tlers, some of whom had resided in that place many years, and declared their determination to burn down the surveyors' houses, and drive them off the land. Mr Cave himself had resided there for six or seven years, and had been always on friendly terms with Rauperaha and Rangihaiata; a knife and fork being always placed at his table for them when they visited Cloudy Bay. They began to put their threats into effect by burning down the house of Mr. Cotterell, having first removed his goods, which they restored to him; they then, in a similar manner, destroyed Mr. Parkinson's house, and compelled all the surveyors to remove to the mouth of the river. Mr. Cotterell was then dispatched by Mr Tuckett to Nelson, to inform Captain Wakefield. An information was then laid before the Police Magistrate, Mr. Thompson, who granted a warrant against Rauperaha and Rangihaiata on a charge of arson. Having been informed that the natives were armed, and in great numbers, the magistrate determined to attend the execution of the warrant himself, accompanied by an armed force, and expressed his opinion that such a demonstration would prevent bloodshed, and impress the natives with the authority of the law. Accordingly, accompanied by Captains Wakefield and England, and several other gentlemen who had volunteered their services, and about forty constables and working men, chiefly belonging to the surveying department, the whole number amounting to forty-nine, (thirty-five of whom were armed with muskets, or fowling-pieces, and the rest with pocket pistols,) he landed in a government brig, on the 16th of June, at the mouth of the Wairoa. On the following morning they came up to the natives, who had moved four miles up the river, and consisted of

eighty or ninety men, forty of whom were armed with muskets, and the rest with tomahawks, besides women and children. They were encamped on a small open space of cleared ground, backed by a dense wood, and on the right bank of a deep unfordable rivulet, about thirty feet wide, which flows into the Wairoa on its left bank. The white men halted on the left bank, with a hill behind them covered with fern, and sloping upwards with several brows or terraces. Mr. Thompson, Captain Wakefield, Mr. Richardson, Mr. Howard, Mr. Brooks, the interpreter, and three constables, having crossed the creek by means of a canoe, which had been laid across it with consent of the natives, Mr. Thompson explained through the interpreter the object of his visit, and called on Rauperaha to go with him on board the brig, which the latter positively refused to do; though he declared he did not wish to fight, but expected the arrival of Mr. Spain and Mr. Clarke, and would have a talk when they came. Rauperaha added that though he did not wish to fight, yet, if the white people fought, he would fight too. He also requested to have the matter decided on the spot, and professed his readiness to make the compensation to Mr. Cotterell required by the magistrates, provided their decision pleased him. Mr. Thompson replied that the case must be heard on board of the government brig, and insisted on Rauperaha accompanying him; who, on still refusing to go, Mr. Thompson, in a state of great excitement, declared he would compel him; and pointing to his armed men, threatened that he and his party should be fired upon. Sixteen natives immediately sprang to their feet and presented fire-arms. The English party on the other side of the rivulet were then ordered to advance, and in cross

ing the stream one of them stumbled, and his piece having accidentally gone off, in a moment afterwards a volley from both parties ensued. The first few shots from the Europeans killed two natives, and wounded three. Then the natives fired and killed three. Then the British fired and killed a woman. The rest wavered, and were on the point of falling back, when Captain Wakefield having called upon his men to retire up the hill and form on the brow, Rauperaha, seeing the retreat, excited his men, who, raising a warcry, darted across the stream. The party of armed workmen, totally unacquainted with the use of firearms and discipline, dispersed at the yells which the natives made, as they darted across the creek, and heedless of the orders of their superiors, fled round the hill and escaped.

The most strenuous efforts were made by Captain Wakefield, Captain England, and Mr. Howard, to induce their party to act in concert, but altogether without effect. Captain Wakefield therefore, in order to prevent a further sacrifice of life, ordered the firing to cease, and Captain England and Mr. Howard advanced towards the Maories with a white handkerchief, in token of peace. Those in advance of the retreating party, however, kept up a running fire, which was returned by the Natives on the whole party indiscriminately. Captain Wakefield and the gentlemen about him were therefore compelled to proceed further up the hill, in order, if possible, to put an end to the conflict. Mr. Cotterell, after accompanying them a short distance, stopped, and, in the hope of assuring the natives of the sincerity of his party, waited their coming up and surrendered himself; and his example was followed, on the next eminence, by Captain

Wakefield, Captain England, Mr. Thompson, Mr. Richardson, Mr. Howard, Brooks, Cropper, and M'Gregor. Puaha again endeavoured to become a peace-maker, and urged on his countrymen that enough blood had been shed. This was acceded to by Rauperaha, and the two parties shook hands. They were soon joined by Rhangihaiata, who, having already killed the wounded on his way, demanded the lives of the nine who had surrendered. To this Rauperaha at first objected, but, on being informed that his daughter (Rangihaiata's wife) was killed, he offered no further opposition. As no resistance appears to have been made by our unfortunate friends, it is probable that they were, through their ignorance of the native language, quite unconscious of the horrible fate that awaited them. Standing in the midst of a large number of Maories, they were easily separated, and whilst in this defenceless situation, perhaps without even a thought of treachery, the monster Rangihaiata silently glided round, getting behind each singly, and, with his tomahawk, brained them all in succession, in spite of the intercession of some of the women, who cried to him to "save some of the rangatiras, (gentlemen,) if only to say they had saved some." They seem to have met their fate with wonderful magnanimity, as George Bampton, who lay concealed in a fern bush not many yards off, deponed, "that he heard neither cries nor screamings, but merely the sound of a beating or chopping, which he supposed at the time to be the natives tomahawking the white people."

Rauperaha, in the speech which he delivered before Governor Fitzroy, on 12th February, 1844, says that Thompson asked him to save their lives, to which he replied, "Did I not warn you how it would be? and

yet you now ask me to save you." He then adds that, "it was according to their custom, after a fight, to kill the chief men of their enemies."

The bodies, when discovered a few days afterwards by a party who went from Port Nicholson to the field of battle, were found, in general, but little mutilated; but the skulls of all had been cleft with tomahawks, and generally disfigured with repeated blows, struck with such ferocity that every one must have been more than sufficient to have produced instant death. Brooks, the interpreter, in particular, was dreadfully mangled.

Such is the account given by the British settlers in that country of this horrible catastrophe. The natives' tale is as follows: "That they had never sold the lands, -it is their own land; and that when they saw the flags erected, supposed that their land was taken from them; they therefore pulled them down, in order that the Europeans might understand thereby they had not sold their lands, or promised to do so. In their estimation it was presumption on the part of the surveyors to erect houses, to cut lines on lands that did not belong to them, and they considered they had a perfect right to do as they pleased with what was growing or standing on their own lands. The surveyors would not listen to their remonstrances, and therefore they burnt the hut. They had no intention to fight, nor had they a thought that way ;-it was the sight of the guns, the firing of the Europeans, and the falling of their friends that aroused them; and call every body to witness that it was the Europeans who commenced, by killing three natives, and they returned the fire, and the struggle began."

The above document is said to have been drawn up