A tall old warrior stood in the middle of the ring, facing Bent—the prophet of the Niu. He was naked from the waist up; his face was completely covered with tattooing. He was a tohunga, or priest, Bent afterwards discovered; by name Tu-ahi-pa, or Tautahi-ariki, a man held in much awe by the people as a worker of makutu (witchcraft).
For a long time the old wizard closely eyed the pale-faced stranger before him. Then he said, through the interpreter, Kere:
"You behold this ring of people, the people of Keteonetea?"
"Yes," said Bent.
"I ask you this, will you return to your people or remain with us?"
"I will never return to the pakehas," Bent replied; "I want to live with the Maoris and to make them my people."
"Good!" exclaimed the Hauhau priest. "Now, turn your eyes upon yon fire, burning there upon the marae. Well, if you had not promised to become a Maori and live with us, the tribe would have thrown you into that blazing oven. It is well that you have spoken as you have."
This, to Bent's great relief, ended the ordeal. The Hauhaus, at a cry from the priest, began their mad march round the Niu—men, women, and children—chanting as they went their savage psalms, rolling their eyes and lifting their arms high in the air as every now and again they cried their wild refrain, "Riré, riré, hau!"—the last word literally barked out from the hundreds of throats.
When the Hauhau ceremony was at an end, a young woman who had joined in the march round the Niu came to Bent, took him away to a hut and gave him a meal of pork and potatoes, and then led him to her father's house. The father was the principal chief of the kainga, and, as it turned out, cousin to Bent's rangatira Tito.
Here the white man spent the night, the chief's daughter lying across the entrance just inside the doorway, for fear—as the chief told him—that some young desperado might take it into his head to earn a little notoriety by tomahawking the pale-face. Outside, the Maoris were gathered on the marae, by the light of great fires, the chiefs making speeches and taki-ing up and down in excited fashion, weapon in hand; now and again the fanatic crowd would burst into a loud Hauhau chant that echoed long amidst the black encircling forest. So the wild korero went on, far into the night.