the dead in revenge for those
of their relatives who had fallen.
Before announcing his recognition of the white
warrior's remains, he turned to the people and asked
if any of them had taken from a pakeha officer a
sword with an unusual curve in it, and a cap bound
\\ith a brass band.
A Hauhau jumped up and said, " Yes, I have
them."
" Show me which soldier you took them from,"
said Bent.
The Maori, with von Tempsky 's sword in his hand,
pointed to the major's corpse.
"' Well," said Bent, " that is the body of Manu-rau,
whom the pakehas called von Tempsky, and that
is his sword."
A great " Ah-h " came from the people, and the
exultant possessor of Manu-rau's sword of wondrous
mana went bounding down the marae, flashing the
weapon above his head, turning his painted face
from side to side in the hideous grimaces of the
pukana, and thrusting out his tongue to an extra-
ordinary length.
184 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
The Hauhaiis were in a frenzy of excitement when
they reaUsed that the renowned Manii-rau Avas in-
deed lying dead before them. Some of them pro-
posed to drag the body out and cook it in the hangi,
so that they might have tlie satisfaction of devouring
their most dreaded enemy, and eating liis heart, the
heart of a tino-toa, a warrior indeed.
But Titokowaru, raising his sacred spear-staff,
forbade the handling of the dead for the present.
Bent was now ordered to return to his hut, and
the door was again fastened on him. The proposal
to cook and eat the bodies of von Tempsky and his
comrades A\"as debated in a wild korero. Bent, from
his eye-hole in the wall of the ivhare, saw Hauhau
after Hauhau, the orators of the tribes, jump up,
tomahawk or gun or sword in hand, and furiously
declaim as they went leaping and trotting backward
and forward in the open space between the ranks
of f he victors and the dead ; and the deeds of the
battle-field were told again and again in great boast-
ing words.
Von Tempsky's body, the pakelia-M-AOYi had
observed while on the marae, had not been mutilated,
except for that tomahawk cut. His heart had not
been cut out, though Bent half expected it would
have been. The rite of the Whangai-hau, the cere-
mony of propitiation and burnt sacrifice following
a battle, had not, however, been omitted. On the
previous night, Tiliirua, the young war-priest, had
THE CANNIBALS OF THE BUSH 185
cut open a soldier's body and had torn out the
heart, A\'hich he had offered in smoke and fire as
oblation to Uenuku, the God of War, chanting a
karakia as he watched tlie heart of the hated white
man smoking in the flames.
" Manu-rau's " famous sword, too, was set apart
as a sacred gift to the gods ; it was a parakia, or
taumahatanga, a thank-offering for victory. It
became a tapu relic, and was religiously preserved
by the Hauhaus. It is in their possession to this
day.
Presently the bodies of the slain — the " Fish-of-
Tu " — were ceremoniously apportioned amongst
the several tribes represented in the village, as Bent
again watched from his eye-hole in the wall.
One of the chiefs paced up and down past the pile
of dead, with a stick in his hand. Pointing to a
soldier's corpse, he cried :
" This is for Taranaki ! Take it away ! "
Pointing to the others, he said :
" This is for Ngati-Ruanui — take it away ! This
is for Nga-Rauru — take it away " — and so on until
the whole of the dead men had been portioned out
to the Hauhau clans to deal with as they deemed
fit — subject always, however, to Titokowaru's ap-
proval.
The Nga-Rauru, the wild tribe of the Waitotara
River, were the only men who actually took a body
from the line of dead.
186 THK ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
Two "warriors jumped up and, laying their weapons
aside, seized a dead soldier by the ankles and dragged
the corpse away. One was Wairau, the other w'as
the celebrated scout Katene Tu-Whakaruru. This
Katene was a strange fellow. He had fought for
some time on the Government side against his own
countrymen, then he suddenly reverted to Hau-
hauism and barbarism, and led his warriors against
his old friends and commanding officers, McDonnell
and Gudgeon, with utter valour and ferocity. Now
he was to turn cannibal.
Katene and his companion dragged the body
along the ground across the marae to the cooking-
ovens in the rear of the dA\elling-huts, watched in
silence by the people. " I could not say whose
body it was," says Bent, " but it was a man in good
flesh ! "
When the two Hauhaus had hauled their body
away to the hangi for a terrible feast, the tribes sat
in silence for a few moments, gazing intently on
their dead enemies lying there before them. It was
a calm, \\indless day, and the midday sun beat hotly
down on that ghastly pile in the middle of the
crowded marae.
Titokowaru rose, taiaha in hand. In his great
croaking voice he cried :
" E koro ma, e kui ma, tena ra koiitou ! Tanumia
te hunga tapu, e takoto nei ; e tahu ki te ahi. Kaore
e pai kia takoto ki rnnga ki te kino. Te mea pat me
THE CANNIBALS OF THE BUSH 187
tahu ki te aJii / " (" Oh, friends, men and women —
I salute you ! Bury the sacred bodies of the slain,
lying before us here. And burn them with fire ! It
is not well that they should be left to offend. They
must be consumed in fire ! ")
At this command the people dispersed to collect
fuel for a funeral pyre. They brought logs and
branches of dry knca timber frorji the surrounding
bush and from the firewood piles in the rear of
the whares, and a huge pile of wood was built in
the centre of the marae. Even the little naked
children came running up with their little hands
full of sticks to cast upon the heap.
All the mutilated bodies of the white soldiers —
except the one that had been dragged away — were
lifted up and placed on the roughly levelled top
of the pyre, which was about four feet high and
about fifteen feet long.
Titokowaru ordered his men to place von Temp-
sky's body on the fire-pile first, and then lay the
others on top of it. The chief suspected, perhaps,
that some of the Hauhaus wished to cook and eat
Manu-rau's body, and he so far respected his
gallant foeman even in death that he resolved to
spare it that last degradation.
So the major's body went on first, and then
around and above it were heaped the other soldiers.
On top of the bodies more wood was thrown.
Bent's hut door was now unfastened, and the
188 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
natives called to him to come out. What he saw
he will tell in his own words :
" When I walked out on to the marae, I met two
Nga-Rauru men I knew from Hukatere village, on
the Patea River. They had come to Te Ngutu-o-
te-Manu with a gift of gunpowder to Titokowaru.
With them I presently went down to the cooking-
quarters to see what had become of the body that
had been dragged away. There we found a large
earth-oven full of red-hot stones, and there they
were engaged in roasting the white man's corpse.
They had prepared it for cooking in the usual way,
and were turning it over and over on the hot stones,
scraping otf the outer skin.
" The cannibal cooks looked round and asked me
savagely what I wanted there. They tlireatened
that if I did not leave instantly they woiUd throw
me into the oven too, and roast me alive.
" I returned to the marae, and was sitting amongst
the crowd there some time later, perhaps an hour,
when I saw a man's hands and ribs, cooked, carried
up. The human flesh was placed in front of the
two powder-carriers from Hukatere, who were
sitting close to me. The meat was in a flax basket,
and a basket of cooked potatoes was set down with
it. This present of food was out of compliment to
the visitors.
" The two Maoris refused to touch it, saying, ' No,
we will not eat man ! ' So the other natives ate it.
THE CANNIBALS OF THE BUSH 189
The rest of the body was also served round, and the
people consumed the whole of it.
" Katene and Wairau were two of those who ate
the cooked soldier. I saw Katene squatting there,
with a basket of this man-meat and some potatoes
before him. He took up a cooked hand, and before
eating it sucked up the hinu, or fat, that was col-
lected in the palm just as if he were drinking
water. The hands when cooked curled up with the
fingers half -closed, and the hollowed palm was
filled with the melted hinu.
" Titokowaru did not eat human flesh himself.
His reason for abstaining was that if he ate it his
mana hipu, his personal sacredness, would thereby
be destroyed."
The younger people in the jm were rather awe-
stricken by the preparations for the cannibal feast,
and stood together some distance away from the
hangi. " I stood with them," says one Te Kahu-
pukoro, who was a boy at the time ; "I was afraid
to join in the eating, but the savour of the flesh
cooking in the ovens was delightful ! "
When the warriors, a little later on, were enjoy-
ing their meal of man-meat, some of the little
children were heard calling out to their fathers :
" Homai he 'poaka mou " ('' Give me some pork to
eat "). They had seen the meat carried up in flax
baskets, and thought it was pork.
Now the white soldiers' funeral pyre was set
190 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
alight. An old man, Titokowaru's tohunga, or priest,
walked up to it with a long stick of green timber in
his hand, an unbarked sapling with a rough crook
at one end. He stood in front of the pile as the
flames shot up and chanted a song. Then, when
the logs with their terrible burdens were well alight,
he began a strange incantation. Using his long
stick with both hands he turned over the burning
logs, pushed them closer together to create a fiercer
heat, and forked the bodies into the midst of the
blaze. And as he did so he recited a pagan karakia,
the chant of the Iki, anciently repeated over the
bodies of warriors when they were being cremated
on the battle-field. These were the words of the
incantation (the mystic meaning underlying some
of the expressions would require many notes to
fully elucidate them) :
Trannlatwn,
Ka ivaere. Clear them awaj',
Ku waere. Clear them away !
Ka ivaere i runga mn keretu. Sweep them into the earth,
Ka waere i raro via keretu. Into the stiff and useless elaj'.
Kei kai kutu ma keretu, There let them perish and
Kei kai rihu tna keretu, decay.
Whakatahia tc kukakuku, Sweep man's flesh to earth
WImkarere te k ukukuka , again.
Te roua alu. Fork them that way !
Te kapea mat. Haul them this way !
Roua ki Whiti, Fork them to Whiti,
Roua ki Tonga, Fork them to Tonga,
E tu te rou. To the ancient homes of man.
Rouroua ! Here I hold my fork erect,
THE CANNIBAL8 OF THE BUSH 191
Takdtaka tc kape ;
Kapekapea !
Ka eke i tua,
Ka eke i waho,
Ka eke i te Maru-ailu
Te ihi nei.
Te inana nei.
Nga toa nei.
Ko tai ko ki,
Ko tai ko rea,
Ko tai takoto ki raro.
Ma peruperu !
Ma whiwhi !
Ma rawea !
Haere ake ra te ihi a nga toa,
Te mana o nga toa,
Te whatu te ate-a-Niiku
Te whatu te ate-a-Rangi.
Huri una te po,
Huri ana te ao.
He rangi ka mahea ;
He irhai ao.
He ao niarama !
I liiiii thfin thii^ way, that way.
Quicklj' stir the funeral pile,
Now this way haul, now that !
Their spirits far have gone ;
The flesh alone remains ;
They have gone the way of
Destiny.
Their courage no longer stirs
them ;
Their pride and power have
flown ;
Their valour's gone !
In the fullness of life they fell —
Like the fullness of tlie tide !
And now they lie naked before
me !
They leaped in the war-dance ;
They were strenuous in battle ;
But they fell.
Farewell ! spirits of the brave !
The pride and power of heroes !
Heart of Earth, and heart of
Heaven —
For both joined to produce
you !
Now turns the night — -
It turns to day again.
The clouds obscure the sky ;
We search for light.
The perfect light of day !
The people sat there on the marae, silently watch-
ing the burning of the dead. Far above the trees
of the surrounding forest rose the thick black
column of smoke from the blazing pile. It went up
as straight as an arrow, unswayed by any breath
of air, to a great height. To the savage watchers it
192 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
was verily the incense of the battle-field, rising to
the war-god's nostrils. " Now and then," says
Bent, " a body would burst, and the blaze of flame
and the smoke would leap straight up, high into
the air."
Long the Hauhaus gazed at the dreadful crema-
tory blaze on the palisaded marae, replenishing the
fire with dry logs as it burned down, until all the
dead were consumed, and nothing but a great heap
of charcoal and ashes remained.
The revival of the ancient practice of cannibalism
was the most hideously savage feature of Titoko-
waru's method of warfare. It was not meat-hunger
in this case ; it was a battle-field rite. In olden
Maoridom war was war to the death, and to the
oven ; it was no use beating your enemy unless you
killed him, and no use killing him unless you also
ate him. The eating of soldiers' bodies not onl}^
glutted racial revenge ; but also — in Maori eyes —
destroyed the prestige of the whites ; it ruined their
mmia as men and as warriors.
The Taranaki Maoris tell a singular little story
in explanation of those man-eating rites in Tito-
kowaru's camps. In consuming bodies from the
battle-fields they were only putting into practice
the spirit of a speech made by old King Potatau te
Wherowhero a decade or so before.
Potatau — grandfather of the present " king " of
THE CANNIBALS OF THE BUSH 193
Waikato, Mahuta Potatau te Wherowhero, M.L.C.
• — was a warrior of exceeding renown three-quarters
of a century ago, and a cannibal of cannibals.
Te Wherowhero Kai-tangata — " man-devourer "
— he was called. Many a time he raided Taranaki
with his war-parties of Waikato and Ngati-Mania-
poto and Tainui. At Pukerangiora, about 1830,
he slew hundreds of Ngati-Awa tribespeople, and
with his warriors cooked and ate them. Nearly
thirty years later he was set up as king over the
confederated Maori tribes in the centre of the island.
W^hen the Maori kingdom was first established, the
then governor of the colony visited old Potatau,
and discussed the Maori aspirations for independ-
ence. The governor, according to the Maori story,
endeavoured to show the king the folly of opposing
the sway of the white man ; if it did come to war-
fare — which was not then contemplated by either
side — the British soldiers would soon make a clean
sweep of the ill-armed and ill-provisioned Maori.
" You are wrong," said Potatau ; " it will take
you many a year to sweep away the Maoris — you
will never do it."
" But," said the governor, " suppose we fight
you, and drive you into the forest, far away from
your cultivations, what will you do for food ? "
" Why," replied the old king, " I have plenty of
food even in the bush — the berries of the tawa and
karaka trees, the heart of the mamaku tree-fern,
13
194 THI^ ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
and the nikmi, and other foods of the forest. We
can live on those."
" And suppose I chase you with my soldiers, and
fight you in the forest, and pursue you so that you
cannot even get those things to eat, the berries and
the mamaku, what then will you do for food ? "
Said old Potatau, grinning, "Then I'll eat
you ! " *
This half-defiant, half-jocular speech of the vener-
able warrior of Waikato was repeated word for
word, as it is given here, in every Kingite village
and in the Hauhau ;:)as of after years ; but it was
left for Titoko's bushmen of Taranaki to put into
actual execution their old foeman's commissariat
methods.
"Titokowaru heard it," say the Maoris ; "and
when the war began, and he became a fighting chief,
he did as Potatau would have done — he fought his
enemy in the forest, and slew him there, and ate
his flesh for food. And, as Potatau had predicted,
it was many a year before the war was ended —
and even then Titokowaru was never caught."
* " Ku koc te kdl nuiit ! "
CHAPTER XVII
SKIRMISHING AND FORT-BUILDING
Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu abandoned — On the march again —
Skirmishing on the Patea — Pakcha in pickle — A new stockade
— Bent the ^Jo-huikler.
The famous " Bird's-Beak " pa, made so memor-
able by the terrible scenes enacted around and
within its stockade, was soon deserted.
Titokowaru, not long after the Hauhau victory
and the savage rites narrated in the last chapter,
issued an order that the village must be evacuated,
and a new position selected for a bush-fort in which
to withstand the attack that must inevitably be
delivered against him by the Government. So one
day the whole of the inhabitants of the Te Ngutu-
o-te-Manu — men, women, and children, and the
solitary white man — having gathered together their
belongings, marched out of their village and
tramped away through the bush eastwards. The
armed men of the T ekau-nui-rua preceded them, to
make sure that the way was clear of the pakeha
enemy.
At the village of Turangarere and at Taiporohenui
195
196 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
they dwelt for a while, and the warriors scouted out
day after day in the vicinity of the European re-
doubts. A little skirmishing occurred ; some shots
were fired at the Turuturu-Mokai redoubt, now re-
garrisoned, and a sniping party amused themselves,
with the Manawapou Camp as a target. Before
very long Bent and his companions were once more
on the move, swagging through the bush to the
Patea Valley. The scene of war was now to be the
Lower Patea and the Waitotara, whence Tito-
kowaru, it was believed, intended to raid the town
of Wanganui.
For some weeks Titoko and his Hauhaus camped
in the Oruatihi 'pa. Then they shifted to Otoia,
near the banks of the Patea, where they built a
redoubt, from which they could fire into the Euro-
pean position at Manutahi. The fortification was
finished in a day and a night, all hands, men and
women, toiling at it, Bent amongst them. Some
dug the trenches with their spades, some carried
earth in flax baskets, and others piles of flax and
fern, with which they built up the parapets.
Early in the morning the day after the pa was
completed there was a brush with the Government
forces. A column of Armed Constabulary and
Wanganui Maoris made a reconnaissance up the
cliffy, forest-fringed banks of the Patea in the direc-
tion of the Hauhau redoubt. Titoko 's men attacked
them, lining both sides of the river. The troops
SKIRMISHING AND FORT-BUILDING 197
retired to their tea after a pretty little skirmish ;
and the Hauhaus marched back to the pa in high
jubilation, singing war-songs, waving their guns,
and bounding about and grimacing like a company
of fiends. Then the steaming pork and potatoes,
and speech-making and howling hakas around the
great camp-fires. From the Maori point of view,
quite a pleasant day's sport.
During the two months following the bush fight
at Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu no serious engagement
occurred, but Titokowaru's war-parties scoured the
district for many miles, laid ambuscades on the
tracks between the European redoubts, burned
settlers' houses, and bagged a stray jxikelui or
two.
One incident of this period illustrates the peculiar
ghoulish humour of the Hauhau savage. Two
friendly Maoris — Nga-hina and another — who were
mail-carriers in the Government service, halted
awhile at Manawapou one day, while on their way
to Patea, and searched the settlement there for the
wherewithal for a dinner. A cask stood beside one
of the whares, and on taking the top off they found
it to be a barrel of brine, containing meat — appar-
entl}' pork.
Anticipating a good meal of salt pork, they fished
up some of the meat. They found to their disgust
that it was human flesh ! — " Long-pig ! " Not being
Hauhaus or cannibals, they dropped the man-
198 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
meat — white man— back into the cask and stayed
their hunger on good honest potatoes.
The question was, who pickled the pakeha ? A
Hauhau prisoner some time later enlightened the
Government Maoris. A scouting party from Tito-
ko's camp had dodged down to Manawapou, and
discovered there, not far from the redoubt — which
had been temporarily vacated by the troops — a
new-made grave. Opening it, they disinterred a
white man's corpse. In sheer devilment they cut
it up, put it into a cask of brine that stood handy,
and then re-covered the cask and left it.
It would have been an exquisite joke, from the
cannibal Hauhau view-point, had the Government
soldiers unknowingly helped themselves to a joint
of white man !
Titokowaru's entrenched position at Otoia was
not a strong one, and shortly he, after a council of
war with his principal men, decided to abandon it
and build a new bush 'pa, which should be as nearly
impregnable as a Maori fort could be.
So one morning a long line of Hauhaus of all
ages and both sexes — the armed men in front and
rear — bearing their simple belongings in flax-
basket pikaus on their backs, left the Otoia re-
doubt, and marched away through the bush to a
spot about twelve miles from the mouth of the
Patea River and a mile and a half from the old
Okotuku pa, which had been attacked by the
SKIRMISHING AND FORT-BUILDING 199
troops two years previously. At this place, Moturoa
■ — the " Song Bush," so called because of a long
strip of forest which covered the plain here — the
war-chief ordered that the new fort should be con-
structed.
The position was on partially cleared land, nearly
level, surrounded by the forest. The men, after
hastily constructing huts, roofed with the fronds of
tree-fern and nikau, set to work with their axes to
hew out a large clearing. Titoko marked out the
lines of the entrenchments and palisades. The
forest-trees quickly fell before the practised assault
of many bushmen, and the shrubby cover in front
of the pa was carefully burned.
Then came the setting up of the stockade. Tawa
and other trees of small size were cut into suitable
lengths for the palisade-posts. There were two rows
of palisades ; the outside one was the largest and
strongest. For the heavy outside row of stock-
ading, timbers from eight to twelve inches in dia-
meter were sunk solidly in the ground, forming a
wall some ten feet high. Saplings were cut to serve
as cross-ties or rails to lash across the posts, and
with supplejack and aka vines the whole were bound
strongly and closely together.
Kimble Bent worked with the Hauhaus — toiling
like a navvy, cutting timber, setting up the great
posts, lashing the palisading, and digging trenches.
He wore nothing but a rough flax mat round his
200 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
waist — trouserless, bootless, hatless. In everything
but skin a Maori.
" It was exciting," says the white man, " but none
the less it was slavery. Many a night those times,
when I lay down on my flax ichariki, though I was
dog-tired, I could not sleep— thinking, thinking over
the past, and dreading what the future might l)ring
me. Many and many a time I wished myself dead
and out of it all."
What furious, what Homeric toil was that jm-
building ! Those wild brown men, spurred by the
reports of speedy attack, laboured with incredible
energy and swiftness. The Moturoa fortified hold
— which later became known as Papa-tihakehake,
because of the battle which befell here — was com-
pleted in three days — stockaded, trenched, para-
peted, and rifle-pitted — ready for the enemy !
Behind the strong tree-trunk stockade there were
trenches and casemated rifle-pits from which the
defenders could fire between the lower interstices in
the great war-fence ; behind the trenches again
was a parapet from which a second line of Hauhaus
coiUd deliver their fire over the top of the palisade.
It was one of the strongest works yet constructed
by the Maoris, and one that was not likely to be
stormed except at the cost of many lives.
