A ROMANCE OF MOTURUA.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LII, Issue 15884, 3 April 1915, Page 1 (Supplement)

A ROMANCE OF MOTURUA.

BT ELSIE K. MORTON". ".July. 1772: On the 12U) of July we sent a bottle to be buried on Marion Island, in which were enclosed the arms of Frame, and a formal statement of the taking possession of all this country, which was mimed Austral-France. This bottle if 4ft under the earth at 57 paces from j the edge of the sea, reckoning from highwater mark, and at 10 paces from the I little stream. This bottle was buried with j all necessary precautions.' Could anything be more.akin to the ■ fascinating stones ol oid-time quests of j bin.-. i ...ile3 and hidden gold, thai m'■ " Treasure Island and other stories have j fired the imagiation of young and old alike? Vet the record as above given is ! very real and authentic, discovered shortly before the outbreak ol European war by ;i well known New Zealander touring in Frame. Tins story of the buried bottle adds .i touch of old-time romance to the most terrible of all tragedies which run a red trail through the pages of early history ol our most lovely Bay of Islands. Marion Island is Moturua, a few mil.'s out from Russell, named after Captain Marion du Fresne. . oininanrtei of the i.l-tate>l Frew h expedition which in 1772 came to New Zealand. To understand fully the circumstances leading to the depositing of this interesting record dose on a century and a.-half ago, it is necessary to recall the main outline of certain incidents leading up to it, incidents that cast a strong light on the fearful dangers which beset men who in early days fared forth to widen the boundaries of empire. The French, eager for colonisation in the South Seas, commissioned the ships Mascarin and Marquis de Castries to explore the Southern Pacific and to learn all that was possible about New Zealand. Captain Cook, who left the Bay of Islands in 1709, had not reached Kngland with the story of this new country when du Fresno set sail, and without doubt when the two French ships came to anchor in the Hay of Islands on May 11, 1772. he. considered the right of discovery to bo his. The long sea voyage from Mauritius had resulted in much sickness among the crew, and the day after arrival tents were erected in a Maori village on the shore of Moturua and the sick men transferred their. A blacksmith's shop was built close by, and here French and Maoris lived i>n the friendliest terms for a month. A lovelier spot could not be imagined ; sheltered from wind and storm, the two boats swung at anchor off an adjacent island a broad, smooth crescent beach sloped to the shining sea, and : a little stream of clear water ran almost Ito its edge. On June 12 came disaster, a i flaming bolt from cloudless skies. On that ! fateful morning Captain du Fresno, with I 16 officers from the Mascarin went ashore jat Manawara Bay, opposite Moturua. j Althouga he did not return that night. ' no doubts were felt as to the safety of I the. party, and next morning a number of sailors from the Marquis de Castries went ashore as usual for wood and water. A few hours later a man was seen swimming toward the fhip and crying out in great j distress. He was taken aboard, badly wounded, and told a fearful tale of the massacre of every one of his companions, who had been surprised at their work, killed, cut up and carried away. He alone had escaped by concealing himself in the bush, running across the isthmus and throwing himself into the oea. Such a tale, coming as a, frightful climax to weeks of apparently harmonious intercourse caused gravest alarm for the safety of Di Fresne and his party, fears which were proven only too well grounded when ar aimed search party of four sailors discovered their captain's empty boat ii Manawara Bay in possession of the natives. At the time of the massacre ! thero was also 60 men encamped inlanc 1 vnder Lieutenant Crozct, of the Mascarin at work felling timber for spar! i for the ships. The search part; • quickly warned him of his dan , gerous position and he got his men t< the seashore without delay. Here he was | met by a horde of natives in full war ' I paint, and informed by their chief tha ! du Fresne and his party had all beet • ! killed and eaten. Alive to the dangei j threatening not only his party but the 1 sick men in hospital, Croaet showed i I spirit that proclaimed him the stuff o j which hones are made. He hurriedly 1 ordered his men to strike the tents, gathei up all tools in the smithy, and be in readi , i ress to rush with the sick men to th< boats whi.-li were waiting well in to tin beach. Then, seizing a stake, he advancec to the chief, drove it violently into the ground at the Maori's feet and sterol) forbade him to move one step forward under peril of his life. The savage wa.' so startled by this amazing bravado, that Crozet instantly followed up his advantage by ordering that every native should be made to fit down. And so great was the impression made by this intrepid bit of bluff that the armed horde of savage; obeyed likj so many whipped children! [ Crozet then walked up and down in front of I hem until the whole party was safe in the boats. He then walked to the water's edge himself and entered a boat, and no sooner had he done so than the natives' fury broke the spell, and, singing their war-chant, they rushed the boats and flung stones after them. The escape was entirely successful, however, and the men reached their ships in safety. Crozet then took command in place of the murdered captain, and organised a dreadful visit of reprisal, when 200 armed Frenchmen pur- ! sued and killed a great number of natives. Massacre and retaliation did away with all possibility of future friendliness, but i Crozet, still badly in need of spars, was . unable to leave. The spars already cut ' at the time of the massacre were protected by a very strong pa. where natives 1 had assembled in vast numbers. Finally ! the Frenchmen determined to attack the , pa, and, though defended with the greatest courage, it was taken after a , bitter struggle, and the Maoris fled ir confusion, leaving scores of dead anc 1 wounded behind them. Crozet then re ' fitted his ship without further interfer , ence, and, having annexed the Nortl , -Island in the name of France, he set sai , on July 14, 1772. The true reason for this sudden anc ' treacherous act on the part of the native! • has never been established. A brutal out , rage had been committed by de Surville t another French explorer, at Mangonui a year or so previously, but the two tribe; ' j being at variance the Moturua affair wa; • j not considered as having connection wit! • this. Some records hold that the mas sacre was an act of mere treachery or the part of the natives, covetous of th( ' ! many new and strange things they saw ]on the Frenchmen's ships: other ' j again hold it to be the resul I' of carelessness of du Fresno's me: » i regarding the laws of tapu. Maoi 3 tradition, strange to say, offers no rea solution of the affair, but however oh f snire the underlying cause, the conse quences themselves were quite sufficient! ' lurid. ' So much for the tragedy of this mos > ill-fated expedition ; that part of it is his t tory. The thread of romance centre round the fact that the bottle containing i Crozet's personal record of the visit sti] lies buried somewhere " ten paces fron " ! the little stream." which a hundred am ? ; forty years ago provided water for th> i I Frenchmen. The little stream is stil t j there, although tangled with weeds an< i I sand-grass: you still may see the beatei , I square of earth where stood the black , smith's shop and hospital tents. Sinn I I the story of the bottle was first madi .' : known, one or two men have made effort; t to locate th«' spot, but high-water marl r , ilmages as the tides of a century and a half How ceaselessly on sandy shores, anc ' - tiftv-seven paces from the edge of the se: » { that bore d l Fresne to his doom at Mana | warn may rot be fifty-seven paces from , ' the edge of waters that bear thi , ! swift launch carrying picnickers t< I i the lovely beach of Moturua, & j there it ' lies, buried 4ft under tin , earth, a prize that still may lure men t< , the quest, not of secret treasure-trove, but | I of something that no treasure can buy, a • relic of those days of high adventure anc , daring that live forever in the archives ol a nation.