CHAPTER XI.
For some time after his return from Cook Strait, Rutherford's life appears to have been unvaried by any incident of moment.
"At length," says he, "one day a messenger arrived from a neighbouring village, with the news that all the chiefs for miles round were about to set out, in three days, for a place called Kipara,[[BY]] near the source of the river Thames, and distant about two hundred miles from our village. The messenger brought also a request from the other chiefs to Aimy to join them along with his warriors; and he replied that he would meet them at Kipara at the time appointed. We understood that we were to be opposed at Kipara by a number of chiefs from the Bay of Islands and the river Thames, according to an appointment which had been made with the chiefs in our neighbourhood.
"Accordingly, everything was got ready for our journey as quickly as possible; and the women were immediately set to work to make a great number of new baskets, in which to carry our provisions. It is the custom for every person going on such an expedition to find his own arms and ammunition, as also provisions, and slaves to carry them. On the other hand, every family plunder for themselves, and give only what they think proper to the chief. The slaves are not required to fight, though they often run to the assistance of their masters while engaged.
"When the day was come for our departure, I started along with the rest, being armed with my mery, a brace of pistols, and a double-barrelled fowling-piece, and having also with me some powder and ball, and a great quantity of duck-shot, which I took for the purpose of killing game on our journey.
"I was accompanied by my wife Epecka, who carried three new mats to be a bed for us, which had been made by Eshou during my absence at Taranake.
"The warriors and slaves, whom we took with us, amounted in all to about five hundred; but the slaves, as they got rid of the provisions they carried, were sent home again, as we had no further use for them. While on our journey, if we came to a friendly village at night, we slept there; but, if not, we encamped in the woods. When the provisions we had brought with us were all consumed, we were compelled to plunder wherever we could find anything. Our journey, being made during the rainy season, was more than usually fatiguing. We were five weeks in reaching Kipara, where we found about eleven hundred more natives encamped by the side of a river. On our arrival, huts were immediately constructed for our party, and one was allotted to me and my wife. We had also two female slaves allowed us for the purpose of digging fern-root, gathering cockles, and catching fish, which articles were our only provisions while we remained here; unless now and then, when I went to the woods, and shot a few wood-pigeons or a wild pig."
A party of New Zealanders thus wandering through their country, with all the inconveniences attending the movement of large bodies of men, but without the combinations of foresight which are necessary for the safety of an army, or the management of supplies, must be occasionally exposed to great privations.
Their island, however, it would seem from Rutherford's narrative, abundantly supplied them with provisions, and their slaves were at hand to perform the office of cooks. Their method of procuring fire for culinary purposes and warmth is curious; and we may as well mention it somewhat fully here, before we proceed to the more busy parts of Rutherford's narrative.
When Nicholas was in New Zealand, he had an opportunity of seeing the process usually resorted to. "The place where we landed," says he, speaking of an excursion which he made with Marsden, and some of the chiefs, to a place a short distance from the Missionary Settlement, "was a small plantation of potatoes belonging to Shungie, and here our party intended to prepare their refreshments, seating themselves, along the ground for the purpose. Fire, however, was wanting; and to procure it, Shungie took my fowling-piece, and, stopping up the touch-hole, he put a small piece of linen into the pan, and endeavoured to excite a spark. But this expedient proved unsuccessful, as the lock had got rusted and would not go off; he then got some dry grass and a piece of rotten wood, and turning a small stick rapidly between his hands, in the same manner as we mill chocolate, the friction caused the touchwood, in which the point of the stick was inserted, to take fire; while, wrapping it up in the dry grass, and shaking it backward and forward, he very soon produced a flame, which he communicated to some dry sticks, and other fuel that our party had collected."
This was not, however, any sudden device of Shungie's, but merely the contrivance in general use in such emergencies among his countrymen.
"We have mentioned two New Zealanders, who are at present in this country, and have recently been exhibiting the dances and other customs of their native land, in several of our provincial towns. Among other things which they show is this method of kindling fire, and we extract from the letter of a correspondent who saw them at Birmingham, the following account of this part of their performance:—'A small board of well-dried pine was laid upon the floor, and the younger New Zealander took in his hand a wedge about nine inches long, and of the same material; then rubbing with this upon the board, in a direction parallel to the grain, he made a groove, about a quarter of an inch deep and six or seven inches long. The friction, of course, produced a quantity of what, had it been produced by another means, would have been called sawdust; and this he collected at the end of the groove farthest from that part of the board on which he was kneeling. He then continued his operation; and in a short time the wood began to smoke, the sides of the groove becoming completely charred. On this he stopped and gathered the tinder over that part of the groove which appeared to be most strongly heated. After a few moments, it became manifest that the sawdust or tinder was ignited; and a gentle application of the breath now drew forth a flame which rose to the height of several inches. This experiment did not always succeed the first time; whenever it was repeated, whether after failure or success, the operator took a new wedge and formed a new groove, and it was stated that this was absolutely necessary. The process was evidently one of very great labour; at the conclusion of it, the operator was steaming with perspiration, and his elder countryman stated that his own strength was unequal to the feat.'"