CHAPTER XVIII
THE FIGHT AT MOTUROA STOCKADE
Katene's vigil — Attack on the stockade — Major Hunter's
death — A Hanliau warrior's desperate feat — Over the paHsades
— Government forces repulsed — A rear-guard fight — An un-
answered prayer — Scenes of terror — Tihirua's burnt-offering — A
soldier's body eaten.
Just within the stockade of the Moturoa, or Papa-
tihakehake jm,^ there was a small, roughly built
kiumaihi, or look-out stage, ten or twelve feet above
the ground, high enough to allow a sentinel to see
well over the sharp-pointed palisades, and scan the
approaches to the fort.
In this bush watch-tower there stood, at misty
dawn on a grey November morning, the Hauhau
scout and warrior Katene Tu-Whakaruru.
Katene was cold, and he stamped his bare feet
upon the unbarked logs that floored the sentry-
box, and he chanted softly to himself a little waiata
to Kopu, the morning star, which he had looked
* Tliis name Papa-tihakehake was given to the place after
the fight, in commemoration of the defeat of the troops. Papa
means a battle-ground ; tihakehake refers to the dead bodies
of the wliites which strewed the ground.
201
202 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
for in vain, for a heavy drizzling mist obscured
everything. The thin, persistent rain penetrated
the blanket that he held closely wrapped about him.
Presently a faint light began to steal over the
forest, and Katene could see the outlines of the
black charred stumps and burned trees in front of
the pa, then beyond the gloomy woods, through
which a narrow winding path led to the open fern-
lands of the Wairoa.
Suddenly Katene's murmured chant ceased, and
he strained his eyes into the mist. To a Maori
forester the slightest sound was enough to set
every faculty on the alert, asking suspiciously, " He
aha term I " He had heard a faint sound in the
direction of the track beyond the black tree-stumps,
a sound that he fancied resembled the striking of
steel against steel.
Katene hardly breathed. His eyes glared fixedly
through the mist. In a few minutes his vision con-
firmed the evidence of his keen ears. He saw, just
for a moment, a dark figure, then another, come
hazily out of the wet fog where the track from the
Wairoa emerged on the clearing, then disappear, as
if they had suddenly dropped to the ground or
vanished behind a tree.
That glimpse was enough for Katene. He
dropped from his sentry-perch, and ran from
whare to ivhare and tent to tent giving the alarm.
" The soldiers are coming ! " he said to those
THE FIGHT AT MOTUROA STOCKADE 203
whom he awakened. " The soldiers are on us !
They are by now entering the clearing. Get your
arms quickly ! Man the trenches ! But don't make
a sound ! "
The fighting-men poured out of their sleeping
huts, snatching up their weapons and accoutre-
ments, and ran to their places in the pits and ditches
behind the stockade. They hastily loaded their
tujxiras, their rifles, and their carbines, and, peering
eagerly through the defence-works, sought to pene-
trate the raw% damp morning mist that shrouded
their front.
The whole bush-castle was alive and ready.
Every man and boy who could shoulder a gun was in
the well-hidden firing lines.
The wet mist slightly lifting as the morning light
came, the musketeers presently saw dim figures
moving out from the dark forest on their front and
right and left flanks. Moving quickly, half running,
in a cautious, crouching gait, they flitted from tree
to tree, and burnt stump to stump, and nearer and
nearer to the stockade.
Not a sound came from the breathlessly waiting
warriors, nor from the ghost-like figures that now
sank to the ground, each behind a log or a great
blackened stump, or the butt of a standing tree.
Gun in hand, finger on the trigger, the Hauhaus
waited.
The apparitions were picked bush-fighters of the
204 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
New Zealand forces, led by Colonel Whitmore, seek-
ing to surprise Titoko in his forest-den.
Advancing silently in skirmishing order through
the bush, they took cover, waiting for light enough
to fight by. There were detachments of four
divisions of the Armed Constabulary, many of them
veteran bush-fighters, and men of the Patea Rifles
and Patea Cavalry. There, too, came Kepa's
Whanganui Maoris, with rifle and tomahawk, old
hands on the war-trail, and eager for another brush
with their ancient enemies of Taranaki.
There were two hundred Government men front-
ing the fort, but the fighting men behind the
palisades did not, according to Maori accounts,
number many more than half the number.
Amongst Titokowaru's men, however, there were
some of the most renowned bush scouts and warriors
in Taranaki, including — besides Katene, the wide-
awake sentry — such men as the veteran Te Waka-
tapa-ruru, Paraone Tutere, one of the best Hauhau
shots, Timoti, the fiercest of the cannibals of
Nga-Rauru, and the active young warrior Tutange
Waionui, he who had despatched von Tempsky on
the battle-field of Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu, Tutange
says that he was asleep in a tent when Katene gave
the alarm that morning. He was with his tribe,
the Nga-Rauru, most ferocious of all Maori bush-
fighters, who occupied one end of the pa ; the other
tribes holding the fort were Ngati-Ruanui and
THE FIGHT AT MOTUROA STOCKADE 205
Pakakohi. It was the side occupied by the Paka-
kohi men that was first attacked.
All at once, as the Hauhaus crouched behind
their palisades squinting for a sight of pakeha, with
impatient fingers on their gun-triggers, fifty or sixty
blue and grey figures sprang from cover and charged
for the stockade. Some of the assaulting party
ran past the corner of the war-fence, looking for
some opening or gateway by which they might
charge in.
The leading files were within a few paces of the
high, solidly set palisading, when suddenly the whole
face of the fence flashed fire, and volleys crashed
in terrifying reverberations that set flocks of sleepy
kaka parrots flying, screaming harsh screams of
fright, through the dark forest.
Nearly half the storming party of A.C.'s fell be-
fore that fearful fire.
The first man shot was their leader, a brave
officer, Major Hunter, whose brother. Captain
Hunter, had fallen at Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu two
months previously. Tutange says that it was
Paraone Tutere who shot the major ; he fired at
the leading figure, not knowing then who he was.
Colonel Whitmore came running in with the
stormers, but, with his usual luck, although in the
thickest fighting he was never hit.
Those of the attacking column who were not hit
instantly cropped to cover amongst the logs and
206 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
stumps that surrounded the jm front. Then they
returned the fire as well as they could, but one man
after another was hit, without being able to see
one Hauhau of the scores that occupied the pa and
thrust the muzzles of their guns through the inter-
stices of the palisades.
It was a foolish thing, that blind frontal charge
on the strong stockade. Major Hunter was too good
a soldier to have done such an insane thing of his
own volition. He was obeying Whitmore's orders.
Hunter was shot in the femoral artery, when within
nine or ten yards of the stockade. He implored
those near him to try to stop the gushing blood,
and some of his comrades attempted to staunch it ;
but the wound was too close to the stomach to get
at, and he died in a few minutes.
Captain W. E. Gudgeon, with about forty Govern-
ment Maoris, tried to work round and take the im
in the rear. His line of charge was on Hunter's
right flank, and he had good cover, but in s})ite of
that he lost two killed and five wounded.
Now a brisk little fight went on on the Hanks of
the jKi between Kepa's men and a party of warriors
wlio had nuxde a sortie from the stockade. Kepa
was furiously assailed l)y the buslnuen, leaping from
tree to tree, yelling their frightful Hauhau cries ;
and it was as much as the plucky Whanganui men
could do to hold their own. Their attempt to take
the pa in the rear failed, and they at last slowly
THE FIGHT AT MOTUROA STOCKADE 207
withdrew to support the shattered ranks of their
white comrades.
The A.C. supports came doubling up, and a heavy
fire was concentrated on the stockade, but to little
purpose. It was impregnable to rifle-fire, and in
their pitted works the defenders were able to pick
off the white skirmishers in perfect safety.
Bullets swept the clearing in every direction, and
through the infernal music of the forest-battle the
white soldiers heard the loudly yelled war-cries of
the chiefs and the shrill voices of the Maori women
as they encouraged their warriors, husbands, and
brothers, and screamed them on to slaughter with
all the fury of brown tattooed Hecates.
The women were gathered in the marae and in
the trenches, some armed, all filled with the fire of
savage war.
'' Ka horo, ka horo / '' they shouted. '' Kia^naia,
kia maia ! Patita, kainga I Patua, kainga ! "
("They fall, they fall ! Be brave, oh, be brave !
Kill them, eat them ! Kill them, eat them ! ")
All this time Kimble Bent was walking to and
fro on the parepare, the inner breastwork, the
bullets screaming zssh ! zssh ! over his head and
all about him. The air seemed filled with flying
lead, yet very few Maoris were hit. One woman
he saw shot dead through the head as she rose to
wave her shawl and yell a fighting cry to the men
at the palisades.
208 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
And here Bent was an eye-witness of the most
desperately daring deed he had ever seen.
A fiery old tattooed warrior, by name Te Waka-
tapa-ruru — the Hauhau mentioned in an earlier
chapter as the man who had killed Charles Brough-
ton, Government Native Agent, on the Patea River,
in 1865 — was in a quiver of excitement while the
garrison awaited the assault, and could hardly be
silenced until the attack was delivered.
When the pakeha storming party rushed up at
the double, the old man was one of the first to open
fire on them with his tupara. And then, when the
order " Kokiritia ! "" (" Charge ! ") was given, and the
Hauhaus rushed out to engage the Government
men who were trying to work round to the rear of
the pa, he led the wild charge.
Perfectly naked, except for the broad flax waist-
girdle, which held his short-handled tomaluiwk, and
gripping his double-barrelled gun, the tall old
savage took a great running junij) at the stockade
from the inner parapet, and leaped clean over it !
Yelling a Pai-marire battle-cry as he rose from
the ground after his extraordinary leap, he snatched
the tomahawk from his belt, and cliaigcd straight
for the advancing whites.
It was a fit of icliakamomori — sheer blind despera-
tion, utter recklessness of death.
Possibly tlic furious old fanatic imagined that his
Hauhau angel and his mesmeric password, " Ha pa !
THE FIGHT AT MOTUROA STOCKADE 209
Pai-marire ! Hon ! " would avert the bullets of
the pakeha. But he was killed in the very charge
— the only Maori fighting-man killed that day.
Two white soldiers met him. He was in the act of
striking a desperate blow when a pakeha ball took
him square in the forehead, and with a huge con-
vulsive bound and a half-choked barking " Hau ! "
on his lips, the old tattooed brave fell dead amongst
the foremost of his enemies.
It was just the death that he desired — face to the
foe, with his war-axe in his hand — the death of a
true Maori toa !
This savage hero's son, Ratoia — ^now living in the
village of Taiporohenui — a young boy at the time
of the fight, saw his father's great leap over the
palisade, and saw him killed.
Bent tells of a curious matakite, or prophetic dream ,
which Te Waka-tapa-ruru had on the night before
the battle. The old man was a close friend of the
white runaway, and they were accustomed to sleep
side by side on the ?t'Aaf*H-spread floor of ore of
the huts. He dreamed that he saw his face re-
flected in a pakeha looking-glass, and that he was
combing his hair. This vision disturbed the old
man, and deeming it a warning from the unseen
world, he asked Titokowaru — just when the ap-
proach of the troops was first announced — what it
might portend. The war-chief interpreted the
dream as an omen of death, and warned Te Waka
14
210 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
not to leave the shelter of the stockade during the
impending engagement or he would be killed. But
he disregarded this in his fit of ichakamomori, and
ran amok, and so he fell.
Finding it impossible to take such a strong and
well-defended position by storm, the white colonel
withdrew his forces. There were dead and wounded
lying all over the place. The iKikehas succeeded in
carrying off the wounded and some of the dead,
including the gallant Major Hunter. A number of
dead, however, had to be left where they were lying,
for it was death to attempt their removal from
under the very muzzles of the Hauhau guns.
The rescue of Hunter's body from the Hauhau
tomahawks, under a heavy fire, was a gallant piece
of work. Captain Gudgeon was one of those who
brought the dead officer out ; one of his comrades
was Captain Edward McDonnell, and troopers
Foote and Kelly were amongst the others. Two
or three men were shot in the attempt. Kepa
(Major Kemp) was there, too, but he was pretty
well engaged in looking after his own men and
extricating them from that ])lace of death.
The Colonial soldiers retired, fighting a hard rear-
guard action, out to the edge of the bush. Each
division of Armed Constabulary in turn halted, knelt
down facing the enemy, and covered the retreat of
the other divisions, thus giving time for those of
the dead and wounded who had been recovered to
MAJOR KEMP (kEPA TE RANGIHIWINUI. )
211
THE FIGHT AT MOTUROA STOCKADE 2i:{
be carried off the field. Out to the fern-lands the
Hauhaus followed the troops, sometimes engaging
them so closely that the fighting was hand-to-
hand, and it was carbine and revolver against long-
handled tomahawk. The skirmishing lasted until
the whites were well clear of the bush ; the Maoris
would have followed them out even to their camp,
the Wairoa Redoubt, had not they been recalled by
orders from Titokowaru. The battle of Papa-
tihakehake was over. It was a more severe repulse
for the Government men than even the engagement
at Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu a bare two months before.
One man out of every four in the force actually
engaged was on the casualty list — more than
twenty killed and quite thirty wounded.*
A grim story of that hard-fought retreat through
the bush is told by Kimble Bent.
After the kokiri, the rush out in pursuit, had been
ordered by the Maori war-chief, one of the Nga-
Rauru men came across a white soldier lying on
the ground, with his head pillowed against a fallen
pukatea-tree. He had been cut off from his division
* Colonel W. E. Gudgeon writes me : " For the number
engaged Moturoa was the most desperate engagement fought
in the Maori War. Whitmore's return did not give nearly our
losses. I made it at the time fifty-two out of less than two
hundred actually engaged. At Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu all did
not behave well, but at Moturoa any one might have been proud
of the men. No force in the world could have behaved better."
214 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENl^
by the foremost of the pursuing Hauhaus, and was
lying there feigning death, hoping that the rest of
the Maoris would pass on and not notice him.
The Nga-Rauru man, liowevcr, stopped and
looked closely at the prostrate pakeha. He said to
one of his comrades, " I don't think that man is
dead." Going up to the Constabulary man, he
put his hand on his shoulder, and said in English,
" Wake up ! "
The white man opened his eyes. He exclaimed,
" Save my life ! Let me go, and I'll never forget
you — I'll repay you for it."
The Nga-Rauru man, who must have been a
humorous kind of barbarian, said to his victim,
again in English, " Go on your knees and pray to
your God to save your life ! "
The soldier knelt as he was told, and ejaculated
some sort of a prayer.
Playing with his prey, the savage asked, " Well,
are you saved now ? "
The kneeling soldier looked up, but could make
no answer. He stared at his terrible-looking captor,
with horror in his eyes.
" Poroporoaki ki to Atua .' " (" Say farewell to
your God ! ") cried the Maori, and swinging his gun
round in both hands, he brought it butt down with
a frightful smashing blow on the soldier's head.
The man fell backwards dead. His slayer stripped
him of his imiform and accoutrements, and a little
THP: fight at MOTUROA stockade 215
later could have been seen dancing a furious haka
in front of the stockade, his face blackened with
charcoal from the charred tree-stumps, the soldier's
cap on his head, and the captured carbine in his
hand.
Young Tutange Waionui was in the thick of the
skirmishing. "My weapons that day," he says,
"were a tupara (double-barrelled gun) and a re-
volver. The gun was a muzzle-loader ; I preferred
it to the breech-loaders used by the pakeha, because
something was always going wrong with them. I
could load (puru-pu) very quickly ; but a quicker
man was old Te Waka-tapa-ruru — he who was killed ;
there was no one so expert as he at loading a
muzzle-loader."
What scenes of horror followed that battle in
the bush !
The Hauhaus were in a delirium of triumphant
savagery. Like frenzied things they came dancing
and yelling back to the pa. They had blackened
their ferocious faces with charcoal from the burnt
tree-stumps in front of the pa. Singing war-songs,
shouting Pai-marire cries, dancing their weapons
in the air, projecting their long snaky tongues and
rolling their eyes till only the whites were visible,
set in a petrifying glare — the grimace of the pukana
— it was a sight that brought fear to the heart of
the lone white man, accustomed though he was by
this time to spectacles of barbaric ferocity.
210 THE ADVKNTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
The women were as wild and savage-looking as
the men — their dark eyes blazing with excitement,
their faces })]ack-painted like the warriors, their
loosened hair flying behind them, many of them
nude from the waist up — waving shawls, mats,
tomahawks, in welcome to the returning heroes,
shoutirg. singing, screaming.
Outside the front fence of the }hi, just us they
fell, among the logs and stumps and on the blood-
stained ground, lay the dead men whom the re-
treating A.C.'s had been compelled to leave on the
battle-field. There were seven of them.
Upon these fallen soldiers rushed the Hauhaus.
They stripped them of their uniforms. They tied
flax-leaf ropes round the necks of the dead pakelias,
and hauled them away to the gateway of the im.
As they dragged the corpses off, leaping from
side to side as they hauled in a fury of blood-mad-
ness, they shouted out such sentences as these :
" Taku kai ! Taku kai ! E hara ka kite noho koe
taku kai, taku tika, taku he ! Nau te kino, naku
whakahoki tou kino. Taea hokitia — te mahi o te
atua a Titokowaru ! '' ("My food! My food!
Behold my food ; behold the right and the wrong
of it all. 'Twas you " — addressing the slain — " that
wrought the evil work. And I have returned your
evil. Behold the work of the god of Titokowaru ! ")
A young Hauhau, huge-limbed and naked but
THE FIGHT AT MOTUROA STOCKADE 217
for a very brief waist-mat of dangling flax, leaps
to the side of one of the white men's bodies, just
as it is harnessed in so revolting a fashion to be
dragged into the pa.
His tomahawk flashes in the air above him as he
steps over the fallen soldier — once, twice, thrice !
He thrusts in a hand into a huge gaping wound
in the dead man's breast ; he is searching for some-
thing. He rises with some object, all bloody, in his
horrible red hand. He sticks his tomahawk back
into his girdle, he comes bounding from the corpse,
waving his dripping trophy in his hand, swinging
it round his head. His fiendish yells ring echoing
over the forest clearing.
What is it he flourishes so exultingly ?
It is the white man's heart !
This is the young warrior Tihirua, the priest of
the burnt sacrifice. He has torn out the manawa
of the soldier, as a maive — an offering to the God
of War !
At his waist, buckled to his flax girdle, is a
leather pouch, such as was generally used for
carrying percussion-caps. Out of this he takes
matches — pakeha matches ! Striking match after
match, he holds them underneath the bleeding
heart until it is singed, and dark smoke goes up
from it — incense to Uenuku, the war-god, who
appears to his savage worshippers in the arch of
the rainbow.
218 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
The heathen rite — the ceremony of the Whangai-
hau — performed, Tihirua flings down his terrible
trophy, and then directs the hauling of the bodies
into the palisaded inferno.
Bent, standing just outside the pa gateway,
watched the in-bringing of the bodies of his fellow-
THE FIGHT AT MOTUROA, 1869.
This sketch, with the one opposite, drawn by an eye-witness shortly after the eiig ige-
ment, depicts the defeat of t'.ie (Tovernment A. C. Force by the Maoris.
whites — prelude, he too well knew, to a cannibal
feast.
He turned to enter the village, when an old
Maori, tugging away madly at a flax line which he
had made fast to the neck of a dead man, caught
sight of him, and shouted :
" You, pakeha ! Come and give me a hand. Help
me to drag in my food ! "
" What do you want ? " Bent heard a rough
THE FIGHT AT MOTUROA STOCKADE 219
voice ask. He turned and saw the war-chief
Titokowaru standing at his side. " What do you
want of this pakeha ? "
The Maori replied that he wished the white man
to help him haul the soldier's body into the inarae.
" No ! " cried the chief in his great hoarse voice.
" No ! you must not call upon my jxikeha to help
THE FIGHT At"mOTUEOA, 1869.
you. He shall not touch the bodies of his country-
men."
So the war-captain and his cartridge-maker stood
by watching the frightful procession of Hauhaus
and their prizes. The seven naked bodies were
dragged into the pa and laid out in the centre of
the rrvarae.
The excited people all gathered in a great circle
around the bodies. One after another the orators
220 THE ADVENTURES OF KLMIiLE BENT
leaped out from the squatting ranks, their eyes
flashing wildly in the pukana glare ; they bounded
to and fro, and cut the air with their tomahawks
as they told the thrilling episodes of the fight.
All the clothes, arms, and accoutrements taken
from the dead and wounded were laid before Tito-
kowaru.
" Whose was this ? " the war-chief would ask,
picking up a carbine, or an ammunition-pouch, or
a soldier's tunic from the heap.
" Mine," replied the man who had taken it on
the battle-field.
" Take it away, then," said Titokowaru. " Whose
is this ? " picking up another trophy.
" It is mine," a young man would reply ; " it is
my first spoils of war, a tanga-ika.''''
" Burn it," was the chief's order.
Then the human bodies lying on the marae were
apportioned one by one, to each tribe, as piles
of food are served out at a ceremonial Maori
gathering.
" Nga-Rauru, this is yours ! Tangahoe, this is
yours ! " and so on, till the seven bodies were all
disposed of.
A woman sat weeping on the marae. She was
Te Hau-karewa, wife to one Te Rangi-whakairi-
papa and a sister of Te Waka-tapa-ruru, the old
warrior who had fallen in his desperate rush upon
the white enemy that morning. Though old, she
THE FIGHT AT MOTUROA STOCKADE 221
was a tall, fine-looking woman, with a mass of black
curly hair.
Ceasing her tangi for the dead, when the bodies
of the soldiers were laid out on the ground, she
rose, and, taking a stick in her hand, she walked
along the row of the dead men and struck each a
blow on the head.
