D—No. 16

work, where you found me. Be sure to come and see me before you return, and let me know how yon get on. He is a very bad man ; there are several hard cases against him. He is always beating the Natives here, and I should like to see your case settled. I then went on to Matapouri ; about midday I arrived. I went to the settlement; they welcomed me ; I sat down. I then waited about an hour ; there was not a word spoke. I kept looking about to catch sight of my wife. It appeared they did not know me. A lad came out of one of the houses; I happened to have seen him before, when I lived at Mr. Henry's, at the Ruakaka, in my stay at Whangarei. He spoke to me ; then told them I was the man belonging to the woman they had there. I did not know which was Henry Ngakapa, although he was sitting by my side. He then asked me where I was going. I told him I had come to hear what was his intentions as to my wife. He then told a woman to get something to eat for me. He said it laid to me ; without the money he had agreed upon he would not give her and the child up. That was £10 he had said at first, but now he wanted £25. I s»id if I had the money I would give it, sooner than have all this bother. I said, you refused the boat ; you said at first to give you the boat and things would be all right. I owned to the trousers, and I said the pig was not a legal debt ; but that I would have settled that if he had not been so rash in his proceedings the night he took the woman. I then told him 1 blamed Mr. Duncan as much nearly as him, for he knew they were coming 'o my place to demand payment for things which I had before disputed to him ; and, as an Officer of justice, he should have sent for me, or else reported it to the Magistrate, that he might have brought it to the right course of justice. He (Henry Ngakapa) then said, when I again see that Duncan, I will pay him out for his deceiving me. But why did you not go to work and earn some money, and come to me; I then would give you up your wife and child ; but without I will not. I then thought of the letter that William Te Tete had given me. I gave it to Henry Ngakapa. He took it and read it, then said, I have received some two or three letters, but I will answer none of them ; nor will Igo to any court of justice. I want the money, and then the thing will be settled, and not without. I told him I had no money; if I had I would pay him ; but I should expect him to pay very dear to me afterwards. I told him he had better consider as a good minded man, not as an evil one. I then told him Mori Te Neri had come with me from the Cowoti (sic) [Kauiti] to Whananaki, and would wait there until to-morrow morning. He said, if you wished to have any conversation to come to him. The food he had ordered was fetched for me to eat ; I did not eat; so when he saw that he turned to and eat it himself. He told a woman to call my wife; she came. I then began to ask her concerning the reports I had heard that we were not married; that I had stole her away from another man, the father of our two boys, our eldest children; that they did not belong to me, but the third, a little girl, the one that was with her, was mine; that it was her wish to remain where she was, and that she had got in the boat of her own accord and told Henare Ngakapa to go and fetch the child. She denied all these reports, and, furthermore, the natives said she has said she was given to you with her wish by her relatives, that you were married to her, that the children all belonged to you and nobody else, and that she would not join herself with any other while you were alive. There has been natives of Rotaroa to pay the money I agreed upon ; they are all relations others, but she said I will not be bought by your money. lam no slave. I was then satisfied. I called her to me and took the child, the child would not stop with me, which when I saw hurt my feelings, I gave it to its mother. Ngakapa then said, you may stop here with your wife to night, to-morrow you may return alone. He then said, you wish your wife to return to you; I said, certainly I do; she is my wife and the mother of my children. He then said, your wife may go with you, your child I will keep, if you had brought the money you might have took both; I said nothing. He then said to my wife, you may go, the child I will keep. If that you fetched the child it would be different, but I took it, so I will keep it in place of the money. She said me and my child will both go. Henry Nakapa said, I will keep that. My wife then said to me, say nothing; let me get clear and let the law decide about the child; I know it is not just law that my child should be payment for debt. If you say anything, he, Henare Ngakapa, will be vexed, and then he will not let me go, and he will turn upon you and you have nobody here to take your part, say nothing. He, Henare Ngakapa, then said, in the morning you two can go, and mind you, on the road say nothing against me or I will come and take the woman away again, for if I was in the wrong, the Magistrate would have been here before now. I will give you a note to Hori Te Neri. We slept there in the morning. The woman, or wife, of Henare Ngakapa took the child, and my wife left the place crying. We went on until we came to the Kawaute, the place where Hon Te Neri was, I then gave him the note from Henare Ngakapa; he read it; then said to us, don't be down hearted about the child; I do not think it right that he should keep the child for debt, it is Dot according to the European law that flesh and blood should be taken for debt. We staid there that night; next morning we left and went on to Moku, the place where William the Te Te lived. I told him the result of his letter, that the woman was not quite given up on account of the Magistrate's, but on account of the head of the Runanga Hori Te Neri. He said, although I take it upon myself to go above Hori Te Neri, I will write to Mr. Barstow and Mr. Clendpn. He wrote the two letters and gave them to the woman; we stopped there that night; in the morning we left and went on to Kororareka, where she, my wife, took the letter to Mr. Barstow ; he then questioned her whether it was true that she went in the boat of her own accord, which she denied. She wished to state her case as to the treatment she had met with among them. He told her to state it to Mr. Clendon, who was then absent, but would be back in the course of a week. We waited at Kororareka three or four days, when we went to the Keri Keri, when my wife left the other letter with Mr. Duncan, who said, I see you have got the woman back. I said yes, but I have not the child, and the woman was not returned through the course of law, but through H or i Te Neri. He then said, you and the woman had better be off home; Ido not want to

9

OF JAMES HOLDEN.