Behind the forest pillars or beneath the fallen logs, what perfect cover had the backwoodsmen, trained to all woodcraft and inured to a hunter's life, where subsistence often depended upon patient stalking and accuracy of aim!
Almost similar conditions prevailed in this guerilla warfare to which England's armaments stood committed. The "mute Maori" glided through the underbrush or amid the fern, himself invisible, until he arose in open order before the astonished troops.
"At times a warning trumpet note, At times a stifled hum,"
he had winded from afar. Reckless in assault as elusive in retreat, the desperate Maori seemed a demoniac foe. Living on fern-root, shell-fish, or kumera, he needed no baggage. The women of the tribe, mingling with the warriors, cooked the necessary food, carried off the wounded, and were not averse to occasional fighting. With ten thousand regular troops, as well as levies of militia and volunteers against them, with powerful tribes of their own race, rusés and daring as themselves, who fought for the pakeha with a ferocity not exceeded in the bloodiest tribal wars, their position appeared hopeless. Still the stubborn Maori held his own. In staying power, as in other respects, the aboriginal, the Briton of the South, displayed his similarity to his Northern prototype. No such conflict had been waged by an aboriginal race against the arms of civilization since the Iceni and the Brigantes confronted Cæsar's legions, fought the world's masters for generation after generation, century after century, till, wearied with the profitless strife and barren occupation, they withdrew, and left the savage inhabitants to a climate of such rigour and gloom that they alone seemed to be its fitting inhabitants. Such for a time appeared to be no improbable finale to the Waikato war. Months, even years, passed without tangible result, without solid advantage to the invaders.
So the seasons wore on, until Massinger began to look upon himself less as a colonist than a soldier. "The reveillé," the bugle-call, became familiar to him and his companions; for neither Slyde nor Warwick, more than himself, dreamed of quitting service until the war was over, the play played out.
Both Englishmen had been wounded at different times, but so far not severely. They were commencing to feel the true fatalism of the soldier, convinced that they were invulnerable until their predestined hour. They came to be well known among the forces, with their guide, from whom they were rarely separated. With no personal interest in the matter, with no land to defend, no interest to conserve, they remained simply because they happened to be on the spot, and, coming of fighting blood, had no power to withdraw themselves from the fascination of battle, murder, and sudden death.
Strange as it seemed to Massinger, they had never happened to meet Erena. They heard of her from time to time, but Mannering and his hapu, though always at the front, were either in another direction when they fell across the Ngapuhi contingent, or the Forest Rangers were on outpost duty.
Nor was intelligence wanting of traits of heroism on her part in the numerous skirmishes and sorties of which her father was the leader. Dressed like his Maori allies, with a plume of feathers in his hair, with cartridge-pouch and waistbelt accoutred proper, wherever the fight was fiercest, high above friend and foe rose the tall form of Allister Mannering.
And ever as the battle-waves surged forward, or were rolled back by superior forces, the eager, fearless face, the huntress form of Erena was seen, disdainful of danger as the fabled goddess in the Trojan war. Her chosen band of dusky maidens—relatives or near friends—accepted her guidance, and surrounded her in every engagement; many a wounded soldier or native ally had they borne from the fray, or succoured when wounded and helpless on the field. Often had they warned outlying settlers when the prowling taua was approaching the unsuspecting family. Nay, it was asserted that had Erena's counsel been taken, her letter regarded, the murder of the missionary, with wife and babes, might have been averted. Sometimes near, sometimes afar, but never absolutely within speech or vision, the situation to Massinger's aroused imagination became tantalizing to such a painful degree that he felt resolved to terminate it without further delay.