" Upoko-kohua ! " she cried vehemently, with
hate flashing in her eyes ; " U]X)ko-kohua ! Ka
taona koe ki te umn, he utu mo taku tungane kua
mate, ko Te Wahi-tnpa-ruru ! Mehemea ko au i
taki i taku tungane i te takiwa i mate at, ka kainga
au i te karu o te tcmgata 7iana i whakamatea Te
Waka ! " (" Boiled heads ! Cursed heads ! Soon
ye'll be cooked in the oven, as payment for the
death of my brother, Te Waka-tapa-ruru. Had I
but been near my brother when he fell, I would
have swallowed the eyes of the man who slew him ! ")
Then, throwing away her stick, she sat down
again, and fell to weeping in the very abandonment
of woe, for the savage woman of the woods loved
her grim warrior-brother greatly.
Some of the Maoris proposed that the bodies of
the slain whites, the " Fish of Whiro," should all be
burned or buried.
But up leaped Timoti, wildest of all the wild
Waitotara tribe, the cannibal Nga-Rauru, a thin,
savage-faced fellow, very dark of complexion, as
222 THK ADVENTURES O'F KiMBLE BENT
active and agile as a wild cat. He ran up and down
in front of his slain enemies, turning from one side
to the other, pukmm-mg — only the whites of his
eyes showing — and his tongue protruded in derision
and defiance. He flashed his tomahawk in the air ;
he yelled, " We must have one body — one body to
cook in the hcmgi ! "
" Yes," said another ot the clan, " the customs
of our fathers must be observed. What is the use
of killing so many pakeJuis if we cannot have one
to eat ? "
No man making objection, several Hauhaus
jumped up and ran to the heap of slain Constabulary
men. They selected a body, and dragged it off to
the cooking-place at the rear of the itmrae. " He is
the fattest of the pakehas,^^ said the saturnine
Timoti.
All eyes watched them, l)ut no man said a word.
Bent, after a while, rose with some of his Hauhau
companions, and walked over to the cooking-Jut ng is,
and watched the cooks at their horrible work.
They were roasting the white man's body on the
great fire of hot stones, in a hollowed-out earth-
oven. " It was being cooked," says Bent, " much
as you would roast a piece of mutton ; they turned
it over and over until it was thoroiiglily done, and
then they cut it up for the feast."
When the cannibal meal was ready, it was brought
on to the marae with much ceremony in flax
THE FIGHT AT MOTUROA STOCKADE 223
baskets. Potatoes had been steam-boiled in other
Jiangis at the same time, and these were carried to
the assembly-gromid, to be eaten with the man-
meat. Bent saw the flesh of the soldier eaten.
The man-eaters, he says, all belonged to the Waito-
tara tribe. Ten of them consumed the pakeha, or
as much of him as was borne to the marae ; the
rest of the people did not share in the feast. Tito-
kowaru himself would not eat human flesh, because
of his tapii.
" I noticed," says the pakeha-Maor'i, " Timoti and
Big Kereopa, each with a basket before them,
enjoying the meal of human flesh. Timoti
grabbed up his portion of meat from his basket,
and ate it just as if he were eating a piece of
bread."
Then Titokowaru rose and, crying in a loud voice,
ordered the people to burn the rest of the corpses,
so that they should not defile the rnarae.
The bundles of clothing from the dead lay on
the marae. The Maoris gave Bent three paiis of
soldiers' trousers, four shirts, and some boots. " I
tell you I was pleased," says the old pakeha-
Maori, who had no inconvenient scruples on the
subject of dead men's clothes ; " for a long time
I had been wearing only Maori-made garments
of flax."
A great pile of wood was collected, heaped up
six or seven feet high, and in the evening, as dark-
224 THE ADVENTUEES OF KIMBLE BENT
ness fell, the bodies of the pakehas were placed on
this funeral pyre and cremated.
The people squatted round- — as they had sat at
a similar ceremony in the " Bird's Beak " pa — and
watched the flames devour their fallen foemen.
And by the light of the great fire roaring away there
on the marae, Titokowaru takVd up and down,
addressing his followers, and bounding and parad-
ing to and fro, his sacred feather-plumed taiaha in
his hand. He recited incantations, and chanted
songs, and exhorted the Hauhaus, bidding them be
of good heart and fight to the bitter end.
Then Titokowaru turned to the body of the slain
warrior Te Waka-tapa-ruru, lying on a blanket on
the marae, with gun and tomahawk by his side.
Gazing upon the silent, tattooed features of the
dead toa, his comrade in many a wild foray and
forest battle, he cried the old farewells to those
whose spirits have passed to the Reinga, and he
chanted this lament :
" Ki konei ra, e Wakci e !
Ka wehe koe i an.
Ka riro i a koe
I nuku-muH iapoto,
K wiak'nujd uutte.
Auc, I- W(ik(t (' ! "
("Theiv thnu liest, O Waka !
Parted troin me for ever.
Thou'rt borne away to the fields of iiiglit,
In revenge for otlier deaths.
Alas, O Waka ! ")
THE FIGHT AT MOTUROA STOCKADE 225
And tlie wild korero went on. Tartgi songs were
chanted, and there were speeclies of savage, boast-
ful jubilation made — " great swelling words." But
from a lone little thatched hut on one side of the.
crowded parade ground came a long-sustained
crying sound, a sobbing heart-breaking dirge, rising
and falling like a Highland coronach — a keening for
the dead. Te Hau-karewa made lamentation for
her slain warrior.
15
CHAPTER XIX
THE TAURANGA-IKA STOCKADE
Another fighting pa built — Scouting and skirmishing — The
watcher on the tower — McDonnell and Titokowaru — How
Trooper Lingard won the New Zealand Cross — Hairbreadth
escapes — Pairama and the white man's leg.
On the edge of the great forest, some miles to the
south of the Waitotara River, was the site of the
olden Maori village, Tauranga-ika. In front fern
and grass lands stretched away to the sand-dmies
of the sea-coast, with here and there a small shallow
lake ; in the rear was the dense and roadless bush,
a perfect and safe retreat for the Haiihaus in the
event of defeat. The country hereabouts w as dotted
with the white man's farmsteads ; but the whites
had been driven oft" before Titokowaru's victorious
army, leaving their homes, the labour of many
years, to go up in smoke, and their sheep and cattle
to feed the Hauhau bands. Wanganui town was
only a day's march away, and Titokowaru's council
of chiefs, eager to follow up their victory at Moturoa,
proposed to assault the town and massacre every
soul in it.
226
THE TAURANGA-IKA STOCKADE 227
This old-time village was fixed on by the Hau-
hau war-chief as the site of his new fighting jki, for
he abandoned Papa-tihakehake soon after the re-
pulse of the white forces at that strong stockade.
With the wariness of the Maori strategist, he avoided
a second attack in any one entrenchment, and
sooner than risk another, and possibly disastrous,
engagement at Papa-tihakehake, he took the trouble
to construct an even stronger fortification, a splendid
example of native military engineering genius.
In the building of this new fa, Kimble Bent and
his Hauhau comrades toiled early and late until it
was completed. It was of large size, fully defended
with palisading, trenches, parapet, and rifle-pits.
It was between two and three chains in extreme
length at the rear, with a somewhat narrower front.
The ground in front was bare of forest, but carried
high fern cover ; on the flanks were burned clear-
ings, dotted with blackened tree-stumps and cum-
bered with logs ; then the forest, with some beautiful
groves of 7nahoe on its outskirts. Two rows of
palisades, high and strong, were erected around
the position ; the posts, solid tree-trunks, were
from six to twelve inches thick and ten to fifteen
feet high ; the rows were four feet apart. The
spaces between the larger stockade-posts were filled
in with saplings set upright close together, and
fastened by cross-rails and supplejack ties ; these
saplings did not rest in the ground, but hung a few
228 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
inches above it, so that between them and the
ground a space was left for the fire of the defending
musketeers, who were enabled to pour volleys from
their trenches inside the war-fence on any approach-
ing enemy with perfect safety to themselves.
Behind the inner stockading was a parapet about
six feet high and four feet wide, formed of the earth
thrown out of the trenches. The interior of the
pa was pitted everywhere with trenches and covered
ways, so that in the event of attack the defenders
could literally take to the earth like rabbits, and
live underground secure from rifle-fire, and even
from artillery. The place was a network of trenches
with coimecting passages, roofed over with timber,
raupo, and toeioe reeds and earth. To any assault
that could be delivered by the Government forces
then available, the fort was practically impregnable.
At one angle of the j)a the Hauhau garrison erected
a rouglily timbered watch-tower, about thirty-five
feet in height. This tower, or taumaihi, was a
feature of the ancient pas of Maoridom ; on its upper
platform a sentinel was jjosted, day and night, to
give warning of the approach of the enemy. In
front of the 2^a, outside the palisades, a tall flag-
staff was set up, and on this staff the Hauhau war-
flags were hoisted. There were two gateways in
the rear stockading, giving access to the bush. In
one end of the pa near the rear was a small tent
occupied by Titokowaru. Bent, the cartridge-maker,
THE TAURANGA-IKA STOCKADE 229
lived in a little riiHli-built whare towards the other
end, near one of the gateways.
When the stockade was finished the Haiihaus
constructed a tekoteko, a great marionette-like figure
of 9j man, cut out of a piika tea-tree. It was so
placed that its head stood about fifteen feet above
the ground, well above the front stockade, and it
had loose- jointed arms, to which flax ropes were
fastened, leading down to the trench below. By
manipulating these ropes the arms of the wooden
warrior were made to move in the actions of the
haJca, just as if some painted Hauhau were dancing
a dance of defiance on the fortress walls.
When the fort was finished the garrison gathered
in their food supplies, saw to their arms, and for
many weeks waited for the pake ha. Hauhau
scouts and small war-parties daily sallied out from
the fort, seeking game in the shape of stray pakehas.
One of these savage man-hunters was a Ngati-
Maniapoto man from the King Country, whose name
was Pairama, and who had married a Nga-Rauru
woman. He used to go out by himself, looking for
some one or something to kill. Te Pairama returned
to the stockade in huge jubilation one day, bearing
as a trophy of his prowess on the trail a white man's
leg ! He had, says Bent, scouted down until he
was close to Kai-iwi. There he spied a white
settler in a grass paddock, carrying a rifle.
Down he crouched at once, and stealthily stalked
230 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
the pakeha. Just as the unsuspecting settler came
to the paddock gate, the Maori leaped out from
behind the fence, with a furious snatch tore the
rifle from the man's grasp, and shot him dead with
it. He cut off one of the pakeha' s legs with his
tomahawk, and brought it home as proof of his
success on the war-path as proudly as any Indian
ever flourished his take of scalps. Up and down
the marae of the jm he bounded, exhibiting the
captured rifle and severed limb, yelling his Mar-
song, and loudly boasting that he would that night
cook the pakehd's leg and eat it all himself.
But the warrior's braggadocio received a sharp
check from Titokowaru. The war-chief disap-
proved of this sort of thing on the part of irrespon-
sible young free-lances. " No man must bring
white man's flesh into this pa''' he said, " unless
he is one of the Tekau-ma-rua, the war-party sent
out by me. Take that pakeha, leg back again at
once and place it alongside the body.'' And soon
thereafter the disgusted scout, his ardour for " long-
pig " so unexpectedly damped by Titoko's code of
cannibal etiquette, was to be seen trudging back
along the track to the pakeha farm, with sulky
visage and reluctant gait, and a white foot and leg
— raw — protruding from a flax basket strapped to his
shoulders.
By day the scouting parties of the Hauhau
" Twelve Apostles " scoured the country ; by night
THE TAURANGA-IKA STOCKADE 231
the people gathered round the fires on the ynarae or
in the big sleeping ivhares, cand talked and sang and
danced the hakas of which they never wearied.
Wild night-scenes those on the stockaded marae,
with the crowds of blanketed or flax-cloaked men
and women, their wild faces illumined by the leap-
ing flames, squatting in great circles round the camp
fires, while more than half nude figures leaped and
stamped and slapped their limbs and chests with
resounding slaps, and expelled the air from their
lungs in wolfish " Ooli's ! " and " Hau's ! " as they
trod the assembly ground in all the fury of the war-
dance. A warrior orator would rise, weapon in
hand, and throwing off his blanket for freedom of
action, go bounding along the marae in front of
the assemblage, shouting short, sharp sentences as
he taki'd to and fro, his athletic figure untrammelled
except for a waist-shawl or short dangling mat, fire
in his movements, and ferocity in every gesture
and in every cry — the embodiment of belligerent
Maoridom in its savage prime.
Like defiant replying shouts from some hidden
foe in the blackness of the forest that rose in a solid
wall above the rear stockade came the clear echoes
of the roaring haka choruses.
And so the wild night passed, until the camp fires
died down, and the tribespeople sought sleep in
their packed wharepunis and their rush-strewn
burrows ; and the melancholy " Kou-kou ! " of the
232 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
" hundred-eyed " r^iru, the bush-owl, was heard, as
the bird-sentry of the night hours cried his watch-
word from the forest or a perch on some tall palisade-
post. Yet not all eyes were closed in the pa, for
the Hauhaus, grown wise by much hard experience,
did not neglect the posting of sentries, and a sen-
tinel watched from the platform in the angle-tower.
At intervals he cried his watch-cry, or raised liis
voice in a night-song that rose and fell in measured
cadences like a tmigi wail.
The most dreaded hour in Maori warfare was the
dark, dank hour just before the daAvn, and then it
was well to be on the qui vive, for Kepa's dusky
forest-rangers and their white comrades the A.C.'s
had a truly unpleasant fashion of attacking their
enemies at most unholy, shivery times, when man
slept soundest. So the watchmen in the tower
were enjoined to extra vigilance in the early morn-
ing hours. And, as in the olden Maori days, out
rang the voice of the high sentinel, chanting his
ancient " Whahiara-jKi,'" his " AlTs well " song, to
Tarioa and Kopu, the first and morning stars.
This is one of the songs he cried, an old watch-
chant of the Ngati-Toa tribe of Kawhia :
Translation.
Kia hiwa e ! Now watcliful be,
Kia hiwa I O watchful be,
Kia hiwa e tenei tuku. On tliis side and on that !
Kia hiwa e tera tuku ; Bend ears to every sound.
Kia, whakarongo koe High up, high up
THE TAURANGA-IKA STOCKADE 233
Translation.
Ki luja kupii. Tho surf rolls in
Whakapunc tonu. On Harihari's cliffs,
Whakapuru tonu And loudly soinids the restless
Tc tai ki Harihari, sea
Ka tangi tere On Mokau's coast.
Te tai ki Mokuu. Now yonder, lo ! the svni—
Ka ao atu te ra, 'J'hc sun leaps uj)
Ka ao mai te ra Aljo\e the mountain-tops.
Ki tim o nga puo ra.
E — c .' / — a — v)e !
Late one night, as tlie Hauhaiis lay behind their
palisades, Colonel Thomas McDonnell^ — a man who
spoke Maori like a native — rode boldly up to the
pa wall with his escort, and asked for Titokowaru.
He called out in the native tongue, " Titoko —
where are you ? "
Titoko, summoned from his tent, went down to
the stockade. " I am here ! " he shouted.
The white officer cried : " Titoko, I have been
trying to discover your atua, the god which guides
you in your battles. Now I have found it — I know
the source of your mana. When the wind blows
hard from the ichakarua (the north-east), I know
it is the breath of your god, the wind of Uenuku !
But your atua is only a tutua — a low fellow ! "
Spoke Titoko angrily, and said : " McDonnell,
go ! Depart at once ! If you do not ride away
directly, there will be a blazing oven ready for you ! "
McDonnell rode away, and the angry chief re-
turned to his tent. Why McDonnell should have
paid this daring night visit to the stockade is not
234 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
quite clear, but the incident is given just as Bent
narrates it. He and his companions on the marae
heard the dialogue, and Bent says the old fear
struck to his heart when he heard Titokowaru
menacing the white officer with the oven. The
Taranakis seem to have been particularly addicted
to the " ordeal by fire."
" The oven is gaping open for you ! " Mas their
customary threat. Their tribal history abounds,
too, in tales of how some obnoxious neighbours or
others, Ngati-so-and-so, had been effectively dis-
posed of by the simple process of surrounding their
huts while they slept, fastening the doors, and
then setting fire to the icliares. The only objection
from the Maori point of view to this sunnnary
method of obtaining utu was that it " spoiled the
meat ! "
Colonel McDonnell was so conversant with Maori
tikanga — customs, rules of life, and ways of thought^ — •
that he was by way of being a tohunga-Mdi,ov\ him-
self, and his dramatic twitting of Titokowaru with
the fact that the reputed source of his fighting mana
was within his (McDonnell's) knowledge was a cir-
cumstance that hugely annoyed the old war-chief.
It Avas just as if so much of his mana-tapu had
passed to his white foeman — to the rival maker of
strong " war-medicine."
Occasional skirmishes with the white cavalry
patrol-parties enlivened the three months' sojourn
A HAI7HAU SCOUT, TUTANQE WAIONUI, OF PATEA.
235
THE TAURANGA-IKA STOCKADE 237
in Tauranga-ika. In one of these rencontres a young
Wangamii trooper — now a resident of Wellington
— won his New Zealand Cross. This was William
Lingard, a member of Captain John Bryce's troop
of Kai-iwi Cavalry,
Out scouting one day, Bryce took a party of his
men boldly up to the front of the stockade on a
reconnaissance. The place was unusually quiet,
and a white flag was flying on the flag-staff in front
of the 'pa. One of the cavalrymen, Sergeant Max-
well, leaping a ditch and hedge that intervened
between the farm lands and the ^^a, raced right up
close to the stockade, and fired at it. Trooper
Lingard, also leaping the obstacles, with the rest
of the detachment, rode up past the pa. Lingard,
though he could see nothing of the Maoris, raised
his carbine and fired a shot. The next instant the
whole palisade front — just above the ground, where
the interstices were left for musketry — was a blaze
of fii'e, and a storm of lead sang over the little trooj).
The Hauhaus, hidden in their trenches, and pre-
serving complete silence, had waited till the patrol
was within murderously close range. Maxwell was
mortally wounded ; but he sat his horse till it
carried him out of range. Several horses were shot,
and fell. One trooper, H. Wright, was pinned to the
ground by his horse falling on his leg, and was un-
able to extricate himself, but, nevertheless, drew his
revolver, and kept popping away at the palisades.
238 THE ADVENTURES OP KIMBLE BENT
The ^^llole pa was now in a roar of battle-excite-
ment. The Maoris, as they fii-ed, raised their
fearful yells and war-shouts, an infernal din that
almost drowned the cracks of the fire-arms. Kimble
Bent was there, sitting on the parapet inside the
stockade, and watching the encounter. A burly
framed Hauhaii, a herculean savage known as Big
Kereopa — one of those who had shared in the
cannibal feast at Papa-tiliakehake — dashed out from
the rear of the stockade, armed with a long-handled
tomahawk, and rushed at the helpless pakelia.
Trooper Lingard instantly put his plunging horse
at the Hauhau, and cut at him with his sword.
Another trooper, Tom D. Cummins (now of Wan-
ganui) took a hand in the combat, and with a shot
from his carbine stopped -the charging Hauhau.
He put a bullet into Kereopa, and the big felloM'
clapping a hand to his wound — which was in his
posterior parts — bolted back into the pa nearly as
quickly as he had come, yelling "I'm shot ! Fm
shot ! " Lingai'd, leaning over, got Wright by the
hand, and, though almost dismounted himself, suc-
ceeded in (h'aggiiig his conH.uh' Iroin iiiKUvr the
fallen horse. Then, noticing a wiiitc horse — which
was usually ridden by one of tiie Maori scouts —
tethered to a lutu-h\\A\ a short distance from the
palisades, Lingard galloped at it, cut the tether-line
with his sword, and soon luid Wiight mounted
again antl riding down the hill out t)f range, ^ith
THE TAURANGA-IKA STOCKADE 239
the Hauliau bullets whistling close around theu"
heads. Lingard's rescue of his comrade was a
remarkably plucky bit of work.
An incident of Hauhau life at this period, illus-
trative of the pitilessly savage character of the
olden Maori, is told thus by Kimble Bent :
" While we were living in the ;pa at Tauranga-
ika, a Hauhau fighting-man named Taketake
quarrelled with his sister. She threatened that
she would run away to the 2J«^e^«s, and tell them
of the cannibal practices of the rebels. He warned
her that if she did he would shoot her. That even-
ing she left the 'pa, and started for the white soldiers'
camp. Taketake loaded his gun and followed her.
Overtaking her on the road, he shot her through
the back and killed her. He returned to the pa
and reported what he had done. A party of men
went out and brought back the murdered woman's
body, and that was all there was about it. No one
interfered with Taketake, or considered what he
had done was a crime. All they said was ' Kaitoa ! '
(' Serve her right ')."
While the pakeha attack was awaited, Bent and his
companions spent much of their time in the forest
at the rear of the fort, catching eels in the creeks,
hunting wild pigs, and gathering wild honey for
the garrison food-supplies.
CHAPTER XX
A SCOUTING ADVENTURE
The passage of the Okchu — A niglit's vigil — Mackenzie the
scout — " Maoris in the bush ! " — The watchers in the fern — A
race for hfe.