Greenstone axes, with carved wooden handles, and ornamented with dogs' hair and birds' feathers.
This method of procuring fire has, in fact, been in use from the most ancient times, and in all parts of the world. It was, as Lafitau remarks, the very method which was prescribed for rekindling the vestal fire at Rome, when it was accidentally extinguished. This writer describes it as in use also among several tribes of the Indians of South America. Among them, however, it is somewhat more artificially managed than it appears to be among the New Zealanders, inasmuch as their practice is first to make a hole in the wood with the tooth of the acouti, and then to insert in this an instrument resembling a wimble, by the rapid revolution of which the wood is set on fire.
The Baron Alexander de Humboldt gives a similar account of the manner in which the operation appears to have been performed among the ancient Mexicans, who adopted this method of rekindling their fires, on their general extinction at the end of every cycle of fifty-two years.
In a letter which Humboldt has printed at the conclusion of his work, from M. Visconti, it is remarked that we find mention made of this contrivance both in Homer's "Hymn to Mercury," and in the "Argonautics" of Apollonius Rhodius. The scholiast of the latter gives a description of the process, which exactly answers to the Mexican delineation.
"On the opposite side of the river," Rutherford proceeds, "which was about half a mile wide, and not more than four feet deep in any part, about four hundred of the enemy were encamped, waiting for reinforcements. Meanwhile messengers were continually passing from the one party to the other, with messages concerning the war.
"One of them informed us that there was a white man in his party who had heard of and wished to see me; and that the chiefs, who also wished to see me, would give me permission to cross the river to meet him, and I should return unmolested whenever I thought proper. With Aimy's consent, therefore, I went across the river; but I was not permitted to go armed, nor yet to take my wife with me. When I arrived on the opposite side, several of the chiefs saluted me in the usual manner by touching my nose with theirs; and I afterwards was seated in the midst of them by the side of the white man, who told me his name was John Mawman, that he was a native of Port Jackson, and that he had run away from the 'Tees' sloop of war while she lay at this island. He had since joined the natives, and was now living with a chief named Rawmatty;[[BZ]] whose daughter he had married, and whose residence was at a place called Sukyanna,[[CA]] on the west coast, within fifty miles of the Bay of Islands. He said that he had been at the Bay of Islands a short time before, and had seen several of the English missionaries. He also said that he had heard that the natives had lately taken a vessel at a place called Wangalore, which they had plundered and then turned adrift; but that the crew had escaped in their boats and put to sea. This is the same place where the crew of the ship 'Boyd' were murdered some years before.[[CB]]
"While I remained among these people, a slave was brought up before one of the chiefs, who immediately arose from the ground, and struck him with his mery and killed him. This mery was different from any of the rest, being made of steel. The heart was taken out of the slave as soon as he had fallen, and instantly devoured by the chief who slew him. I then inquired who this chief was, and was informed that his name was Shungie, one of the two chiefs who had been at England, and had been presented to many of the nobility there, from whom he received many valuable presents; among others, a double-barrelled gun and a suit of armour, which he has since worn in many battles. His reason, they told me, for killing the slave, who was one belonging to himself, was that he had stolen the suit of armour, and was running away with it to the enemy, when he was taken prisoner by a party stationed on the outskirts of the encampment. This was the only act of theft which I ever saw punished in New Zealand.
"Although Shungie has been two years among Europeans, I still consider him to be one of the most ferocious cannibals in his native country. He protects the missionaries who live on his ground entirely for the sake of what he can get from them.
"I now returned to my own party. Early the next morning the enemy retreated to a distance of about two miles from the river; upon observing which our party immediately threw off their mats, and got under arms. The two parties had altogether about two thousand muskets among them, chiefly purchased from the English and American South Sea ships which touch at the island. We now crossed the river; and, having arrived on the opposite side, I took my station on a rising ground, about a quarter of a mile distant from where our party halted, so that I had a full view of the engagement.
"I was not myself required to fight, but I loaded my double-barrelled gun, and, thus armed, remained at my post, my wife and the two slave girls having seated themselves at my feet.
"The commander-in-chief of each party now stepped forward a few yards, and, placing himself in front of his troops, commenced the war-song. When this was ended both parties danced a war-dance, singing at the same time as loud as they could, and brandishing their weapons in the air.
"Having finished their dance, each party formed into a line two-deep, the women and boys stationing themselves about ten yards to the rear.
