PAGES OF THE PAST

Taranaki Daily News, 5 January 1924, Page 11

PAGES OF THE PAST

(By

"Juvenis.”)

AN EARLY TREK. EROM NEW PLYMOUTH TO WELLINGTON. (Continued.) After our escape from the hornet’s i nest of Waitotara, we gleaned some particulars of the events that attended the destruction of the pah (which we assuredly would have avoided by a considerable detour if we had been advised of the state of affairs there). It then appeared that Te Heu-Heu had driven away from Taupo two native teachers, with the intimation that if they returned he would ‘‘eat their heads, and make cartridges of their books.” This insult was resented by their friends of Waitotara in strong warnings of God’s wrath upon the heathen leader and his people. Filthy recriminations occurred between the Waitotaras and their neighbours, the Patutoktftus—who were heathep adherents of Te Heu-Heu —until war was declared. About 150 of the choicest warriors besieged the Waitotaras, and drove them to the Taranaki coast pahs. Here they collected reinforcements, and returned.]* Finding their district devastated, and the pah : strongly fortified, the professing Chrisj tion warriors besieged the fort; and, ■ during the siege, the reverend gentleman —who had astonished us with his taci-turnity-—played the zealous .part of a mediator between the fighting parties, and when the besieged found their supplies exhausted they’ consented to a parley. It was then’agreed with the intercessor that the besiegers should enter the pah, shake hands, and be friends with the pagans, “in the usual manner with Christians”; after which the heathens should be allowed to depart in peace to their kainga at Wanganui. Accordingly the Waitotara chiefs advanced in the presence of their reverend friend, and with their left hands grasped the outstretched right ones of the Patutokutus. AN ATROCIOUS AND PERFIDIOUS ACT. In an instant the Waitotaras drew their tomahawks with their right hands from beneath their mats and hacked at the heads of their unarmed foes. A horrible carnage ensued, and a general rush of the Patutokutus took place down the mount, during which numbers were shot down in ambush. About onethird only of the Patutokutus reached Wanganui. One of Te Heu-Heu’s near relatives fell in the conflict, and thus secured a civilising retribution upon the great chief, and eventually that of the transfer of the person of his highness into the grim Maori mythology, by the fall of the decomposed side of a mountain upon himself, wives and friends—a catastrophe which was lauded as a great triumph over heathenism. Holding along the beach course, so long as our exhausted limbs held out, we came to a halt on the banks of a .stream, where w e stripped, and divested ourselves of as much outward impurity as time would permit. 'Scraping together all our scraps of biscuit and German sausage, we primed our “inner man” for a day’s walk of about 35 miles to Wanganui, reserving only our last ration of brandy. Coming upon a quaint, hermit-looking native, he or she (for we could not understand which gender) presented us with some dried mussels and corn-pirau (or corn steeped in a pool of water, till merging upon a state of decomposition). A half-crown to wear round the neck gratified the shrivelled specimen of mankind as much as the kai did ourselves; and coming to a halt again, where some oysters were abundant on the rocks, we made an extensive roast, and recruited fully the inward man for the work before us. Tow ards the close of the day we descended from the high shores, on to the beach for easier travelling. AN ANXIOUS TIME.

As we hastened along the rocky shore, we observed that full tide had* flowed to the base of the perpendicular cliffs, along the face of which we were now staggering over rocks. Rounding a small point we found that they extended unbroken—at least as far as the next one. We, therefore, immediately retraced our steps; but ere we could pass the cliffs, rolling waves took possession *of our way, and closed up all escape from them, either backwards or forwards. There was no time for hesitation; a squall came dead in upon us, and we fell to work with our knives, cutting holes in the strata for hand and fees, above high-water mark. In the course of a fearfully anxious time, the surf, with mighty force, broke beneath our feet, with deafening roars, scattering the hissing spray far above our heads, and saturating us to the skin. Reeling that one stroke of the sea upon our bodies would drag us down mangling upon the rocks, each thundering bound struck death upon our hearts. Our holds upon the face of the cliff were slippery, and we were beyond all earthly assistance. A confused struggling sensation of the soul, getting rid of its trembling frame, and leaping into a brighter condition of things was impressed upon one of us, with a perfect conviction of the Almighty's presence; a cool defiant indifference to the roaring hurley-burley war, felt by another, until the storm passed away, over the heights above our heads, in fitful gusts; and the subsiding of the rollers was watched through all its doubtful phases. Benumbed with cold, and wet, we awaited opportunity to descend upon a rock to which we clung, ' overwhelmed at times with broken waves. “Sweet are the uses of adversity,” and so we felt, with hearts deeply laden with gratitude for the feelings and strength imparted to us, of an I absolute certainty of an interposing Providence; ,a power possessing the nerve system over the jaws of death; a visit of mighty intelligence, unmistakable, and stamping a knowledge upon the mind, .seldom experienced during the usual every-day life. A HAVEN REACHED.

With difficulty we found our wav into Wanganui that night, with begrimed clothing, minus one portion and another. Rousing up Mr. G., a settler (with his family) of and large means, for an extensive farming establishment, we were soon into a change of clothing, and upon a supper produced from a well stored larder, accompanied with large, medicinal hot ■tumblers, of what the material man felt to be “elixirs of life.” Our generous host, with his noble mien and heart, congratulated us warmly upon our escapes from both war and storm. He remarked that Te Heu-Heu had d®itroyed another pah

f ity of Wanganui. As usual the topic of conversation drifted into the policy or blunderings of Governments, of which we virtually had three, viz., that of Downing Street, the Governor and the New Zealand Company; the latter were considered to have displayed to the native mind, land-stealing and feuds, arising from the same over-reaching and avaricious minds as their own. That great sacrifices of opportunities, property, and life had taken place, owing to graspings and vacillations over lands, loud outcries from settlers of invasion of rights, repudiation on the part of natives, and rapine, had from time to time been reported, without any redress resulting—the company pointings out that the stigma of suffering all these without redyess rested with its adversary, the Imperial Government, and its injudicious selection of officials; but, however, the refined laws of the Governor were able to argute these offences away in favour of native rights and promises, -such arguments were altogether foreign and not understood by the Maori and his ritenga; and, in consequence of their attacks being unattended by retaliation or punishments (notwithstanding explanation of native protection), our supineness was construed to want of strength, and also of fear. Their great governing principle that “might is only right” remained unshaken, but the great evil was believed to exist in the purchase of large districts by small payments made to some leading chief, without any reference to other individual owners. Mr. M—— considered ourselves to be the pioneers of an improving order of things, the majority of whom would be rewarded for their colonising exertions, in loss of possessions and life —in fact, martyrs, laying the foundation of a glorious country; our work being clearly to meet with firmness (like soldiers of Providence) envy, rebellion, and avarice, which constitute the spirit of every secret committee amongst the natives. That the pakeha’s power was certainly laughed at, his sham purchases of land repudiated, and his great Christian truths observed as pleasant to the pastime of mind, as the sun’s warmth to the body—his kind intentions considered to be covers merely for land acquisitiveness—the compact body of soldiers, with their red coats, good marks for skirmishing Maoris, etc.