A CLEAR, bright, moonlight night of summer ; a
moon that silvered the sharp hill-tops of the broken
Maori country, but left black mysterious shadows
in the gorges and river valleys that every few miles
cut deeply into the rolling fern lands ; valleys full
of danger and death, for in their depths crept the
war-parties of the savage, laying ambushes, plan-
ning murder and mutilation. On a gently sloping
rise on the open fern lands a hundred M'hite tents,
the camp of the pakeha troops, glittered in the full
moonlight. The sweet bugle-calls of " Lights out "
and the " Last post " rang out for miles across the
wilderness, and except for the piquets and sentries
the camp was soon asleep. But away on the forest
edge, a mile from the safely entrenched camp, a
little band of men, half a dozen scouts, crouched
hiding in the fern, carbines in their hands, watching,
listening. They were the eyes of the army. Their
240
A SCOUTING ADVENTURE 241
wits, tlieii- keenness of vision and hearing, were
pitted this night against the savage men of the
forest, born bushmen, with the cunning of the
Indian.
It was the 17th of January, 1869, nearly three
months after the repulse of the Colonial troops at
the Moturoa stockade. All this time Titokowaru and
his victorious Tekau-ma-rua had everything their
own way on the West Coast, scouring the country-
side, burning settlers' houses, killing cattle, and
strengthening their palisaded position at Tauranga-
ika. The East Coast campaign following on the
Poverty Bay massacre had necessitated the diver-
sion of nearly all the Constabulary from the West
Coast, until the storming and capture of Te Kooti's
hill-fort Ngatapa and the flight of the rebel chief
to the forests of the Urewera Country enabled
attention to be again given to the Taranaki and
Waitotara Hauhaus. Now, well on in the month
of January, 1869, Colonel Whitmore, with Colonel
Lyon — a brave one-armed soldier, veteran of the
Crimea — as his second in command, advanced from
Wanganui with a strong force of Armed Constabu-
lary, about eight hundred in number, l)esides a large
body of K'upa'pas, or friendly Maoris, mostly, of the
Whanganui tribe, under Kepa te Rangihiwinui.
The force encamped at the end of the first day's
march near the right bank of the Kai-iwi stream,
about ten miles from Wanganui, and prepared to
16
242 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
march the next day through the Okehii Gorge and
on to Nukumaru and Tauranga-ika.
This country around the Kai-iwi was mostly open
fern land, but some of the river gullies were filled
with a dense growth of forest. A short distance to
the north of the camp there was a deep gorge, the
valley of the Okehu stream. Through this gorge
a road had been cut some years before, and the
river had been bridged, giving access to Nukumaru
and the Waitotara, and this was the route by
which Colonel Whitmore intended to approach the
Hauhau stronghold. It was, however, plainly a
dangerous place, where the Maoris might easily
lay an ambush. The little colonel was too old a
soldier to run risks of this sort, and he determined
to have the gorge carefully scouted before he took
his column into it.
That afternoon he selected half a dozen of his
most active men, some of them Constabulary, some
volunteers, and as soon as night fell despatched
them to the Okehu, with orders to spend the night
on the fern-covered right bank of the gorge, and find
out if the Maoris were laying an ambuscade in the
bush below. Trooper William Lingard, of Bryce's
Kai-iwi Cavalry — the young trooper who liad dis-
tinguished himself at the Tauranga-ika skirmish
described in the last chapter — was placed in charge
of the scouts. With him were Chris. Maling, a
young surveyor — his father had been killed by the
A SCOUTING ADVENTURE 243
Maoris years before, and he often declared that he
would never rest until he had killed a Maori with
his own hands in revenge ; a Frenchman called
Peter the Guide ; three men named Herri, Powell,
and Williamson ; and an old Indian soldier named
Mackenzie. It is with this Mackenzie that this
story of a night's scouting expedition is chiefly
concerned.
It was the calmest of nights, a still night when
sounds travelled far, and in silence the little squad
of armed scouts set out from the tented camp in
single file towards the dark gorge of the Okehu.
They marched as silently as Indians, for they were
shod exactly like Indians, in moccasins that felt
the ground as soundlessly as a wild cat's pad.
The making and wearing of those moccasins was
Mackenzie's idea. This veteran soldier was a man
who had been brought out from India by Sir Henry
Cracroft Wilson, when that gentleman settled in
Canterbury, He was, as one of his scouting com-
rades says, a fine-looking, resolute man, something
over forty years of age, with hair beginning to turn
grizzly, and a bold, fearless eye. He was partly of
Gurkha blood, and his senses were wonderfully
keen. He had marvellous escapes from death, and
had even been partly scalped. Once when he was
overpowered and felled in a melee, a savage had
passed his knife around his head and underneath
the scalp, and was about to " lift his hair " when a
244 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
timely bullet from one of Mackenzie's comrades
knocked his assailant over, and the soldier was
rescued. His companion ran to his aid, pressed
down the torn scalp into its place, and bound it
firmly with bandages. Mackenzie saved his hair,
but to his last day bore the scar of the scalping-
kiiife running round his head. He carried besides
his carbine a remarkable weapon, a two-ended
steel knife, or dagger, of Afghan make, which he wore
in a sheath at his back with a flap of skin over tlie
top. Ojie end of the dagger was a stiletto and the
other was a double-edged cutting and thrusting
blade, ground as sharp as a razor. It had the
handle in the middle. With this knife he would per-
form some wonderfully dexterous feats. He A\ould
throw it up into the air thirty or forty feet and
catch it by the middle as cleverly as a juggler as it
came whizzing down. He would stick a piece of
paper on a post and, retiring twenty or tlmty yards,
hurl the shining weapon at it and transfix the
target in the exact centre, the knife quivering several
inches deep in the jjost.
The moccasins the scouts wore were made by
Mackenzie from the skin of a horse. Immediately
the party had been organised the old soldier went
out with his carbine and shot one of the numerous
ownerless horses tluit roamed tlie liills. Cutting
out suitable pieces of the skin, lie litted them while
still warm to his connades' feet, with the hair in-
A SCOUTING ADVENTURE 245
side ; then cut thongs and laced the horse-skin shoe
firmly to the foot. In a few hours these moccasins
took perfect shape, and made the most suitable
foot-gear for bush-work that could have been de-
vised. " If we wear ordinary boots out scouting
we're sure to lose our lives," said Mackenzie ; "we
can't scout noiselessly in them, or run fast enough
when it comes to running."
An old Maori war-track wound through the high
fern above the Okehu Gorge. Along this the scouts
marched to take up their night's vigil. Two were
posted at the end of the gorge nearest the camp,
two more about two hundred yards away, and the
third couple about the same distance farther on,
above the middle of the gorge. The men made
themselves nests in the fern alongside the track, and
close to the edge of the slope that fell to the im-
penetrable blackness of the bush below. The leader,
as he posted the men, told them to keep a sharp
watch and listen for any sounds, and to give a signal
if any of them heard Maoris in the gorge. The
signal was to be the thrice-repeated sharp cry of the
iveha, the night-roving wingless bird that haunted
these forests and gulches.
After posting his comrades in their several posi-
tions, young Lingard rejoined his companion Maling
in a little nook in the thick fern just on the gorge
side of the narrow foot-track, and stayed a Miiile
with him conversing in whispers. In half an
246 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
hour's time ho cautiously patrolled the track again
to visit the others. When he came to Mackenzie,
the old soldier was sitting up reading a pocket Bible
by the bright moonlight.
" What are you reading ? " asked Lingard, as
he squatted down quietly in the fern by Mackenzie's
side.
" Look and see," said the soldier, and Lingard
saw, and wondered, for not many a rough old
soldier like Mackenzie was seen with such a book.
And he wondered still more when Mackenzie, clos-
ing the book, asked him to look at it again. There
was a clean-cut hole in it, right through one of the
covers and penetrating many of the leaves.
" That book saved my life," said the veteran.
And he told the story. It was the comrade who
had bowled over the Indian who was about to scalp
him that gave Mackenzie the little Bible. " ' You
say you will always be grateful to mc for saving
your life,' he said. 'Well, I want you to do just
one tiling for me ; it's a little thing. I w on't ask
much.'
" He was so insistent," said Mackenzie, " that
I gave him the promise he asked. 'Well,' said
my friend, ' just take this little book of mine and
read something in it every night ; or, if you won't
read it, take it out and look at it and open it. And
always carry it with you. It will save your life.'
" I did so, and I read it, more to please my old
A SCOUTING ADVENTURE 247
friend than anything else. I carried it in my
jumper pocket, for it was small and light. And in
those dangerous days I carried something else night
and day — this dagger that I wear at my belt.
About midnight one night I was lying alone in my
tent, half-asleep, when I heard something — no,
smelt it ! It was pitch dark, but I knew there was
something or some one close to me. As quietly as I
knew how, I loosened my dagger and gripped it
firmly. The next moment I felt a terrible thud on
the chest, and a figure hurled itself on me. I brought
round the knife with a swift sweep, and nearly
ripped the side out of the fellow — killed him dead.
It was a native who wanted to kill and rob me.
He had jumped at me with a knife, but the point
of his blade struck the Bible in my breast pocket
as I lay on my back, and that saved my life. See !
It's the sort of thing you used to read about in little
Sunday-school books, isn't it ? I wonder how
many people would believe it ? But it's absolutely
true. That old comrade of mine saved my life
twice. And it's these two I put my trust in, my
Bible and my dagger. That knife's the best weapon
I've ever had. It's more to me than carbine or
revolver."
Then Mackenzie put his hand on his fellow-
scout's arm, and spoke in an earnest whisper of a
presentiment that filled his mind.
" I feel," he said, looking straight into his friend's
248 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
eyes, " that this is my last night on earth. I have
a conviction that I won't see another sun rise."
" Nonsense ! " said young Lingard, beginning to
feel creepy. " Don't talk like that, old man ;
you'll unnerve me. You're not going to die."
" Why should I unnerve you, my boy ? " asked
Mackenzie very quietly and gently. " There's no-
thing to be afraid of in dying. I can face death
with perfect calmness ; and I know I'm to die very
soon."
There was silence for some moments. Suddenly
Mackenzie started, turned in a listening attitude, and
put up a hand in warning.
" Don't you hear them ? " he whispered. " Don't
you hear them ? There are Maoris moving in the
bush below. I heard the pat of a naked foot just
now and the breaking of a twig."
The young leader of the scouts listened with
utmost intentness for the next few minutes. The
two comrades could hear each other's hearts thump-
ing, so still they crouched. But not another sound
came except the occasional call of the melancholy
morepork.
After a little while Lingard bade Mackenzie
good-bye for the time, and, with his carbine at the
" ready," crept back along the track and visited
the other men. Joining Maling, he told him of his
strange conversation Mith Mackenzie.
" He's a real good fellow," said Maling, " a good
A SCOUTING ADVENTURE 249
comrade. I hope that presentiment of his is all
bunkum. But if he says there are Maoris moving
in the bush, we'll have work before morning."
In half an hour's time Lingard went the rounds
again, stopping every now and then to listen for
sounds of the enemy. He found Mackenzie still
reading, bare-headed, by the clear moonlight in his
little nook in the fern. Mackenzie's mate was
sound asleep.
The old soldier's senses Mere wonderfully acute.
Quietly as Lingard stole up on his moccasined feet,
he had heard him. He was listening while he read.
" Lingard," he said, " I've been reading for the
lar.t time. I know it's my last night of life. To-
day I was so sure of this that I settled my account
at the canteen, and paid my last instalment on a
horse I bought from John Handley, and I've written
to my wife. I won't see to-morrow's sun rise.
This came to me yesterday morning.
" Lingard," he went on again, in a whisper,
" there are Maoris about ! Can't you smell them ?
They're in the bush below, waiting. But you'll
stay, I suppose, till daylight, unless something
happens before then."
In a few minutes Lingard, after vainly listening
for sounds in the bush, cautiously rose and walked
back along the track. He left Mackenzie sitting
there, with the moonlight streaming down on his
earnest face, still reading his little book. Returning
250 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
to Maling, Lingard sat with his companion listening,
until it was within perhaps half an hour of full day-
light.
Then, all at once, they heard a fearful sound. A
rifle shot, followed instantly by a terrific yell, the
war-yell of the Maoris from the bush behind them.
The bush flashed fire, the flashes of many guns,
accompanied by reverberating bangs ; then the
pattering and thudding of many naked feet along
the track.
The ambuscade had been unmasked. One of the
scouts — so it was learned afterwards — had cau-
tiously worked his way down the valley, far enough
down to see that the bridge over the Okehu had
been set on fire, and by its light he saw a large
party of armed Hauhaus. He hurried back to give
his comrades warning, but before he could reach
them some of the prowling natives discovered
Mackenzie and Williamson and fired on them,
wounding Williamson in the back when he started
to run.
The scouts had done their work, but would they
ever reach the camp alive ?
The whole of the war-party were on the white
men's heels, racing through the fern and along the
narrow track and firing as they ran. The moon
had gone down, and it was too dim to see very far,
but the dawn was spreading over the eastern sky.
" They're on us ! — they're on us ! " exclaimed
A SCOUTING ADVENTURE 251
Maling. " It's no use to run now ; we wouldn't
have a show. Let's hide here in the fern."
The scouts were crouching in the fern within a
yard or so of the Maori track. The fern was very
high here, over a tall man's head in height, and was
very thick and matted, and lying in a slanting
direction. The two men, knowing that it was certain
death to venture out, for the Maoris were rushing
along the track in force, crept underneath the thick
masses of ferns, and pushed it up over them so that
they had room to move and were perfectly screened
from the enemy's eyes in that early morning light.
They made ready their Terry carbines, bit their
cartridges ready for reloading, and put their per-
cussion-caps in their mouths for instant use. Just
before they did so, Maling turned to his companion
and said :
" Lingard, old man, promise me if it comes to
the worst you won't leave me, and I'll do the same
by you. Don't let us leave each other," and he
put out his hand.
The young leader of the scouts gripped Maiing's
hand. " We'll stick by each other," he said.
The next moment there was a thundering rush
of feet past the very muzzles of their carbines. A
mob of Hauhaus, yelling and shouting, raced past
them, following up the leaders who had been fixed
on by the scout, and who had come dashing after
the white men.
252 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
The two hidden scouts could hear nothing of
their comrades, but they well knew the odds were
greatly against any of them reaching the camp.
Presently they heard firing from the direction of
the camp. The troops had turned out on hearing
the shots at the bush edge, and were covering the
retreat of the scouts.
Then another thing happened. Maling and his
companion heard and felt something now and then
swishing and cutting through the fern just above
their heads. They were under the fire of their own
comrades.
" Maling," said Lingard, " this is getting too
warm ! It's not good enough to stay here and be
shot by our own men. Let's make a run for it."
Creeping out from their place of concealment, and
giving a quick look backwards to make sure that no
more Hauhaus were coming, the two scouts ran
along the track in the direction of the camp. Close
by on their left they could hear the enemy yelling
and firing.
Just as they turned a })end in the path they came
u])on a terrible sight. Mackenzie lay on the
ground, face downwards ; his head smashed in
and his brains spattering the ground. His carbine
and ammunition and Afghan sheath-dagger were
gone.
This they saw at one horrified glance, then they
dashed on, taking a shoi't cut across the fern to the
A SCOUTING ADVENTURE 253
camp. They could see the white tents now in the
morning light. They ran towards the troops shout-
ing, " Don't fire ! — don't fire ! "
The two scouts reached camp safely, and Lingard
immediately reported the result of the night's work
to the colonel. All the others excepting poor
Mackenzie turned up. One of them had fallen shot,
wounded in the back, close to the camp, but was
rescued by the surgeon. Dr. Walker, who pluckily
ran out and carried him in.
Mackenzie, one of the survivors said, was running
well, and would have escaped, but he suddenly fell
prone on his face without any apparent cause. A
Hauhau came running along next moment, and,
putting his gun close to Mackenzie's head, blew his
brains out.
Then came another strange development of the
morning's adventure. Surgeon Walker, on examin-
ing Mackenzie's body, said he believed the scout
had died suddenly of heart disease, and that he ^^■as
quite dead before even the Hauhau shot him.
The brave old Gurkha soldier's present iment of
speedy death was only too true a foreword fiom the
Unknown.
It was fortunate that tliis Hauhau ambuscade
had been unmasked. The camp was already astir,
and the troops were having their early morning
coffee, and in another half -hour would have begun
the march by the Okehu Gorge route, when the first
254 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
shots were fired. Once down in the narrow' gorge
and the presence of the enemy undetected, they
would have been practically at the mercy of their
active and well-concealed foes in the thick bush
above and on either side of them.
After this little morning skirmish the Hauhaus,
numbering probably a hundred and hfty, quickly
retired through the bush to the Tauranga-ika pa,
taking with them as trophies the dead soldier's arms.
The white troops were soon on the move. Four
divisions of Armed Constabulary, the Volunteer
Cavalry, and the Kujmjm Maoris marched through
the Gorge unmolested, and took uj) a ])osition near
the great Hauliau pa., which Whitmore now pre-
pared to storm. First he tried artillery in an en-
deavour to breach the stockade, and Kimble Bent
and his Maori comrades in the crowded fort now
stood target for cannon-fu'c.
CHAPTER XXI
THE FALL OF TAURANGA-IKA
Shot and shell — Tlie fort abandoned — Fliglit of the Hauhans
— The chase — The fight at Karaka Flat— Mutilation of the dead
— The ambuscade at the peach-grove — The sergeant's leg —
Rewards for Hauhau heads.
Skirmishing up over the fern slopes of Tauranga-
ika came Whitmore's Armed Constabulary and
Kepa's kilted guerillas from the Wanganui. Some
of the A.C.'s advanced to within about two hundred
yards of the stockade, and took cover in a ditch
which ran parallel with the front palisading ; here
they opened fire. The main body had pitched
camp about half a mile from the 'pa front. At the
same time Armstrong guns were brought up and
posted on the left front of the stockade, and shell-
fire was opened on the rebel position at a range of
five hundred yards.
But most of the Hauhaus were safe in their
trenches and their covered ways, and the shells and
bullets passed harmlessly over them. A few of the
young bloods danced and yelled defiance from above-
ground. On the stockade was the Hauhau tekoteko,
the dummy figure which they worked in marionette-
255
256 THE ADVENTURES OP KIMBLE BENT
fashion by means of ropes that led into the trench
below. This dummy was intended to draw the
'pakeha fire, but it had hardly deceived the veteran
A.C.'s and Kepa's Kupa'pas, versed in all Hauhau
ways that were dark and tricks that were vain.
Bent was underground, listening to the bang of
the Armstrongs and the whistle of tlie shells, and
now and again squinting through the palisades at
his adversaries.
One Maori, who was standing in an angle of the
pa, was wounded in the head by a splinter knocked
off one of the palisade-posts by a shot from an
Armstrong gun. The same shell, whizzing through
the 'pa, ripped a hole in Titokowaru's tent.
When night fell, no appreciable breach had been
made by the sheU-fire. It was now decided to
storm the pa at daybreak. Some of the A.C.'s
crept up with tliek entrencliing tools to witliin
fifty yards of the stockade, and dug out slielter-
trenches.
Tlie fort was remarkably quiot during the night.
It was reconnoitred \\hcn daybicak came, and
found — empty. The Hauhaus had for some mys-
terious reason deserted it under cover of (hirkness,
and taken to the l)ush. So fell lo llic pakeha the
very strong Tauranga-ilui pa.
Bent explains this unexpected abandonment of
Titokowaru's most formidable entrencliment.
The eternal feminine was at the bottom t)f it all.
THE FALL OF TAURANGA-IKA 257
The chief of blood and fire, with all his mana-
tapu, was vulnerable to the artillery of a dark
wahine's eyes and soft wahine blandishments. He
was detected in a liaison with another man's wife.
This misdemeanour was, in Maori eyes, fatal to his
prestige as an ariki and a war-leader. He had
trampled on his tapu, and his Hauhau angel, who
had so long successfully guided his fortunes, now
deserted him. His run of luck had turned.
A council of the people was held to discuss the
cause celebre, and many an angry speech was made.
Some of the chiefs went so far as to threaten
Titokowaru with death. At length a chieftainess
of considerable influence rose and quelled the storm
of violent words. She appealed to the aggrieved
husband's people not to attempt Titoko's life ; but
urged that the garrison should leave the jxi — it
would be disastrous to make a stand there after
their tohunga, their spiritual head and their war-
leader, had lost his 7nana-tapu. This met with
general approval, and on the night of the attack
the people packed their few belongings on their
backs and struck quietly into the forest for the
Waitotara. Titokowaru, with forty warriors,
covered the retreat. " Afterwards," says Bent,
" when we had taken safe shelter in the Upper
Waitara, Titokowaru regained his tapu by means of
incantations and ceremonies performed by another
tohunga. But by that time the war was over."
17
258 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
So to the forest fled Titokowaru and all his people,
and hard on their trail, when the qia A\as found
deserted, came the A.C. scouts and Kepa's Maoris,
in lightest marching order for the chase.
The Government troops overtook the Hauhau
rear-guard at Te Karaka flat, on the descent to the
Waitotara River. At Te Karaka Major Kepa,
the fighting chief of the Whanganuis, was leading the
advance-guard of the pursuing force, A\hen he A\as
hotly attacked by the Hauhaus who had planted
an ambush in the bush. Kepa was closely pressed.
Captain T. Porter, who commanded No. 8 Division
of Armed Constabulary — consisting of Arawa and
Ngapuhi Maoris, Avith a few good European bush-
men — was close up when Kepa was fired en, ajid he
promptly extended the supports across the flat.
Kepa, after a sharp hand-to-hand fight with the
enemy, bui'st through them and fell back on Cap-
tain Port(n\ The Kupapas and their white com-
rades fought the Hauhaus till dark, and had to
leave them dead and wounded on the field. Next
morning they found the mutilated bodies minus
hearts and livers, \\hich the cannibal enemy had
cut cut and taken away. The Hauhaus had also
beheaded one of the slain, a Whanganui soldier
named Hori Raukawa.