"The two bodies then advanced to within about a hundred yards of each other, when they fired off their muskets. Few of them put the musket to the shoulder while firing it, but merely held it at the charge. They only fired once; and then, throwing their muskets behind them, where they were picked up by the women and boys, drew their merys and tomahawks out of their belts, when, the war-song being screamed by the whole of them together in a manner most dismal to be heard, the two parties rushed into close combat.
"They now took hold of the hair of each other's heads with their left hands, using the right to cut off the head. Meantime the women and boys followed close behind them, uttering the most shocking cries I ever heard. These last received the heads of the slain from those engaged in the battle as soon as they were cut off, after which the men went in among the enemy for the dead bodies; but many of them received bodies that did not belong to the heads they had cut off.
"The engagement had not lasted many minutes, when the enemy began to retreat, and were pursued by our party through the woods. Some of them, in their flight, crossed the hill on which I stood; and one threw a short jagged spear at me as he passed, which stuck in the inside of my left thigh. It was afterwards cut out by two women with an oyster-shell. The operation left a wound as large as a common-sized tea-cup; and after it had been performed I was carried across the river on a woman's back to my hut, where my wife applied some green herbs to the wound, which immediately stopped the bleeding, and also made the pain much less severe.
"In a short time our party returned victorious, bringing along with them many prisoners. Persons taken in battle, whether chiefs or not, become slaves to those who take them. One of our chiefs had been shot by Shungie, and the body was brought back, and laid upon some mats before the huts. Twenty heads, also, were placed upon long spears, which were stuck up around our huts; and nearly twice as many bodies were put to the fires, to be cooked in the accustomed way.
"Our party continued dancing and singing all night; and the next morning they had a grand feast on the dead bodies and fern-roots, in honour of the victory they had gained. The name of the chief whose body lay in front of our huts was Ewanna. He was one of those who were at the taking of our vessel. His body was now cut into several pieces, which, being packed into baskets, covered with black mats, were put into one of the canoes, to be taken along with us down the river. There were, besides Ewanna, five other chiefs killed on our side, whose names were Nainy, Ewarree, Tometooi, Ewarrehum, and Erow.[[CC]] On the other side, three chiefs were killed, namely, Charly, Shungie's eldest son, and two sons of Mootyi,[[CD]] a great chief of Sukyanna. Their heads were brought home by our people as trophies of war, and cured in the usual manner.
"We now left Kipara in a number of canoes, and proceeded down the river to a place called Shaurakke,[[CE]] where the mother of one of the chiefs who was killed resided.
"When we arrived in sight of this place, the canoes all closed together, and joined in singing a funeral song.
"By this time, several of the hills before us were crowded with women and children, who, having their faces painted with ochre, and their heads adorned with white feathers, were waving their mats, and calling out to us 'ara mi, ara mi,' the usual welcome home.
"When the funeral song was ended, we disembarked from our canoes, which we hauled up from the river, and our party then performed a dance, entirely naked; after which they were met by another party of warriors, from behind the hill, with whom they engaged in a sham fight, which lasted about twenty minutes. Both parties then seated themselves around the house belonging to the chief of the village, in front of which the baskets containing the dead body were at the same time placed. They were then all opened, and the head, being taken out and decorated with feathers, was placed on the top of one of the baskets; while the rest of the heads that had been taken at the battle were stuck on long spears, in various parts of the village. Meanwhile, the mother of the slain chief stood on the roof of the house, dressed in a feathered cloak and turban, continually turning herself round, wringing her hands, and crying for the loss of her son.
"The dead body having been in a few days buried with the usual ceremonies, we all prepared to return to our own village. Shaurakke is one of the most delightful spots in New Zealand, and has more cultivated land about it than I saw anywhere else. While I was here, I saw a slave-woman eat part of her own child, which had been killed by the chief, her master. I have known several instances of New Zealand women eating their children as soon as they were born."
FOOTNOTES:
Kaipara.
Raumati.
Another rendition of Hokianga.
Mr. Craik adds a note stating that the place which Rutherford here calls Wangalore is Wangaroa. (The proper spelling is Whangaroa.) The ship, he says, was the "Mercury," of London, South Sea whaler, which put in at Wangaroa on March 5th, 1825, and was plundered of the greater part of her cargo by the natives. She was also so much disabled by the attack made upon her that, after a vain attempt to carry her round to the Bay of Islands, it was found necessary to abandon her, when she drove to sea, and asserted that no cause of offence whatever was given to the natives by the captain or crew of the "Mercury," while the conduct of the former was in all respects treacherous, unfeeling, and provoking.
All the names are spelt wrongly.
Probably Matui or Matohi.
Evidently Hauraki, which, however, is on the east coast, while Knipara is on the west.