The grief of the friendly Maoris at this mutila-
tion of their dead was intense, and was given vent
to in A\ceping and furi(.iis llircats. Ke])a was
THE FALL OF TAURANGA-IKA 259
in a terrible rage, and determined on retaliation in
kind.
This feeling was intensified a few days later,
when a strong force of Hauhaus ambuscaded and
slaughtered seven out of a party of ten white Con-
stabulary men at the Papatupu peach-grove on the
banks of the Waitotara River. The Constabulary
detachment was in charge of Sergeant Menzies of
No. 2 Division. The men, who belonged to Colonel
McDonnell's force at Te Karaka, had obtained leave
to forage for peaches in a grove at Papatupu, on the
opposite (north) bank of the Waitotara, and crossed
the river in a canoe. They were gathering the
fruit when a volley was suddenly poured into them
by a large body of Hauhaus, who were lying close
by waiting for pakeJia game. They at once seized
their arms and rushed for their canoe, pursued by
two or three score of Maoris, led by Big Kereopa.
The rest of the story was told the author lately
by Tutange Waionui, of Patea, he who had dis-
tinguished himself in the repulse of the white troops
at Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu the previous year. This is
Tutange's account :
" I was one of the Hauhaus who ambushed the
Constabulary men, under Sergeant Menzies, at the
peach-grove at Papatupu. Some of them had got
into their canoe, and would have escaped, but the
others held on to it in an attempt to board it,
and so we caught and killed seven of them. The
260 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
sergeant was a big, tall man, and stout. I killed
him. He was stooping down at the time. I slew
him with no other weapon tlum a canoe paddle of
7»ia?wka wood. I snatched up a paddle from the
canoe and struck him a slanting blow on the side
of the temple with it, the fatal blow called tipi, as
delivered in sideways fashion with the edge of a
stone mere. The white sergeant fell, and a Maori
named Toawairere slashed off one of his legs with
a tomahawk. This was done for the sake of getting
the boot on the pakeha's foot for one of our men,
a one-legged fellow named Paramena, who A\anted
the boot. The leg was taken away into the
bush."
Next day Colonel Whitmore sent the Ktipapas —
the Maoris of No. 8 Division under Captain Porter
and the Whanganui under Kepa — across the river
in pursuit of the enemy, and Colonel McDonnelFs
division of Constabulary followed them in ,su})port.
Porter and his men, during the skirmisli which
followed, came across the fire in which Sergeant
Menzies' leg had been roasted. The remains of the
bone of the leg were there, and it was evident that
]5ig Kereopa * and his fellow-savages had once more
feasted on the flesh of the qxikeha.
It was now that Colonel Whitmore agreed to a
request made by Kepa and offered rewards for
* ]v(*ivi)|)a, in the days bctoi'c the war, liud been a jjiipil at tho
Kui-iwi iiiissioii school.
THE FALL OF TAURANGA-IKA 261
Hauhau heads. He said he would give £5 a head
for ordinary men and £10 for chiefs killed. This
gave a fillip to the bush-whacking chase, into which
the Government Maoris entered with ferocious zest.
CHAPTER XXII
THE FOREST FORAGERS
Fugitive Hauhaus — Hard times in the bush — The eaters
of mamaku — Bent's adventure — Lost in the woods— Rupe to
the rescue — The tapu'd eels.
"After we deserted Tauranga-ika," says my old
pakeha-Ma,o\:\, " v>'e led a miserably rough life in
the bush. We A\'ere as near starvation sometimes
as we could well be. Kepa's Ku papas and the a\ hite
scouts were hunting for us, stalking us like wild
beasts, and we were hiding in the forest and living
on what we could pick u]). We scattered in parties.
I and some of the Hauhaus selected a safe spot in
the deep bush, built ivhares to shelter ourselves,
and then went out to the edge of the forest digging
up fern-root for food. We scoured the bush for the
mamaku fern-tree,* and cut out the A\hite pith of
* Tlie Taranaki Maoris used to rMilti\ate the mamaku fern-
tree for tlie sake of the edible pitli. The natives point out
one of the olden mamak^i gi'ounds just to the north of Kete-
onctea (near the ])resent township of Norinanby), where the old
Whakaahurangi track went in towards Mount Egmont. Here there
were two or three miles of maynaku forest. The Maoris used to
cut off the uppcM- parts of tlie trees and j)lant them in tlie ground,
thus making two mamaku grow where only one grew before.
The old tree so decapitated always sent out a new head.
262
THE FOREST FORAGERS 263
the tree ; it was one of our principal foods at that
time. It has a peculiar effect on any one who eats
much of it — it makes him strangely drowsy and
sleepy. Sometimes, too, we had to eat ichara-
whara and similar mosses, and the mushroom-like
harore that grew on the to?t'a-trees, and hakeke, or
wood-fungus. We became very weak and feeble
for want of food. We did not dare to ligkt a fire in
the daytime, for fear the smoke rising above the
forest trees would betray us. At night we would
kindle a small fire, just enough to keep the pipes
going as we sat round and smoked and talked in low
voices."
Titokowaru's warriors, too, ran short of ammuni-
tion. For his cartridges. Bent sometimes had to
use small pieces of hard wood cut to the proper
size instead of lead bullets. The natives were also
often short of percussion-caps ; they used to save
the exploded ones, and cut off match-heads and
insert them. A box of caps was a great prize to a
Hauhau in those days. This ingenious use of match-
heads was a common practice in the later days of
the war, and many a box of pakeha matches found
its way through supposedly " friendly " Maori
hands into the rebel camps.
For three or four weeks the Hauhaus concealed
themselves in the forests between the Waitotara and
the Patea Rivers, their warriors making occasional
sorties and laying ambuscades for straggling whites.
264 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
Not only was Bent in daily and nightly danger of
death at the hands of his enemies, the Government
men, during this period of hiding and starving in
the bush, but in one of his adventures he narrowly
escaped the tomahawks of his oAvn companions, the
Hauhaus.
Bent and a l)arty of about twenty Maoris set out
one day from their camp at Oteka, away inland of
the Weraroa, on a food-hunting expedition into the
great trackless forests in the rear of their hiding-
place. They travelled half a day's journey into the
rugged bush-country, a lone region where no booted
foot had ever trod. They fished for eels in the
creeks, and climbed for wild honey wherever they
saw the bees buzzing round their hives in the hollow
trees. They carried with them taha (calabashes
made from the hue, or vegetable gourd) ; these they
filled with the honey. When they had collected
as nuich as they could carry, they started on their
return tramp to the kainga. Bent's pikau, or back-
load, consisted of about thirty pounds weight of
honey in taha and two large eels, all in a flax
basket.
When the party left their camping-place the
white man went on ahead, and was soon out of
sight of his companions. After a while he found
that he had missed the route by which he had come
the previous day.
He pushed on and on, hoping every moment to
THE FOREST FORAGERS 265
catch sight of a broken branch or a footprint or a
tomahawk blaze on a tree that would indicate the
trail. He wandered about, up and down hill,
crossing creeks, and tearing what little clothes he
wore in the tangled bush, until he had not the least
idea where he was.
He was lost in the forest.
Night came on while the lonely white man was
still toiling bewildered through the dense woods.
He spent the hours of darkness crouched up under
a tree, sleeping little, and shivering with the cold,
for he was thinly clothed and had no blanket, and
no matches or flint and steel with which to light a
fire for warmth and cooking.
Early next morning Bent climbed a tall rata-tree
near his bivouac and scanned the wild country
round. Nothing but forest, forest everywhere —
vast waves of deep verdure sweeping away and
away as far as the eye could see. No sign of human
life — no guiding landmark. Somewhere beneath
that impenetrable pall of green that clothed every-
thing were his people. But where ?
Ah ! What is that blue, thin coil rising slowly out
of the forest far ahead, westward ?
A curl of smoke ! A Hauhau camp ; perhaps
some hunting-party cooking their morning meal.
The white man joyfully descended from his tree-
perch, and quickly getting into his pikau straps
again, set out at as fast a pace as his load
266 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
would allow him, steering in the direction of the
smoke.
He toiled on and on, breaking through jungles
of undergrowth and clinging vines, over logs and
through watercourses, until suddenly he found him-
self at the foot of a rocky wall which rose perpen-
dicularly above him for about thirty feet.
He endeavoured to clamber up the precipice,
assisting himself by the forest roots and creepers
which hung in trailing coils down its face, but they
gave way under his weight when he had ascended
but a few feet, and he found himself at the base of
the cliff again, debating whether to try the climb
again, or make a long detour, and perhaps lose the
run of the point for which he was heading.
Suddenly, high above him, a voice cried, " Who's
there ? "
The startled wliitc man, ])eering (lirough the
tangle of foliage and creepers, saw a man standing
on the cliff -top — a Maori girt with a flax mat, a
gun in his hand. It was Rupe, his chief and
owner.
The Maori was gazing intently down the elift".
With him was a woman, the old chief's daughter
Hi hi, who was Bent's wife. He had heard the noise
made by Bent in his attempt to scale tlie cliff, and
he noticed the shaking of llic bush-vines and
leaves that screened the lower part of the wall, but
the white man was so far liidden from his vision,
THE FOREST FORAGERS 267
Bent called to him : " Don't fire, Rupe ! It is
I, your pakeha — Tu-nui-a-moa ! "
" E tama ! " cried the old chief. " I am glad
indeed ! I came out searching for you, for your
life is in great danger."
The pakeha, changing his position so that Rupe
could see him, explained his predicament.
" Remain where you are," said Rupe, " and I
will lower a rope to you."
In a few minutes a line, made of split leaves of
the harakeke flax, knotted together, and strengthened
with aka, or bush-vines, was thrown down the cliff
to Bent. The upper end of the hastily made bush
rope the old man had made fast to a tree on the
cliff -top.
" Send your jnkau up first, and you can follow,"
ordered Rupe.
Bent tied his flax basket of eels and honey to the
line, Rupe hauled it up, lowered the line again,
and Bent tied it round his body below the arms.
Then the chief and his stalwart daughter hauled
the light-weight pakeha safely to the summit of
the wall.
Rihi and her father both wept as they took Bent's
hands, so great was their relief at finding their
pakeha safe and sound. Rupe told the white man
that he had feared he was dead.
" Why ? " asked Bent.
" Why ? There are a score of armed Hauhaus
268 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
searching the forest for you, and had they found
you before I did they would have killed you."
The old chief explained, further, that when Bent
did not return to the bush-village the pre^^ous
night, his fellow-eelers had come to the conclusion
that he had given them the slip on the joiu'ney
home, and had made off to the white men's camp.
So at daylight a party set out to scour the forest
round the kainga, fully intending, if they found the
deserter in hiding, to summarily execute him. Old
Rupe, too, had taken to the forest with his daughter
— before daylight — but for a different reason : he
did not believe his pakeha would desert him, and as
he concluded Bent had lost himself in the bush, he
had kindled a fire on the most prominent hill-side
in the forest, in the hope that the wanderer would
see it and make his way towards it. His bush-
craft was successful, and no doubt it saved Bent's
life, for had he gone wandering on he would
most probably have run into the arms of his
hunters.
So the three of them — the rangatira and his
" tame white man " and the Maori girl — travelled
homeward as quickly and as quietly as they could,
seldom speaking to one another foi" fear some
prowling Hauhau should hear them. " Even now,
if they find you out in the forest," said Rupe, " I
may not be able to save you. Be cautious, for this
may be your last day ! "
THE FOREST FORAGERS 269
Late in the afternoon the camp of the fugitive
rebels was reached, and Bent was safe.
Titokowaru, just back from a scouting expedi-
tion to the forest-edge, was in the village. The
grim war-chief was genuinely pleased to see the
white man back again, and safe.
'"'' E tu ! ''"' said he ; "it was fortunate indeed that
Rupe met you in the forest. Had any of the others
found you — my young men of the Tekau-7na-rua —
then you had been a dead man ! "
Now came an illustration of that many-sided law,
the tapu. Titokowaru took the two eels which Bent
had carried home on his back and hung them up
as an offering to the atua, the heathen gods. They
were under the ban because they had been borne
on the white man's back, which was temporarily
tapu ; therefore they could not be eaten.
The honey, however, was not wasted. Titoko-
waru, having no doubt a sweet tooth, sagely de-
cided that it would be sufficient to hang up the eels
for the gods ; he whaka7ioa''d the honey, that is, he
repeated karakia, or incantations, over it, by which
the maleficent powers of the tapu were nullified or
averted and the food made fit for consumption.
CHAPTER XXIII
A BATTLE IN THE FOG
The surprise of Otautu — An early morning attack — Kimble
Bent's dream — " Kia tupatof" — A gallant defence — Brave old
Hakopa — Fliglit of the Hauhaiis.
A MISTY morning in the forest. A little Maori
hamlet, just a collection of thatched huts, in a
small clearing enclosed on all sides by the dense
woods. In the rear a deep ravine, jungly with
thick undergrowth, then tlie winding snag-strewn
Patea River. This was Otautu, Titokowaru's re-
fuge-camp. It stood on a plateau — now a richly
grassed farm ; scattered over the clearing were
potato-gardens. There was a frail stockade of
stakes, but there were no trenches or rifle pits ; it
was an ordinary residential kairiga ; the fugitive
Hauhaus trusted to the tangled forest as theu' best
defence.
Grey dawn. The raw morning fog hung low on
the sleeping village — a mist so thick that it shrouded
from the view objects even a few yards distant.
It lay like the winding bank of smoky mist that
marks the course of a forest stream early on a
270
A BATTLE IN THE FOG 271
summer morning ; the black tree-tops stood out
clear above the white pall of damp, cold vapour.
Not a sound from the slumbering kainga, where
some three or four hundred Hauhaus — Kimble Bent
amongst them — lay packed in their nikau-iooied.
huts.
At the edge of the clearing a solitary Maori
sentry, a man armed with a revolver, sat, keeping
a semi-somnolent guard.
Suddenly, out of the dark forest, appeared a
body of armed men. They came in Indian file ;
they broke into a stealthy run as they left the
shadow of the trees ; their bodies were bent eagerly
forward ; they carried their rifles at the trail ; they
uttered not a sound.
They were the Maori advance-guard of Colonel
Whitmore's expeditionary force of four hundred
A.C.'s and Kupapas. After weeks of bush-scouting
a Government column had at last happened on the
Hauhau hiding-place.
The Maori sentinel — he was a man of the Puke-
tapu tribe named Te Wareo — was all in an instant
wideawake. The moment he jumped up he was
fired on by the advance-guard. Leaping into cover
he raced for the village, firing his revolver as he ran.
The discharge of the rifles rolled crashing through
the forest. Startled kaka parrots flew from their
tree-perches, screaming discordantly at their rude
awakening. The clear notes of a bugle rang out
272 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
—it was the " Advance " and " Double ! " The
active little colonel rushed his men up at top speed,
extended them, and advanced on the hidden camp,
and a strange combat began.
At the first crack of the firearms the kainga was
awake ; and what a scurry there was ! The Maoris
poured out of their whares just as they leaped from
their sleeping-mats — some wearing only a shawl or
ragged mat ; others entirely naked. Some of the
women rushed out of their huts without a shred
of clothing on, screaming and shouting, and running
for their lives. The men snatched up their guns and
tomahawks, and their cartouche-belts ; and quickly
took post to defend their position, and give time
for their women and children to retreat in safety.
According to Kimble Bent the attack was not
entirely unexpected. At any rate, it had been fore-
shadowed in Maori fashion by one of the Hauhau
" medicine-men."
"The day before this attack," says Bent, "I
had a strange dream, which Titokowaru's priest and
reader of dreams interpreted as an omen of mis-
fortune. I dreamt that I saw a strange Maori
village in wliich each house was cut in two length-
ways, leaving only half the dwelling standing, in
the shape of a shed or lean-to, such as we called
tihere. I described this vision to the Hauhau seer.
He gathered the people in the meeting-house that
night, and after speaking of the dream I had had,
A BATTLE IN THE FOG 273
he cried in a loud voice to them these words of
caution and warning:
" Kia twpato! He po kino te po; he ra kino te ra ! "
(" Be on your guard ! This is a night of evil and
danger, and the morrow also will be a day of evil ! ")
" The prophet then said to me : ' Be ready for
flight in the morning ! Get your belongings ready
packed in your kit, and, if you hear a suspicious
sound, fly from the pa at once.'
" So, when the first shots were heard in the early
morning, I was ready to make a bolt for it. The
moment the alarm was given I jumped up from
my sleeping-place in one of the huts, grabbed my
kit, and barefooted and with nothing on but my
shirt and an old piece of a tent-fly girt round my
middle, I ran to the bank at our rear, and jumped
down the cliff. I went tumbling and scrambling
down to the river, and then travelled up along the
banks for a considerable distance as fast as I could
go. All I had saved from Otautu was what I had
in my kit — some papers, a little money, needles and
thread, and so forth. As I ran up along the river
banks I fell in with some of our people. We went
on until we found a canoe tied up on the bank, and
we crossed the Patea in her, ferrying four across at
a time until all were safely over. Those who were
with me were non-combatants, like myself, mostly
women."
While the unarmed people of the camp were mak-
18
274 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
iiig good their escape, the Otaiitii clearing was the
scene of severe fighting. The Haiiliaii Avarriors
took post just at the edge of the Httle plateau
where the thickly timbered ground suddenly fell
away to the ravine at the rear. Sheltered by the
fall of the ground, they swept the clearing with
their rifles and smooth-bores. Some of them
climbed into the branches of the mto-trees and
delivered their fire ; some extended in bush-skir-
mishing order on either flank ; and both sides —
paTceha and Maori — peppered away briskly at each
other for half an hour or more.
It was a singular skirmish, for the dense fog still
shrouded the hill-top ; and the Government men,
who were being piniished severely by the Haidiau
fire, could for a long time see nothing of their
enemies. Many A.C.'s dropped, some shot dead.
The Government Maoris, the Kupapas, under the
celebrated Kepa, advancing from tree to tree round
the edge of the clearing, came to close quarters
with the Hauhaus. One of Titokowaru's veteran
warriors performed a deed here which is still told
and retold with loving admiration by the old
Taranaki Hauhaus.
He was the old man Hakopa (Jacob) te Matauawa,
the Maori who had taken a friendly interest in
Kimble Bent at Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu, and saved the
white man from the two savages who stalked him
there, as narrated in a previous chapter. Hakopa
A BATTLE IN THE EOG 275
N\as a tall, athletic man, of spare frame, and well
tattooed. He was about seventy years of age, a
true type of the olden Maori toa — the hero of the
war-trail, the brave. He was a curious figure, in
his military cap, tunic, and trousers — stripped from
a dead Constabulary man after the fight at Papa-
tihakehake.
Hakopa dodged from tree to tree out on the
flanks of the clearing, making good use of a recently
captured carbine. In the uncertain light it was
difficult for the Government men to tell friend from
foe, and Hakopa's pakeha uniform seems to have
completely deceived some of the Kupapas. As he
leaped from tree to tree and stump to stump, he
shouted " Raunatia ! Rau7uitia .' " (" Surround
it ! ") to induce the belief that he was one of the
Government force.
At last all Hakopa's cartridges but two were gone.
A prudent warrior would have retired at this stage
— but not Hakopa. He did not like the idea of
retreat while he had a shot in his locker, and he
determined to bag something in the way of a
Kupapa or a pakeha with his last charges. He waited
until the leading men of Kepa's party were within
close " potting " distance, and, as one of them unsus-
pectingly approached him, he quickly threw up his
gun and put a bullet into his enemy, then turned and
bounded into cover, and rejoined his comrades in
the defile, unhurt, hugely delighted with his exploit.
276 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
" You young men waste your cartridges," he
i;aid reprovingly, after the fight, to some of the
youthful braves of Ngati-Ruanui. " Look at me !
I know the worth of good powder and lead too
well to fire them away for nothing. For every
cartridge I used I hit a man ! '"
It was a determined, plucky stand, that defence
of the Otautu clearing by Titokowaru's warriors.
Every minute they held out, they knew, was giving
their women and children and old people a better
chance of safety.
At last the fog lifted, swept away from the clear-
ing by the morning breeze, and the sun shone out.
Now for the first time the Government soldiers
saw the village. The bugle sounded the " Ad-
vance " again, and at the double the A.C.'s swarmed
into the empty kainga, to find, to their astonish-
ment, that it was neither rifle-pitted nor parapeted.
The Hauhaus, their resistance broken, took to
the forest, racing down the steep gully in rear of
the village and up along the banks of the Patea.
Kepa's Maoris went in hot pursuit, and shot two
or three of the fugitives. The main body crossed
the Patea safely, and rejoined their womenfolk and
children, camping, hungry, weaiy, and with limbs
and body torn and bruised in their flight, in a well-
hidden nook dee}) in the forest on the north bank
of the river.
CHAPTER XXIV
THE HEAD-HUNTERS
Tlie skirmish at Whakamara — Hauhaus on the run — Govern-
ment head-hunters — Major Kemp's white scout — Sharp work
in the bush — Barbarism of the Whanganui — Kupapas — Smoke-
drying the heads — A present for Whitmore — The heads on
the tent floor — End of the war.
The deep and roadless forest was now the scene of
sharp, barbaric war. The Hauhaus, after the aban-
donment of Tauranga-ika, built no stockades, but
trusted to their most ancient of refuges, the
nehenche-nui, the great woody wilderness. From
one hiding-place to another they fled, with the
Government bush-fighters on their heels.
" After our surprise and defeat at Otautu," to
continue Kimble Bent's narrative, " we were safe
neither night nor day. Even when far in the depths
of the bush we were always on the look-out for
danger, for we never knew when we might have a
sudden volley poured into our midst. Kepa and
his friendlies were continually scouring the country
for us. We retreated north and west through the
forest till we reached a settlement called Whaka-
mara. Two nights we were on the track ; all we
277
278 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
had to eat was a couple of ])otatoes each. At
Whakamara we found many pigs, and were able
to fill our stomachs once more.
" But early one morning the soldiers were on us
again. Two of our men, young Tutange and the
warrior KateneTu-Whakaruru, who were out scout-
ing on horseback, discovered the troops lying in
ambush just outside, waiting to attack the village.
They turned and galloped back to us, Tutange
waving his sword and whacking his horse along
with the flat of the blade.
" So off we went again, running for our lives,
with Whitmore's troops close behind us, firing as
they ran. Titokowaru and all his men fled, after
a very short fight. We took to the bush just like
wild pigs racing before the hunters. I and a few
others kept together, running for all we were worth,
half -naked, foodless, tumbling over logs, scrambling
in and out of creeks, and made no halt until we
found ourselves once more at Rimatoto, my old
home of 1866."
From Whakamara village the Maoris fell back on
a little fortified jm in the rear of the camp. This
position they abandoned after a brief skirmish, and
then the forest chase began. Whitmore ordered an
immediate pursuit, and a flying column of sixty
white Armed Constabulary, under Captains North-
croft and Watt, and about one hundred and forty
Maori Kupapas, under Major Kepa and Captain
A CONSTABULARY OFFICER IN BUSH-
FIGHTING COSTUME.
iFTom a vholo of Colonel T. PorUr's taken in 18G9.
279
THE HEAD-HUNTERS 281
Thomas Porter, all in light marching order, took
to the bush after the retreating enemy.
The advance-guard of the pursuing force num-
bered twenty-five Maoris, about equally divided
between the Whanganui and Arawa tribes. Cap-
tain Porter was the only European officer with
them, but one or two white scouts and bushmen
accompanied the Maoris. As the column's march
was necessarily in single file through thick and
tangled bush, it was difficult to bring a large number
of men into action when any skirmish or ambuscade
occurred, and the consequence was that practically
all the fighting was done by the advance-guard.
It was a picturesquely savage chapter of the war,
that chase of Titokowaru and his scattered Hau-
haus. There was more than a touch of the barbaric
in it, for some of the Government forces reverted
to the primitive war-methods of the Maori himself.
Between the moccasined hero of the war-trail
in Fenimore Cooper's and Captain Mayne Reid's
romances of Red Indian days, and Kepa's Maori
guerilla and some of his white comrades, there was,
after all, only this difference : one took the trail
hunting for scalps, the other for heads !
As mentioned in a previous chapter. Colonel
Whitmore had agreed to a request made by Major
Kepa after the. fighting on the Waitotara, and had
offered rewards of £10 a head for Hauhau chiefs
killed and £5 for ordinary men. Kepa's Kujxijm
282 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
Maoris, recruited from the Whaiiganui, Ngati-Ajia,
Ngati-Raukawa, and other " friendly " tribes — only
friendly to the pakeha by reason of their deadly
animosity to the Taranaki tribes — were little less
savage than the Hauhaiis themselves, and this man-
hunt under the inana of the Government was just
the work that delighted them. They were " stripped
to a gantlin' " for the bush chase — simply a waist-
mat or shawl and cartridge-belts and a pouch for
their percussion-caps. And some of the white
bushmen-scouts were just as eager on the head-
hunting trail, and added to their ser\nce arms a
tomahawk.
With the Whanganui men marched a European
scout and bushman about whom some remarkable
stories are told. This was Tom Adamson, Kepa's
pa keh a -^^ 0.01'}, a big, powerful fellow who surpassed
the ^Maoris themselves in bushcraft and endurance.
He marched barefooted, like his Maori comrades.
Another of the white scouts and Hauhau-hunters
was a man who, in after years, became celebrated
for his pioneer exploration work in the vast wilder-
ness of Milford Sound, an old John-o'-Groat's sailor
and soldier named Donald Sutherland, whose name
has been given to the immense waterfall that is one
of New Zealand's natural wonders.
It was a wild, picturesquely unkempt column,
that little armed force of pakehas and Maoris, as it
filed off under its active and daring young officers
THE HEAD-HUNTERS 283
into the gloomy, (laiiger-haunted woods, the un-
known and trackless forest through which the Patea
and its tributaries flowed. The bush-fighting cos-
tume of many of the whites as well as Maoris was
simple, not to say brigand-like. Officers and men
of the Constabulary and other corps who had to
do much bush-marching discarded the trousers of
civilisation and took to the " garb of old Gaul,"
worn alike by the Scottish Highlander and the
Maori ; this kilt was usually a coloured shawl,
strapped round the waist and falling to the knee.
Through the huge and tangled woods they
scrambled — hunters and hunted. Now along some
narrow trail, hardly discernible to the untrained
eye ; now crawling through networks of supple-
jacks and brambly shrubs and great snaky lianes
that looped tree to tree in bewildering coiled in-
tricacies. Down into steep and narrow water-
courses, swinging down one after another by the
hanging vines and tough tree-creepers ; up rocky
gorges and jungle-clad cliffs. For endless miles
upon miles the great solemn woods covered the
face of the rugged land ; beneath the shadows of
the thick, dark foliage loped the blood-avengers.
In the afternoon of the first day of the chase
the column descended into a deep, thickly wooded
gorge. Suddenly from both sides a fire was opened
upon the centre of the force, the main body of the
A.C.'s. " Clear the bush ! " was the order. The
284 THb: ADVENTURERS OF KIMBLE BENT
advance-guard and A.C.'s quickly circled round and
enfiladed the enemy, who bolted like lied Indians
through the thickets ; and the chase went on.
Three Hauhaus were shot and decapitated on the
first day of the chase. Every man killed, in fact, on
this and the succeeding days of the ])ursuit had his
head cut off.
The first Maori decapitated was a young chief,
who was shot while in the act of climbing a steep
cliff in the bush. Being a rangatira, his was a
£10 head. This man was a prominent Hauliau
named Matangi-o-Rupe. He belonged to Titoko-
waru's own immediate clan, or hapu, Ngati-Manu-
hiakai — " The Tribe of the Hungry Bird." It was
a Ngati-Raukawa soldier in Kepa's contingent who
took off the Hauhau's head \\\\\\ his tomahawk ;
later he duly delivered it at the pakeha camp.
Matangi's son, Kuku — now living at the village of
Taiporohenui — on learning of his father's fate, swore
to have 2itu — revenge — and vowed to Bent that if
he ever encountered the man who beheaded his
parent, he would " slice him to pieces like a piece
of beef."
Some years after the war. Bent, while on a visit
to a Maori settlement at Oroua, in the Manawatu
district, met this Ngati-Raukawa head-hunter — " an
ugly, tattooed old villain," as he describes him.
The pakeha, by way of imparting an interesting bit
of news, informed the old warrior of Kuku's threat,
THE HEAD-HUNTERS 285
but the tattooed veteran only smiled. The days
of the lex kdionis were over. That idii account has
not been squared ; but only because of the incon-
veniently peaceful rule of the ]mkeha. Kuku has
by no means forgotten or forgiven the man who
sold his father's head to the white man.
Later on in the bush chase the advance-guard,
hurrying along at the double, came upon a Hauhau
family^ — a grey-haired, middle-aged man, his wife,
and two or three children. They had not been able
to travel so fast as their friends, on account of the
tired children, and so had been left behind. The
old warrior was fired on by one of the Arawa Maoris,
and was severely wounded. He fell, but struggled
to a squatting position, with his empty gun across
his knees. The Arawa rushed at him, with toma-
hawk raised, to finish him off. The old Hauhau
sprang up with a great effort, gripping his toma-
hawk. He was too badly wounded, however, to
strike a blow, and the Arawa seized him and his
tomahawk. Just at that moment a white man,
dressed like a Maori in a waist-shawl, and bare-
footed, rushed up, tomahawk in hand. He seized
the Hauhau by the hair, and, with a couple of
furious strokes, chopped off his dead, and dropped
it, all bloody as it was, into the flax kit he carried
slung at his back, and in which there were already
other heads.
The Arawa by no means liked being done out
286 THE ADVENTURES OF KIIMBLE BENT
of what he considered A\as liis liead, seeing that
he had captured the Hauhau, and lliere was a
savage squabble between the two as to its owner-
ship. The white man " bhiffed " the Maori out of
it, however, and prepared to add the heads of the
rest of the family to his collection. He rushed at
the weeping unhine and her children, and their
heads would have come off also had not Captain
Porter, fortunately for them, just come up. The
poor, terrified woman clung to his knees, beseeching
him to save her and her children. He told them
they would be safe, and ordered the white scout
forward. The Arawas took charge of the widow
and her children, and she was sent to Rotorua when
the campaign was over.
The Whanganui Kupapas were fully as savage as
any wild rebel. No quarter was given to any
Hauhau warrior, and no Hauhau thought of asking
for any mercy. Of one frightful scene Porter was
an eye-witness. After killing and beheading two
or three men in a little valley in the forest, the
Whanganui Maoris tied flax ropes to their ankles
and hung them up to the branches of the trees,
eviscerated them and thrust sticks into them to
keep them open, just like animals in a slaughter-
yard. Then they danced round the bodies like
fiends, flourishing the tattooed heads of the dead
by their long hair and shouting and yelling war-
songs, and making the hideous grimaces of the
THE HEAD-HUNTERS 287
'pukana. They were quite beyond control, mad
with the hist of killing.
Porter at last managed to put a stop to this
mutilation, but he was powerless to prevent the
head-taking, except so far as his own men were
concerned. He did not allow any Arawas to de-
capitate an enemy, much as some of the warriors
from the Hot Lakes Country would have liked to.
He asked the Whanganui natives to bury the heads,
and, if necessary, take only the ears with them if
they wished to claim Whitmore's reward. But the
warriors answered, " No, Witimoa said 'heads,'
and if he doesn't get the heads he may not pay us."
The pursuit of the Hauhaus continued for several
days, until Titokowaru's warriors finally scattered
in the dense forest, and the pursuers had exhausted
their food. It was then determined to make for
the coast again, but owing to the density of the
bush the Government men lost their bearings.
They were far in the tangled, jungly forest, without
a guide, for they had killed their prisoners. The
column accordingly divided, each division march-
ing independently for the open country, food, and
tented camps.
The night before the divisions of the pursuing
column separated, Major Kepa ordered one of his
tohungas, a wild-looking, tattooed old warrior,
learned in all the savage arts of Maoridom, to
whakapakoko nga upoko, that is, to dry or preserve
288 THE ADVENTURES OF KTMBLE BENT
the heads of the skiiii Hauhaus. Porter and the
other Europeans in the Maori contingents now for
the first time witnessed the ancient process of smoke-
drying human heads. The heads had up to this
time been carried in flax kits on men's shoulders
through the bush, and it was necessary, if they were
to be taken out to the camp, that they should be
preserved from decay.
The old medicine-man went into the bush and
returned with armfuls of branches of the mahoe-trco,
and made a fire, which he kept burning until all the
wood was reduced to glowing embers. The earth
was heaped up around this fire, and the head, neck
downwards, was placed over it, and all openings at
the sides were closed, so that the fumes from the
charcoal oven would pass up into the head. The
brains had previously been removed and the eyes
stuffed u]). As the smoking went on, the old man
smoothed down the skin of the face ^^ith his
hands to prevent it wrinkling and wi])od off the
moisture, until the head was thoroiiglily smoke-
dried and quite mummified. For several hours the
head-smoking went on, and in the morning the
trophies of the chase were packed for the final
march.
Half-starved, ragged and weary, the Constabulaiy
and their Maori allies at last reached the open
country ; from the top of the range of wooded hills
they had seen the white tents of Colonel AMiilmore's
THE HEAD-HUNTERS 289
head-quarters at Taiporohenui. That evening they
were in camp, and there they enjoyed the first
square meal they had had for days. Kepa and
Porter and their contingents had been nine days in
the bush.
Captain Porter went to Colonel Whitmore's
quarters as soon as he arrived, and reported the
result of his expedition. While he was giving the
commanding officer an account of the forest chase,
the Whanganui men who had taken the Hauhau
heads came up in a body and opened the tent door,
and poured in head after head upon the ground,
exclaiming as they did so, " Na, Witimoa, to iipoko ! "
("There, Whitmore, your heads ! ")
The little colonel was thunderstruck. He stared
with consternation in his eyes on the ghastly heads,
most of them tattooed, with grinning teeth and
long blood-stained hair, strewn about the floor
where they had rolled. There were eleven of them,
some at the colonel's feet, some beneath the table ;
some had rolled under the camp bedstead.
He had forgotten all about his promise of a re-
ward for heads. Anyhow, he now told the Maoris,
he did not mean that the heads should actually bo
brought in to him in camp, but that a reward would
be paid for each Hauhau killed in the pursuit. But
he kept his word to Kepa, and each head was paid
for.
The white scouts, too, brought in their kits of
19
290 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
heads, and received their blood-money. These and
certain other Taranaki heads broiiglit in were not
personally delivered, but were all ])aid for, mostly
in orders for clothes, boots, and other necessaries.
" No more heads," was the colonel's order. He
realised that this barbarous fashion of squaring
affairs with the enemy would arouse a how 1 of con-
demnation from those who did not understand the
sharp and savage necessities of frontier-fighting.
These facts may not please the mild or gentle
variety of reader. The idea of a New Zealand
Government force decapitating its enemies and
smoke-drying those heads for purposes of reward is
too, too savage for the refined humanitarian to
contemplate without a shudder. Nevertheless, these
are facts. Many an ugly incident happened in the
bush-fighting of those days. It was no kid-glove
warfare. In this case the Government Maoris were
inflamed by anger and revenge, and indeed some
of them were little better than the cannibals they
were chasing. And they were wild with a desire
to Tigaki mate, that is, to seek vengeance, payment,
for their dead — blood for blood.
But while it was barbarous, it was thoroughly in
accord with the spirit of guerilla warfare that was
forced upon the troops, and it served its purpose,
for it struck terror into the hearts of Titokowaru's
warriors, and they never fought again.
THE HEAD-HUm^ERS 291
The Hauhau war-chief's mana-tapuwsis gone, and
there was nothing for it but to fly to the depths of
the wilderness. He and his men gathered in a few
days at Rimatoto, but made a very short stay there.
They marched through the forest to the island-
fastness in the Ngaere swamp, where they were very
nearly caught by Whit more and his Constabulary,
who made a rough tete-de-pont over the quaking
morass with hurdles of supplejack and bush-vines.
Then they made off for the Ngatimaru Country, on
the upper waters of the Waitara, thirty or forty
miles away, over terribly rough country and through
an almost trackless forest.
" A party of forty or fifty of us," says Bent,
" remained in our little settlement at Rimatoto,
always on the alert against surprise by the troops,
until the anxiety of our position became too much
for us. We packed up our belongings, and s wagged
them inland to Rukumoana, on the Patea River.
In this lonely spot, far in the bush, we camped, and
made a little clearing in order to plant food. When
we had felled the bush with our axes, twenty men
travelled across to the Upper Waitara to procure
seed potatoes from their friends, and we planted
our crops and waited."
In this remote valley of refuge, far in the forest,
the white runaway and his Hauhau companions —
he was still with his chief Rupe — remained for many
weeks, living the loneliest life conceivable, hearing
292 THE ADVENTURES OF K'MBLE BENT
nothing of the outside world, and existing pre-
cariously on the foods of the forest.
Titokowaru was safe in his bush retreat in the
Ngatimaru Country, his last battle fought, his once
godlike mami in the dust.
CHAPTER XXV
THE LAND OF REFUGE
The fliglit from Rukumoana — Retreat to the VVaitara — The
Kawau pa — Life in the Ngatimaru Country — Rupe and his
white man — A Maori Donnybrook fair — A tale of a Taniwha.
One day two Hauhaus, exhausted and half-starved,
entered the little bush-camp at Rukumoana. One
of them was Bent's old rcmgaiira, Tito te Hanataua.
They ha^d passed through many perils and hair-
breadth escapes, and they warned the white man
and his Maori comrades that Kepa te Rangihiwinui
and his Whanganui Maori scouts were still hunting
for them, and would have their heads to a certainty
should they happen on the trail to the refuge place.
The old feeling of terror came over Bent and his
companions at the mention of Kepa's name. That
night Hauhau piquets kept watch on the edge of
the clearing, and more than once they imagined
they heard stealthy footfalls, the breaking of
branches, and the whispers of enemies in the woods.
These dangers, however, were things of the imagina-
tion. Nevertheless, it was an anxious night in the
lonely kainga, and when morning came the people
293
294 THE ADVENTURES OE KEMBLE BENT
decided to abandon their camp and bury themselves
still deeper in the wilderness.
In a very short time the men and women of the
settlement were on the march, laden with their
flax pihius, containing such belongings as they
thought worth removing. They took to the forest
in a due northerly direction ; bound for that
Alsatia of rebels and Hauhaus, the remote and
rugged Ngati-Maru Country, up on the head-waters
of the Waitara — Titokowaru's hiding-place.
The utmost caution was observed on the march.
No fires were lighted. 80 that there should be no
clue to the direction of the flight, care was taken
to leave no broken branches or other bushmen's
signs ; not a leaf was tiu'ned or a twig displaced if
the refugees could help it mitil they were well into
the ranges. Wherever possible they took to the
creek-beds and walked in the running water, so
that no trail should betray them. They could have
spared themselves that anxiety and trouble, however,
for the Government troo])s liad at hist abandoned
the chase.
Two days Bent and liis friends s})ent on that
tenible trail — the roughest, wildest part of the
Taranaki hinterland. Fording rivers, pushing
througli matted jungles, climbing wooded precipices,
lowering their swags down ])cr])cn(licuhir clilTs, and
swinging themselves <h)\vn l)y forest vines and
creepers — they emerged at last, a weary little band,
THE LAND OF REFUGE 295
on the banks of the Waitara, about thirty miles
from the mouth of that river. All around towered
the densely forested blue ranges ; the high banks of
the winding Waitara fell precipitously to its rapid-
whitened waters.
On the cliff-top where they left the forest there
was a little Maori camp. Here the fugitives were
ordered to the main Hauhau camp, the Kawau pa,
where Titokowaru and his followers had established
themselves, weary of war, but nevertheless resolute
to die " fighting like the shark," as the Maori has
it, if attacked in their last hiding-place.
The Kawau 'pa stood in an admirable position for
defence, in a great bend of the Waitara River. The
winding rapid river here swept round a long tongue
of steep-banked level land, protecting it on three
sides ; in the rear was the dense forest. The banks
of the river were from twenty to thirty feet high,
and could be climbed only in a few places. On
this high tongue of land, about a quarter of a mile
long, there stood a large village of well-built raupo
and nikau thatched houses ; between the village
and the forest were the cultivations of potatoes,
kumara, and taro. On the opposite side of the river,
in the direction of the Taramouku Range, wild
horses and cattle abounded in the bush. A short
distance below the village there was a large pa-tuna,
or eel-weir, consisting of two rows of stout ma^iuka
stakes set closely together and sunk into the river-
296 THK ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
bed and converging in a V, at the lower end of
which hinaki, or eel-baskets, were set for the pur-
pose of catching the piharau, or lamprey, which
abounded in the Waitara, and an hich were a great
Maori delicacy.
As Rupe and his pakelia Bent and their com-
panions marched slowly into the 7narae of the war-
chief's camp, their eyes on the ground, they were
welcomed with the ancient ceremony of the powhiri.
The village women and girls waved green branches
and shawls as they retired before them, singing all
together the famous old greeting song, " Toia Mai
te Waka ! " (" Oh, haul up the canoe ! ") likening the
guests to a canoe-party of visitors arriving from a
distant shore.
Then as the women fell back the A\hole force of
Titoko's warriors leaped to their feet, and swinging
their firearms this way and that, threw themselves
with martial fury into all the thrilling action of the
war-dance. The ground shook undei- llie mighty
tread of many scores of brown feet, and the forest
rang with the chorus of the war-song and the re-
verberating volleys of many guns. And then, when
the dance wa;; ended, the hotKji of long-sev^ered
friends, the pressing of nose to nose, and the pitiful
weeping for the dead. For quite two hours the
great tanfji lasted. When it ceased one of the head-
men of the rivcr-triljes sent the new aiiivals to his
own camp, close by the Kawau ; the village women
THE LAND OF REFUGE 297
came in procession, to the lilt of the tuku-kai song,
bearing their baskets of food, steaming hot from
the liangi, and the half-starved white man and
his friends were soon enjoying a bountiful feast
after their long-enforced existence upon the meagre
rations of the bush.
Kimble Bent lived in this securely hidden place
of refuge, and at Paihau village, near by, from the
end of 1869 until about 1876. He was now a
Maori in all his ways ; he planted food-crops and
harvested them, snared birds, fished for eels, cut
out canoes, and paddled his canoe on the river,
joined the Hauhaus in their songs and their
sacred chants, and danced with them in their
hakas ; he wore as little clothing as any native in
the camp.
Life did not go too easily with the white man
during those days on the Waitara. He was still
Rupe's bond-servant ; and his master and owner
sometimes took fits of ungovernable passion. In
one of these paroxysms of anger Bent had a
narrow escape.
Rupe one day ordered his white man to go down
to a creek, which ran into the Waitara near the
Paihau pa, and clear out the little dam in which the
household were accustomed to steep their Indian
corn, their kaanga-pirau. Bent was working away
cleaning out the steeping-pool when his chief came
298 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
up and found fault with him because he was not
working hard enough. " I made him some answer
wliich didn't please him," says Bent, "whereupon
he flew into a terrible rage and rushed at me like a
tiger. I stooped and caught him by the leg, and he
fell into the muddy pool. Up he jumped in a
foaming passion, and ran to the ixi, got out his gun,
and loaded it to shoot me. But his wife rushed at
him, took the gun out of his hands, and told me to
hurry down to the other village, where I would be
safe. 80 I ran to the river-bank, loosed a small
canoe, and paddled down the river to the lower
IKi, where I was kindly received and taken into my
old friend Hakopa's house, and I lived and worked
there for some months."
Another incident of those wild old days on the
Waitara, narrated by Bent, is worth the telling, as
an illustration of the whimsically variable temper
of the Maori and of his truly Hibernian love of a
"free fight."
The war had long been over, and some hapus of
the tribes on the upper river talked of selling their
lands to the whites. Certain of the chiefs had
been down at Waitara townshi}) and in New Ply-
mouth, and there they had been a})])r()ache(l by the
agents of the Government. In the end they sold
their lands for eighteenpence an acre. But the
more conservative of the Hauhaus stoutly held out
against land-selling, and against any dealings with
THE LAND OF REFUGE 299
the hated pakeha ; and the difference of opinion
led to frequent quarrels.
One day a council of the people was held on the
marae of the Paihau village for the purpose of dis-
cussing the land-selling proposals. Long and bitter
were the speeches ; speaker after speaker taki'd up
and down the tmirae, and worked himself up into a
fury of excitement.
Two old chiefs, tattooed veterans of the war,
their long hair adorned with feathers, weapons of
wood and stone in their hands, angrily assailed
each other. One was Rupe, the other was Horo-
papera Matangi. One advocated the sale of sur-
plus lands, the other vigorously opposed it, and
insisted on the principle of " Maori land for Maori
men." Then there arose a dispute about the owner-
ship of a tangiivai (greenstone pendant). From
argument they came to hurling abusive threats at
each other.
At last Rupe furiously hurled his weapon — a
sharp wooden spear — at Horopapera, who dodged
it, and cleverly caught it near the butt end as it
whistled past him. He instantly smartly returned
it to its owner, spearing him through the leg.
Next two women went at it. Women of rank
these, who considered themselves entitled to equal
debating voice with the men -folk. Their powers of
rhetoric and invective exhausted, they fell on each
other very literally "tooth and nail," biting, hair-
300 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
pulling, scratching, screaming. In their struggle
they tore each other's clothes off, and two nude
Amazons raged round the marae.
One of the wild women, a young chieftainess, her
long hair streaming behind her, her pendant breasts
quivering, her shoulders bleeding, seized a canoe
paddle and struck her antagonist a blow across the
naked back with it. The other grabbed a tokotoko,
or walking-staff, and, thrusting it between her op-
ponent's legs, neatly up-ended her, in the " alto-
gether," on the green marae.
By this time the whole tribe were into the battle,
with sticks, paddles, spears, and any weapon they
could lay their hands on — men and women alike.
It was a real faction fight. Fortunately, the people
had left their guns in their whares, and were too
intent upon their hand-to-hand encounter to run
for their firearms.
Kimble Bent stood on one side watching the
squabble. He was close to the riv^er-bank, where
the canoes were tied u]). Pi'esently, one of the
Maoris ran down to the water-side with an axe, and
began furiously cutting away at his antagonists'
canoes. Others ran to the cooking Junigis, and with
burning sticks from the ovens set fire to some of the
thatched houses in the kainga. Soon there was a
pretty blaze, and half the village was burned down
in a few minutes.
In half an hour's time the people had cooled down,
THE LAND OF REFUGE 301
and the trouble was over. Then — a Hibernian
people the Maoris, surely ! — they began to weep
over their quarrel, and fell on each other's necks —
or, rather, pressed each other's noses — to make up
for the hard words and blows they had just ex-
changed, and set to work to rebuild the dwellings
they had destroyed in their hasty anger.
Meanwhile, Titokowaru wearied for the trail
again, unable to rest in this secluded wilderness of
the Waitara. His tapu status had been restored
by a Waitara priest, with the appropriate karakias
and invocations. Gathering together a band of his
warriors — the remnant of the once ever- victorious
Tekau-ma-rua — he paraded them in the marae of
the Kawau pa, and farewelling his people, took his
old place at the head of the taua and led them off
in a grand war-dance, A truly savage figure, that
stern old chief, as he leaped to the van of his war-
party and danced, his sacred taiaha in the air ; his
waist girt with a coloured shawl, a rich feather cape
of native make fastened over the left shoulder and
under the right ; his grizzled head decked with
white plumes. And with loud cries of " Haere, ra !
Haere ra ! " the villagers farewelled the great war-
chief as he marched his armed men out of the pa
and struck into the forest of the Taramouku, bound
for the open lands of South Taranaki and his an-
cestral home. But it was no longer the war-trail,
302 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
for Titoko and his henchmen fought no more, but
betook themselves to the great camp of Te Wliiti
the Prophet, who preached peace, and prophesied
sundry supernatural ways by which the Maori would
come into his own again.
The minds of these isolated forest-dwellers were
saturated with superstition, with strange beliefs that
were a reflex of the vast untrimmed places of
nature in which they lived. Tlie white man, too,
almost came to believe in the tales of saurian-like
tannvhas and water-demons, in the p(itu]xiiarehe
and maero, the forest-fairies and forest-giants, in
the occult malevolence of the tajm and makutu
spells.
A story related by Bent is illustrative of the
Maori belief, up to quite modern days, in malignant
beings which made their homes in lonely waters and
in caves — the dreaded taniwha.
The tale of the " Taniirha " oj the Kopna :
One day — this was in the early " seventies " — an
old man named Te Maire left the Kawau landing
in his canoe, and paddled down the Waitara to a
place called Te Kopua, the site of an ancient village.
The object of his expedition was to procure dry
resinous strips of the rmw-pine for the purpose of
making torches to be used in catching piharau
THE LAND OF REFUGE 303
(lampreys) in the river at night. After getting the
wood he required he started on the return paddle
to his home. On the way to the Kawau he disap-
peared, and was never seen again alive ; no doubt
he overbalanced and fell into the river while poling
his canoe up one of the small rapids near the
Kopua.
That afternoon five men from the Kawau, includ-
ing Kimble Bent, were paddling their canoe down
the river to a settlement a few miles distant, when
they caught sight of the old man's empty canoe
drifting down with the swift current. As they ap-
proached it it sped away rapidly before them, and
at last stranded on a shingle-bank in a bend of the
river. In it they found Te Maire's gun and a young
pig, which the vanished man had evidently caught
in the bush while on his torch-making expedition.
Bent's Maori companions immediately explained
in their own way the mystery of their tribesman's
disappearance.
" There is a tcmkvha there," they said, " a fearful
water-monster that dwells in a deep, still pool
under Te Kopua's banks. He has stretched forth
his long claws and dragged the old fellow down to
his den."
The Maori canoeists made haste to quit the dead
man's craft, and plied their paddles with unusual
energy until they reached their destination on the
shore below. They told their story, and that even-
304 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
ing a meeting of the village people was held in the
wharepuni to discuss the mystery.
For hours the wiseacres of the bush-hamlet
solemnly debated the circumstances, and each
canoeist in turn had to give his account of the affair
and advance his theory. At last it was decided
that there was no possible doubt that the taniwha
of the river had seized Te Maire and drowned him.
There must, of course, be a reason, for no taniwha
of any repute would take such an extreme step
without some good cause.
The verdict was that Te Maire had violated the
tapv, of the deserted village ; he had in all probability
taken some dry rimu from an old house that stood
there, and which was sacred because a chief had
died in it- — goodness knows how long ago. The
river-god had very properly punished him with
death — it was the penalty of infringing the law of
tapu.
The next day and for some days thereafter canoe
crews hunted the river for the old man's body, but
found it not. At last a woman at the lower settle-
ment, on going down to the river one morning to
get a calabash of water, spied the body of the miss-
ing man hanging in the branches of a prostrate
kahikatea-iroe on the opposite side of the river,
about four feet above the water.
The question was, how did the bod)^ get there,
entangled in the branches that height above the
THE LAND OF REFUGE 305
liver, for there had been no flood, no noticeable rise
or fall in the level of the river.
The answer was plain to the mind of the Maori.
He summed it all up in two words :
" Te taniivha ! "
The river-monster, after grabbing Te Maire from
his canoe and detaining him a while in his watery
grave, had dragged the body away down-stream
and hung it up in the tree-branches opposite the
village, so that the dead man's people should have
no difficulty in recovering it, and in giving it decent
burial.
A truly thoughtful and considerate taniwTui !
20
CKAl'TKR XXVI
BUSH LIFE ON THE TATEA
The return to Riikunioana — The forest-village — Bird-snaring
and bird-spearing — BtMit the canoe-bviilder — His third wife.
At last — about the year 1876 — the Upper Waitara
was Kold to the Government. T}ie wliite man and
his Maori people cried their farewells to Ngati-Maru
and journeyed back over the ranges and through
the forests to their old lands in the valley of the
Patea. Bent was still Rupe's servant. The old
chief and his household and some Hauhau relatives,
armed, and carrying their belongings on their backs,
trudged through the wilderness until they reached
l^ukumoana, their old-time shelter-camp on the
banks of the Patea, about thirty miles from tlie
sea. Here they halted and built their hamlet of
saplings and thatch, and an old overgrown clearing
was burnt oft' and planted with potatoes and maize.
The party was but a small one. Besides Bent,
there were Rupe, his wife, and their two sons ; old
Hakopa and his wife ; and their niece, a gii'l named
Te Hau-rutu-wai ("The Breeze that shakes the
Raindrops down").
30G
BUSH LIFE ON THE PATEA :^07
It was an even lonelier w])()t than the refuge-
camp in the Ngati-Maru country ; life here was
simple and primitive in the extreme. The people
tended their little plots of food-crops, shadowed by
the dark forest ; they snared and speared the forest
birds, they hunted the wild pig, and climbed the
hollow trees for wild honey. For nearly two years
the fakeha-MsiOvi lived with his little tribe in Ruka-
moana.
The ancient customs of the Maori fowler's cidt
were observed by these bush-dwellers, brown and
white. For instance, the first kaka parrot or tui
or other forest creature snared or speared in a day's
birding was not eaten, but was left, as an offering
to the gods of the forest, beside an old tapu canoe
which was lying in the bush close to the river-bank.
It was a hoary relic, this ancient waka-kipu, a
carved dug-out covered with long grey moss. It
was a small canoe, eight or ten feet long, and had
lain there for years and years filled with water.
Somewhat similar canoe-shaped troughs, filled with
water, stood in various places in the forest ; these
were filled with water, and were generally placed
in spots remote from streams or pools. Above
them slip-knot snares were arranged, so that the
pigeons and tui and other birds, flying down to
quench their thirst after feeding on the miro or
hinau or iawa berries, were caught in the nooses,
and hung there, flapping and helpless, until the
308 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
fowlers went round to collect the day's bag. This
canoe was called a iraka-whangai, or wai-tuhi.
When spearing birds with the long barbed spear
of taiva-wood, the hunter would take great care to
avoid getting any blood on his hands in withdraw-
ing the weapon from the bird's body. .Should
blood stain the hands — " kaore e mana te tao " — the
spear would lose its bird-killing powers ; it would be
an unlucky affair altogether, and the forest-man
might as well throw it away. Such were the beliefs
of the dwellers in those dim forest-places.
At the end of the first harvest season Rupe led
his white man ovit into the forest one day, and,
halting before a tall, straight totom-pine that grew
near the steep bank of the Patea, he said :
" This is my canoe ! Hew it down and carve it
out ! In it we will paddle down the river to Huka-
tere, and you shall look upon the faces of your
ieWow-qxikehas again."
So now behold Bent the canoe-builder. There
above him towered the tree — Tane the Forest-god
personified. In his hand was his broad-axe ; with
it he must make his rungatini' s river-boat.
He felled the tree, and, lopping off the upper part,
began the laborious work of dubbing out the waka.
The upper side of the trunk he levelled off with his
axe, and then he gradually cut it into hollowed
shape, an art he had learned on the Waitara. For
this portion of the work an adze was chiefly used,
BUSH LIFE ON TUK PATE A 3(>9
a steel blade lashed to a wooden handle in the old
Maori fashion. He trimmed and shaped the ends
into bow and stern, and day by day the canoe
assumed more shapely proportions, until at last it
lay complete — a craft of about twenty-five feet in
length and three feet in beam, rough and undecor-
ated, it is true, but still a ship of the Maori, fit to
carry cargo and paddlers, and run the rapids of the
swift and broken Patea. Ropes were made of stout
supplejack vines, and with Rupe and his family
the white man lowered the canoe down the high
bank to the water-edge. Te Riu-o-Tane lay ready
for its crew — -the Hollow Trunk of Tane.
Then paddles were shaped out, and Bent and his
companions set to work catching and drying eels
and gathering wild honey, in preparation for the
voyage down the river to Hukatere village, where
the main body of Rupe's tribe resided.
About this time the white man entered upon his
third matrimonial experience. His chief's grand-
daughter, a good-looking girl of about eighteen,
came to the little village with a visiting party of
Ngati-Ruanui. She had already a husband, but
he had quarrelled with her, and attempted to kill
her ; she, therefore, returned to her old tupuna,
Rupe, who now gave her to Bent ; and the white
man and his young Maori wife lived happily there
in well-hidden Rukumoana.*
* This name Rukumoana originated thus, according to the
310 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
Maoris : About the year 1830 a war-party from tlic Waikato
attacked and slauglitered a number of Taranaki people here.
One of the Taranakis savod his own life and that of his brother
in a remarkable manner. Tliesc two men were cousins of
Hakopa, the old warrior who befriended Kimble Bent in Te
Ngutu-o-te-Manu pa in 18G8, and later on the Waitara. One
of the men was wounded, and in another moment his head
would have been slashed off by a Waikato savage, but his
brother seized him in his arms, and leaped over the steep bank
of the Patea into the river below. He dived to the bottom, and
still holding his brother, crawled along the bottom until he
reached a place imder the banks where the overhanging shrubs
concealed them from view. The pursuers failed to find the
brothers, who presently escaped to the forest. The Taranaki
people commemorated this heroic deed by naming the spot
where Hakopa's cousin took his daring leap " Ruku-moana "
(" Deep-Sea Diving ").
CHAPTER XXVII
HIROKI : THE STORY OF A FUGITIVE
Hiroki, tlie slayer of IMcLean — Strange faces at Rukumoana
— A forest chase — A meeting and a warning — Hiroki's wild
bush life and his end.
More than one outlaw from the white country out-
side took refuge in the Taranaki bush even in those
'post-bellum days. One of these was Hiroki, the
Maori who killed McLean. Hiroki ("The Lean One" )
had quarrelled with a survey-party who had camped
on his land away out near the coast in the year
1878 ; the cause of the trouble, as he said, was
the killing of his pigs by McLean, who was the sur-
veyor's cook. Hiroki remonstrated with the
pakehas, but they jeered at him ; and when his last
pig had disappeared he sat down and wept, then
loaded his gun, went to the survey camp, and shot
McLean dead. Wherefore he was a hunted man,
with a price on his head.
One day, as the jjakeha-Maori (Kimble Bent) and
his Maori companions were sitting smoking in their
lonely little bush-village at Rukumoana, far up the
Patea River, they heard a loud hail across the river.
311
312 THE ADVENT UK E8 OF KIMBLE BENT
They looked at each other in astonishment and a
little alarm, for they imagined that no one knew
their hiding-place. Bent went to his hut, and load-
ing a revolver, put it in his belt, tlicn walked over
to the river-bank. On the other side of the stream
there were six natives standing. They called to
Bent to bring a canoe over and ferry them across.
Bent, always on the qui vive for danger, was
dubious about the wisdom of trusting himself alone
with a party of strangers, who, for all he knew,
might be after his head, for he was still an outlaw.
But he dropped into his canoe, and with a few strong
strokes sent the dugout across the river. He knelt
in his canoe, holding her nose into the bank, and
interrogated the strange Maoris. The leader was
a tall young half-caste. They Mere all armed with
revolvers, and one or two had tomahawks stuck in
their belts.
" Where do you come from, and what do you
want here ? " asked the white man.
" We have come seeking a man who has com-
mitted a crime," replied the half-caste, speaking, as
Bent had done, in Maori.
Bent shoved the canoe a stroke off from the bank
and said determinedly, with a hand on his revolver :
" If you have come to capture me I will not be
taken ; I will spill the blood of the first man who
attempts it. I will kill my enemy first and then
kill myself." (" Ka maringi i ahau te toto a te tangata
HIROKI: THE STORY OF A FUGITIVE 313
tvxitahi. Ka mate taku hoariri nei, maku e whakamate
toku tinana.'")
" It's all right, friend, we don't want you," said
the half-caste ; " we are looking for a Maori called
Hiroki, who has murdered a surveyor's cook, named
McLean, out yonder on the plains. We have traced
him up here, and we want to know where he is,
because there is a price on his head, and we are
Government Maoris."
" Come along, then ; I'll take you across," said
Bent. The strangers stepped into the canoe, and
the white man paddled them over the Patea ; then
took them up to the village and into Hakopa's
house.
To the old chief and his Maori companions the
half-caste explained the mission that had brought
his party to lonely Rukumoana.
" We have not seen your man Hiroki," said
Hakopa. ' ' He may have swum the river and passed
through here by night. Who knows ? If he has
passed this way he has no doubt gone to Te Ngaere,
which is a very difficult place to reach and a good
refuge-place for men like Hiroki."
" We do not know the trail to Te Ngaere,"
said the half-caste. " Will any of you guide us
there ? "
Bent offered to go as guide, saying he knew the
track to Ngaere very well and had frequently been
there in the war-days. "But," he asked, "will
314 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
you guarantee my safety if I trust myself with
you ? How do I know that you will not cut my
head off when you get me out alone in the bush,
and take it out to get the Government reward ? "
The half-caste laughed. " You're quite safe,
pakeha. Not a man of us will touch you. I tell
you we only want Hiroki."
A young man named Pakanga, of the Ngati-
Maniapoto tribe from the King Country, happened
to be in the village on a visit to the forest-dwellers.
He was sitting alongside Bent, " Friend," he said
quietly, " I will go with you, and see that they don't
attack you treacherously."
So Bent agreed to go as guide, and, after a meal
of pork and potatoes, set before them by the women
of the kainga, the armed party of man-hunters set
out along the lush-track leading in the direction
of the swamp-defended Ngaere, the place where
Colonel Whitmore and his force of Colonial soldiers
just failed in surprising and capturing Titokowaru
in the last days of the war in 1869.
Bent leading, the party filed along the narrow
overgrown trail until they were close to the banks
of a small stream, the Mangamingi. A little dis-
tance back from the creek the white man asked his
companions to halt, saying that he and Pakanga
would go on to reconnoitre.
The half-caste and his five men sat down and lit
their pipes, and Bent and the King Ccuntry Maori
HIROKI: THE STORY OF A FUGITIVE 315
went off cautiously, saying one of them would
come back at once if they caught sight of the fugi-
tive.
The wliite man and liis friend liad gone only a
short distance when they came upon a fire burning
just alongside the track, in an old camping-place
beneath the shade of a giant totara-tree, whose great
branches overhung the little dark river that flowed
close by. A few roasted potatoes, still warm, lay
alongside the fii'e. Evidently it had been deserted
only a few minutes.
"Now," said Bent to his companion, "let us
settle quickly how we shall act. Hiroki — for it can
be no one else — must be close by ; he must have
only just left this spot. Shall we betray him to
the Government, or shall we let him escape ? He
had a just grievance against the man whom he shot.
We have heard all about it, and we know that he
was a peaceable man, who was provoked into a fit
of passion. He is a lonely and a hunted man, and
for me my sympathies are with him, for is he not
a fugitive like myself ? "
" E tika ana," said the young King Country
Maori. " That's right. We won't give him up to
the Government head-hunters."
" Let me tell you now, friend," said Bent, " that
I have had suspicions for some days that Hiroki
has been in hiding near our village. One morning
lately, when I went to look in my pataka (store-
;}16 THE ADVENTURES ()E KLMJiJJ-: BENT
house) across the river, where I keep my seed-
potatoes for the new season's planting, I found that
some of them had been taken. Then half a mile
up the river the next day I saw a ])Iac(' where some
stranger had been fishing for eels, for there were
heads of the eels lying there where he had cut
them off. There was a fire there, and some of my
seed -potatoes had been roasted in it. I told old
Hakopa and no one else about it."
The two men descended the bank to the river.
Just where the track entered the slow-moving,
muddy stream they saw the fresh prints of naked
feet. Wading across, they quickly mounted the
opposite bank and set out at a noiseless, easy lope,
their bare feet making hardly a sound, along the
trail that wound into the glooms of the bush.
Suddenly, at a turn in the track, they came upon
Hiroki.
The fugitive was standing there, waiting, for the
low growling of his dog, a white, savage-looking
animal, had given him warning of pursuit. The
hunted man menacingly presented a short-barrelled
gun at the pakeha and his companion. He was a
fellow of middle stature, lean, as his name implied,
but strong and hard-limbed, with a dark deter-
mined face and a short black beard.
'' Where are you going ? " cried Hiroki.
"Oh, nowhere in particular," Bent replied ;
"just strolling along " (" ki te haereere ").
HIROKI : THE STORY OF A FUGITIVE 317
The Maori looked puzzled and suspicious, and
kept his gun at the ready.
" Listen to me, friend," said Bent quickly ; " you
are in danger. There are six Government Maoris
close behind you, and they want you dead or alive.
Now, go on, and go quickly. And don't venture
hack, lest you die ! "
"' Ka pai koe ! " ("You are good!") was all
Hiroki said. Turning, he went quickly at a half-
trot along the path, with his gun at the trail, and
his wild-looking, mongrel dog close on his bare heels,
and in a few moments both disappeared in the
dark forest.
Bent and Pakanga returned to the pursuing
party, who were becoming impatient at the long
absence of their guide and were hot with questions.
The white man and his companions managed to
quiet the suspicions of the man-hunters. They de-
clared that there were no signs of any one having
passed that way, and that it would not be much
use going on to the Ngaere, which was a long and
very toilsome journey. Fortunately for them, the
half-caste and his men had not troubled to go on
as far as the big totara on the river-bank, where the
tell-tale fire was not yet cold.
After some debate the whole party returned to
Rukumoana, and the hunters, giving up the chase
in that direction, made out to the open country,
and that was the last Bent heard of them.
318 THE advp:ntures of ktmble bent
Three j^cars later Bent met Hiroki in Parihaka,
the village of the prophet Te Whiti. The slayer
of McLean had had a wild and anxious life of it
after his escape from Ruknmoana. He told Bent
of his lonely existence in the great forests of the
back-country, living on eels, wild honey, the young
, shoots of fern-trees, and such-like rough fare of the
bush. After he came out into the open country
and was making his way across the Waimate Plains
in the direction of Parihaka he was chased by several
Government men (one of whom was Mr. William
Williams, a Plains settler), and was fired at and
wounded, but escaped. Te Whiti sheltered him
and condoned his crime, which, being a semi-agrarian
one, was counted a patriotic deed by the people
of Parihaka. He spoke gratefully of what Bent
had done for him, in giving him timely warning
that day in the Mangamingi bush, and offered him
a money gift as some measure of utu. This Bent
promptly refused, saying, "Keep your money, and
thank the Atua for your escape, not me."
Hiroki was a wild figure in Parihaka those lawless
days of 1S78-81. On meeting-days and feast-days,
when the faithful of the Maori tribes gathered to
hear the prophet expound the Scriptures after his
fashion and prophesy many strange happenings,
the Lean One used to head the procession of the
tuku-kai, the bringing of the food for ceremonious
presentation to the visitors. A double line of gaily
HIROKI: THE STORY OF A FUGITIVE 31 d
dressed girls, bearing baskets of potatoes and pork
and fish hot from the haugi, marched in time to a
lively song into the marae, and in front of them
paraded Hiroki, stripped to a loin-mat, a loaded
and cocked double-barrelled gun in his hands, white
feathers stuck in his hair, red war-paint on his
cheeks and forehead, leaping from side to side, eyes
rolling, tongue defiantly protruded, the embodi-
ment of Maori savagery and ferocity. But when
John Bryce, as native minister, invaded Parihaka
in 1881 with his force of 1,700 Armed Constabulary
and Volunteers, and arrested the two prophets To
Whiti and Tohu, Hiroki was also captured, and
shortly thereafter he was tried for McLean's murder
and was hanged.
To this day the Maoris of the Patea tell stories of
Hiroki 's solitary and savage life in the bush. One
place in particular — at Orangimura, between three
and four miles above Rukumoana — is pointed out
as a hiding-place of the refugee. Here a large,
hollow rata-tree grew near the top of a high bank ;
the Patea River flowed below. Hiroki had camped
here in order to get wild honey from a hive in the
hollow tree, and after he had filled a couple of cala-
bashes with the honey he lit his nightly fire and went
to sleep close to the cliff-top, first tying his dog up
to a bush with a flax rope. In the night the dog
bit through the flax that held him, and jumping on
his master so startled him that he forgot he was so
320 THE ADVENTURES OF KBIBLE BENT
near the verge of tlie cliff, over whicli lie promptly
rolled in the darkness ; he fell with a mighty splash
in the river below, together with his astonished dog.
The spot where this night adventure occurred is
called by the Maoris Te Pari-o-Hiroki. which means
" Hiroki's F^recipice."
CHAPTER XXVIII
OUT OF EXILE
Canoeing on the Patea — The voyage to Hukatere — The
white man's world again — Bent the medicine-man — Makutu,
or the Black Art — Bent's later days — The end.
All was ready for the voyage, and the pakeha-
Maori and his companions loaded their canoe and
embarked for Hukatere — thirty miles down-stream,
not far from the sea-coast. The Patea was a very
winding stream, flowing between high forest-
covered banks ; its course was impeded by frequent
rocky shoals and accumulations of sunken logs,
which formed rapids. Aboard the canoe, besides
Bent, were Rupe, Hakopa and his niece, and a
man named Te Rii, who was an unikehu, or " fair
hair."
The white man and his Maori companions paddled
along merrily for seven or eight miles, lightening
their labours with canoe-songs. Then, in shooting
a rapid, the canoe struck a rock, swung broadside on
to the swift current, and immediately capsized.
The crew reached the shore safely, and hauled
the canoe up on to a shingly bank. Fortunately
21 321
322 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
all the cargo — the baskets of dried eels and the
calabashes filled with honey — had been made fast
to the thwarts, as a precaution against such an
accident, and so was saved ; but old Hakopa lost
a little kit — his bush savings-bank — containing a
sum of money which he had acquired at the Waitara.
On the bank a fire was kindled by means of flint
and steel — commonly used amongst the Maoris in
those days, and still occasionally seen in use in
remote forest districts, such as the Urewera Country.
By the blaze of the great fire the wrecked canoeists
dried themselves and their garments, and they
camped there that night.
At daylight next morning they embarked again,
and another day and a half at the paddles took
them down to the Hukatere kainga, a large settle-
ment of r«i///9o-thatched houses, standing on the
left bank of the Patea, in a beautiful bend, with the
lofty, forest-fringed cliffs of Pariroa jutting out
abruptly on the opposite shore.
The approaching canoe, its four paddles flashing
in the sun and dipping again all together, was seen
from the kainga while still some little distance up
the river, and the men and women of the Hukatere
gathered on the water-side and cried and waved
their welcome to the long-absent people of the bush.
" Kumea mai te waka ! " they chanted, and the
women waved siiawls and green bi-anches in the
poetic greeting of the powhiri. "" To-o-ia tnai te
OUT OF EXILE 323
imka ! Oh, haul up the canoe ! Draw hitherwards
the canoe. To the resting-place— that canoe ! To
the sleeping-place — that canoe ! Oh, welcome, wel-
come, strangers from the forest-land ! Urge swift
your paddles, for home darts your canoe ! "
So, chanting their ancient song, the villagers re-
ceived the new arrivals, and, still waving their gar-
ments and their leafy branches, retired slowly be-
fore them as they landed and walked up the sloping
banks until the open marae in the centre of the
kainga was reached. There the guests from Ruku-
moana were received by a dignified chief, white-
bearded old Nga-waka-taurua (Double-canoe). Now
the potuhiri was succeeded by the doleful sounds
of the tangi, and one after another the Hukatere
tribespeople pressed their noses to those of Rupe
and his household ; and they wept long and unre-
strainedly for the dead, for those who had passed
away since they last met.
And then the feasting. The bush-family and
their " tame white man " enjoyed a meal of truly
huge proportions and variety in comparison with
the meagre forest-fare to which they had been con-
fined so long. And when the pakeha tobacco and
pcikeha grog came out — unwonted luxuries to the
mohoao, the bush-people — old Rupe and his house-
hold were indeed in the Promised Land for which
they had longed for many a month ; they had all
that the heart of the Hauhau could desire.
324 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
The feast over, the dried eels and honey, conveyed
with so much toil from distant Rukumoana, were
brought up to the marae, and ceremoniously pre-
sented to old "Double-Canoe," who distributed the
food amongst the people of the village. The canoe
itself was similarly presented to the chief as a gift
of aroha from Rupe. In return, the men of Huka-
tere placed before the visitors their gifts — £5 in
money (representing the sum total of the pakeha
cash in the village), and blankets, shirts, and other
articles of clothing, of which Bent and his com-
panions were in much need after their rough life in
the bush.
"While I was in the kahiga,'" says Bent, "the
local chief went down to the town of Patea, a few
miles away, to get me some European clothing.
He informed some people in the town that Tu-nui-
a-moa, the paheka-M.a,ov\, who had been with the
Hauhaus for twelve or thirteen years, was in his
kainga, and next day about twenty Europeans rode
up to the settlement out of curiosity to see me.
We had a long talk, and they gave me some articles
of clothing, and told me all about the white man's
world from which I had cut myself off. This was
about the end of the year 1878.
" After a month's stay we returned to our own
village, in a canoe belonging to the Hukatere
natives, loaded with goods and ' tucker.' Five days'
paddling and poling up-river took us to Ruku-
KIMBLE BENT, THE PAKEHA-MAORI.
(From a photo taken in 1903.)
325
OUT OF EXILE 327
moana. Planting season came round again ; then
we whiled away the time in Maori fashion — hunt-
ing wild pigs, snaring and shooting birds, catching
eels, and getting honey — until the crops were har-
vested. And not long after that we bade farewell
to our old kainga for ever, loaded our canoe for the
last time, and once more paddled down to Huka-
tere."
From Hukatere the ]xikeha-Ma,ori and his girl-
wife went to Taiporohenui — Bent's old home in the
war days. There he lived for a year or so, blanketed
like a Maori, and working in the cultivations.
Here, too, in the long nights he was much with the
old men of the kainga, and from such learned men
as Hupini and Pokau — true tohungas, or priests, and
soothsayers — he learned much of the strange oc-
cultism of the Maori. He saw singular ceremonies,
the rites of the makutu, the black art. He learned
scores of karakias — incantations useful in Maori
eyes for all sorts of purposes, all conditions of war
and peace time. Some of these were makutu spells
by which the wizard could slay an enemy, by witch-
craft and the power of the evil eye. Many a case
of death from makutu came under Bent's observa-
tion during his life among the ^laoris. Old Hupini,
says the 7>>aA:eA«-Maori, undoubtedly killed men
with his makutu — a combination of three factors :
projection of the will force, the malignant exercise
328 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
of h\'pnotic influence, and sheer imagination and
fright on the part of the person makniii'd.
Many Maoris believe that the witchcraft can be
wrought by an adept or tohunqa hy taking some of
the hair or clothing or even remains of the food of
the person intended to be slain, and pronouncing
the appropriate powerful karakias and curses over
it. The enemy's hau — his life-essence, his vital
force — then lies in the hollow of the tohunga''s
hand.
A tohunga can take the hau of a man's footprints
and thereby makutu liim ; he can even nuikutu an
enemy's horse so that it will fall sick and not be
able to travel !
Amongst the prayers and ceremonies which old
Hupini taught Bent were the karakia for combating
the evil spell of the makutu and for restoring a be-
witched and ailing ])erson to health and safety —
to the Land of Light and Life, the Ao-marama.
One of these rites Bent describes in true Maori
fashion :
A person is taken seriously ill ; it is the makutu.
The wise man is called in ; he divines that the ill-
ness is caused by another tohunga''s witchcraft. At
daylight in the morning the sick man is carried to
the water-side. The wise man then takes three
small sticks or twigs [rito) — fern-sticks will do — and
sets them up by the side of the river or the pool.
One of these sacred wands represents the invalid,
OUT OF EXILE 329
one the tribe to wliich he belongs, and one the
mischief -working wizard {te tangata nana te inakutu).
A charm is said over them, and then two rito are
taken away, leaving only one— that for the wizard
— the " wand of darkness."
An incantation, beginning :
" Toko i te po, te po nui, te po roa " (" Staff of the
night, the great night, the long night "), etc., is
repeated over this wand. When this is said the
priest conducts the sick person to the edge of the
water and sprinkles water over his body, repeating
as he does so a charm to expel the niakutu spirits
from his body, ending with a curse upon the malevo-
lent wizard — " Eat that tohunga makutu, let him
be utterly eaten and destroyed."
When this is ended the patient is taken back to
his house. He is told that the wise man has, by
virtue of his very strong charms, seen the rival
tohunga makutu, and that it will not be long before
that evil man dies. The curse falls, the wizard is
himself makutii'd, and the invalid — perhaps — re-
covers.
About the year 1881 Bent- — now able to venture
into the towns of the pakeha again in safety — left
Taranaki, and travelled to Auckland and up to the
Waikato. Then he went on to the west coast, and
spent some months amongst the Maoris of the
Ngati-Mahuta tribe, living in the historic old settle-
ment Makelu, on the shores of Kawhia Harbour,
330 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
close to the legendary landing-place of the Tainui
canoe — the Waikato Maoris' pilgrim ship.
Tawhiao, the Maori King, was then living at
Kawhia, and he asked Bent to remain with him and
be his pakeka and interpreter. The white man was
now, however, wearying to be back in liis old homo,
Taranaki .
"Tawhiao," says Bent, "insisted on mo remain-
ing with his tribe, but I repeated a Maori incanta-
tion which I had been taught by the tohiingas in
Taranaki, a karakia used as a charm by strangers
{tangaki taithou) who may desire to leave the place
where they are staying on a visit and proceed to a
new pa, and who fear obstruction. The charm
begins :
" ' Ka u, ka u, lei tend tauhou,
Ki tenet whemm tauhou.^
" When the old king heard me repeat the incanta-
tion he exclaimed :
" ' Ha, so you are a tohunga ! '
" ' Yes, I am,' I replied.
"Then the old man said, ' Kua twwhera te rori
mou' ('The road is open to you.') He permitted
me to return to Taranaki, and sent four of his men
to escort me through the King Country to Waitara."
The last quarter-century of Kimble Bent's life
has not carried much adventure. Living amongst
the Maoris, he acquired some reputation as a
"medicino-man." During; his wild life in Maori-
OUT OF EXILE 331
dom he had become expert in the rude pharma-
copoeia of the bush, and learned to extract potent
medicines from the plants of the forest. Native
herbs and tree-bark and leaves, prepared in various
ways, are exceedingly valuable remedies. The
knowledge of these herbal remedies, gained from
many a tohnnga and wise woman of the l)ush tribes,
the white man now turned to practical account.
His fame as a doctor reached Parihaka, the village
of Te Whiti, the Prophet of the Mountain. The
prophet's people sent for the white medicine-man
to come and heal the sick. He spent a week in
Parihaka, and returned to his Taiporohenui hut
with more money in his pocket than he had pos-
sessed since he left his old home-town of Eastport
to see life in England. " And I was luckier than
most pakeha doctors," says the old man, " for none
of my patients died ! "
And so the tale of " Tu-nui-a-moa " is told, and
we take our leave of the old pakeha-M.a,oTi — Kimble
Bent, sailor, soldier, outlaw, Hauhau slave, cart-
ridge-maker, pft-builder, canoe-carver, medicine-
man, and what not — ^sitting smoking his pipe in
the midst of his Maori friends. He is still living
with the natives ; working in their food-gardens,
fishing with them, house-building for them. A grey
old man, of mild and quiet eye, who might easily
te taken for some highly respectable shopkeeper
332 THE ADVENTURES OF KIMBLE BENT
who had spent all his life in city bounds. Yet no
man probably has lived a wilder life, using the
term in the sense of an intimate acquaintance with
primeval, passionate savagery, and willi the ever-
near face of death. He is the sole living white
eye-witness of the secret Hauhau war-rites ; the
only white man who has survived to tell of those
terrible deeds in the bush, to tell tlic story of the
last Taranaki war from the inner side — the Maori
side.
Bent has reached the age of seventy-three ; and
now the old man's thoughts go to his boyhood's
home in the far-off State of Maine, and he some-
times expresses a Avish to reach his homeland again.
" If I could only get a berth on some American
sailing-vessel bound for New York or Boston, I'd
even now try to work my passage home," he says.
"I'd like to die in my mother's land." But that
can never be. He is for ever beyond the pale ; and
he will die as he has lived, a pakeha-MeiOvi .
APPENDIX
TITOKOWARU, THE TARANAKI WAR-CHIEF
The following interesting supplementary particulars con-
cerning Titokowaru, one of the leading figui'es in this book,
were supplied to the writer by the Rev. T. G. Hammond,
of Opunake, Wesleyan missionary to tlie Taranaki Maoris :
" It was Titokowaru' s right eye that had been destroyed
by a bullet in some engagement. He was about five feet
nine in height and somewhat spare and muscular, with
fine bone, an alert, active man, but by no means good-
looking. His skin was rather darker than the general run
of Maoris, and his nose low in the bridge, with wide
nostrils. His face rarely lit up pleasantly, and he was of
reserved manner. His knowledge of tikanga Maori was
considerable, and during the war he conducted the usual
ceremonies to make the war-parties successful.
" The late Rev. Stannard. of Wanganui, told me that
Titokowaru' s name given him in baptism was Hohepa
(Josepli), and I liave heard from Taii'uakena and others
that Tito was one of tlie young men who accompanied
the Rev. Skevington on his last visit to Auckland. (This
was long before the Maori War.) They journeyed overland
fron^ Te Waimate to Auckland, Mr. Skevington going to
attend the Auckland Synod. While in the old High Street
Churcli, Auckland, he died suddenly. Titokowaru and the
other young men returned to bear the news to the peoiDle,
as he (Tairuakena) put it, ' Ka hoki mai matou tangi,
haere ki tena kainga, ki tena kainga.'' Mr. Woon succeeded
Mr. Skevington at Heretoa, Te Waimate.
333
334 APPENDIX
" I had one interview with Titukowaru which I shah
never forget. I think it was in 1876, and before I knew
Maori. Mr. WilHani WiUiains, of Manaia, Taranaki, was
going to visit Titokowarn at Omuturaugi, on the Wairnate
Plains, and, as I was on my way to New l*ly mouth, he
persuaded me to delay a day and go with him — a most
unwise thing, as the Maoris had said they would shoot
any one who crossed the Waingongoro. We went from
Hawera to Normanby, and then picked up old Katene
Tu-Whakaruru, who was just then acting as a Maori
policeman. We rode along over these vast plains, with
the cocksfoot brushing against our knees as we sat in our
saddles. We came to a house on the edge of the bush,
and found only one woman, whose face was deeply scarred ;
she had lately lost her child, and had been cutting herself
in her grief. This woman told us that Titokowaru and
the men were in the bush planting potatoes, and pomted
out a narrow path, along which we galloped for a good
distance, perhaps a mile.
" Suddenly we came upon about eighty Maoris, all men,
and Titokowaru with them. They gathered round us as
we dismounted, and Titokowaru came and took mj' right
arm, and a big burly fellow my left. They sat me between
them, holding me fast, while the smoke fronx the fire close
by almost smothered me. An old bald-headed Maori began
to speak in an excited manner, and when he had done a
very rascally looking young fellow made a speech, coming
up to me and smacking his thigh, and letting out an angry
grunt at the end of every period. When he finished,
Katene spoke, and did his best to turn away their anger ;
reminded them of the good the missionaries did in getting
them released from bondage in the Waikato and the
Ngapuhi Country.
" Then Williams spoke, and at tlie close of his speech a
hne man in a piupiu (flax waist-mat) orated, and then
came forward to hongi (rub noses) with me. After which
there was a little fraternisation, and we came away. Even
APPENDIX 335
old Katene looked very white while the row was on, but
I did not know enough to be scared. It was a narrow
escape ; 1, of course, know now what I did not know
then. I thouglit at the time Titokowaru was protecting
me, but I think now he was making sure that I did not
get away."
Titokowaru died at his village near Manaia, on the
Waimate Plains — the scene of his olden battles against
the whites — towards the end of 1889. To the end he was
a sturdy enemy of the Europeans, and though he did not
actually fight against them after 1869, he was the leader
in many obstructive movements against white settlement,
surveying, and road-making.
REWABD FOR TITOKOWARU' S HEAD
Under address and date Downing Street, February 26th,
1869, the Right Hon. Earl Granville, K.G., Secretary of
State for the Colonies, wrote to Sir George F. Bowen,
G.C.M.G., Governor of New Zealand :
" I see it stated in the newspapers that you have offered
a reward of £1,000 for the person of the Maori chief Titoko-
waru — I infer alive or dead — and £5 for the person of
every Maori rebel brought in alive. I do not at present
pronounce any oj^inion as to the propriety of these steps,
but I must observe that they are so much at variance
with the usual laws of war, and appear, at first sigh^, so
much calculated to exasperate and extend hostilities, that
they ought to have been reported to me by you officially
with the requisite explanation, wliich I should now be
glad to receive.''
In the course of his reply to this despatch Governor
Bowen said :
" It is contended that this passage implies that the
Maoris now in arms . . . are foreign enemies, or at all
336 APPENDIX
events belligerents, with wIkmu the usual laws of war
must be strictly observed."
On this, Earl Granville remarked in a despatch of
November 4th :
" I think you would have done well to point out to
those who thus argue that my desjjatch nowhere hints
that the Maoris are foreigners, a doctrine which I had
never heard of before I perused the Attorney-General's
opinion ; and tliat the legitimate inference from my de-
spatch is the direct contrary to that which is drawn from
it. . . . I do not clearly understand how you justify this
notice as a matter of law. I imderstand you to disclaim
the application of martial law ; and viewing Titokowaru
merely as a notorious, but untried and unconvicted rebel
and murderer, I am not aware of any Colonial enactment
which would make it lawful for any chance person to shoot
him down."
Printed and bound by Hazell, Watson tt Viney, Ld., London and Ayleabury.
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