“There is an island out in the ocean not far from here to the eastward. It is full of birds—both land and sea-birds—of all kinds, some living in the peaty soil, with albatross in plenty on the outlying islands. There is abundance of sea and shell-fish; the lakes swarm with eels; and it is a land of the karaka. The inhabitants are very numerous, but they do not know how to fight, and have no weapons.”
“TE HONGI”
His hearers saw a vision of a Maori El Dorado! But how was it to be reached? In canoes they could not venture so far, nor did they know the way. Doubtless, however, they remembered how Stewart of the Elisabeth had carried Rauparaha and his warriors to Akaroa in the hold of his brig a few years before. Another brig, the Rodney, was in Cook’s Strait now, seeking a cargo of scraped flax. Her captain, Harewood, was not such a villain as Stewart; but if he could not be bribed he could be terrified—so thought the Ngatiawa. In Port Nicholson (Wellington harbour) lies a little islet with a patch of trees on it, like a tuft of hair on a shaven scalp. Nowadays it is used as a quarantine place for dogs and other doubtful immigrants. Thither the Ngatiawa decoyed Harewood and a boat’s crew, and then seizing the men, cajoled or frightened the skipper into promising to carry them across the sea to their prey. Whether Harewood made much ado about transporting the filibustering cannibals to the Chathams will probably never be known. He seems to have had some scruples, but they were soon overcome, either by fear or greed. Once the bargain was struck he performed his part of it without flinching. The work of transport was no light task. No less than nine hundred of the Maori of Cook’s Strait had resolved to take part in the enterprise, so much had Rauparaha’s freebooting exploits in the south inflamed and unsettled his tribe. To carry this invading horde to the scene of their enterprise the Rodney had to make two trips. On the first of them the Maori were packed in the hold like the negroes on a slaver, and when water ran short suffered miseries of thirst. Had the Moriori known anything of war they might easily have repelled their enemies. As it was, the success of the invasion was prompt and complete. Without losing a man the Maori soon took possession of the Chathams and their inhabitants. The land was parcelled out among the new-comers, and the Moriori and their women tasted the bitterness of enslavement by insolent and brutal savages. They seem to have done all that submissiveness could do to propitiate their swaggering lords. But no submissiveness could save them from the cruelty of barbarians drunk with easy success. Misunderstandings between master and slave would be settled with a blow from a tomahawk. On at least two occasions there were massacres, the results either of passion or panic. In one of these fifty Moriori were killed; in the other, perhaps three times that number of all ages and sexes. On the second occasion the dead were laid out in a line on the sea-beach, parents and children together, so that the bodies touched each other. The dead were of course eaten; it is said that as many as fifty were baked in one oven. I have read, moreover, that the Maori coolly kept a number of their miserable slaves penned up, feeding them well, and killed them from time to time like sheep when butcher’s meat was wanted. This last story is, I should think, doubtful, for as the whole island was but one large slave-pen, there could be no object in keeping victims shut up in a yard. The same story has been told of Rauparaha’s treatment of the islanders of Kapiti. But Kapiti is but a few miles from the main shore, and one of his destined victims, a woman, is said to have swum across the strait with her baby on her back. The unhappy Moriori had nowhere to flee to, unless they were to throw themselves into the sea. The white traders and sealers on the coast were virtually in league with their oppressors. The only escape was death, and that way they were not slow to take. Chroniclers differ as to the precise disease which played havoc with them, but I should imagine that the pestilence which walked among them in the noonday was Despair. At any rate their number, which had been 2000 in 1836, was found to be 212 in 1855. The bulk of the race had then found peace in the grave. It is a relief to know that the sufferings of the survivors had by that time come to an end. Long before 1855 the British flag had been hoisted on the Chathams and slavery abolished. After a while the New Zealand Government insisted upon a certain amount of land being given back to the Moriori. It was a small estate, but it was something. The white man, now lord of all, made no distinction between the two brown races, and in process of time the Maori, themselves reduced to a remnant, learned to treat the Moriori as equals. These better days, however, came too late. The Moriori recognised this. For in 1855, seeing that their race was doomed, they met together and solemnly agreed that the chronicles of their people should be arranged and written down, so that when the last was dead, their name and story should not be forgotten. The conquering Maori themselves did not fare so much better. They stood the test of their easy success as badly as did Pizarro’s filibusters in Peru. They quarrelled with their friends, the white traders and sealers, and suffered in an unprovoked onslaught by the crew of a certain French ship, the Jean Bart. Then two of the conquering clans fell out and fought with each other. In the end a number of them returned to New Zealand, and the remainder failed to multiply or keep up their strength in the Chathams. In the present day Moriori and Maori together—for their blood has mingled—do not number two hundred souls.
WAHINE’S CANOE RACE ON THE WAIKATO
The affair of the Jean Bart is a curious story. The vessel, a French whaler, anchored off the Chathams in 1839. Eager to trade, the Maori clambered on board in numbers. They began chaffering, and also quarrelling with one another, in a fashion that alarmed the captain. He gave wine to some of his dangerous visitors, and tried to persuade them to go ashore again. Many did so, but several score were still in the ship when she slipped her cable and stood out to sea. Then the Frenchmen, armed with guns and lances, attacked the Maori, who were without weapons, and cleared the decks of them. The fight, however, did not end there. A number of the Ngatiawa were below, whither the whites did not venture to follow them. They presently made their way into a storeroom, found muskets there, and opened fire on the crew. Two of the Frenchmen fell, and the remainder in panic launched three boats and left the ship. By this time the Jean Bart was out of sight of land, but the Maori managed to sail back. She went ashore, and was looted and burnt. About forty natives had been killed in the strange bungling and causeless slaughter. The whalers and their boats were heard of no more. It is thought that they were lost in the endeavour to make New Zealand.[6]
[6] In the Journal of the Polynesian Society, vol. i., Mr. A. Shand summarises and compares the various versions of this odd business.
We have seen how the Maori began their invasion of the Chathams by the seizure of the Rodney at Port Nicholson. It is curious that the best-known incident of the subsequent history of the group was almost the exact converse of this—I mean the seizure at the Chathams of the schooner Rifleman in July 1868. In this case, too, the aggressors were Maori, though they did not belong to the Chathams. They were prisoners of war or suspected natives deported thither from the North Island, and kept there under loose supervision by a weak guard. Their leader, Te Kooti, had never borne arms against us, and had been imprisoned and exiled on suspicion merely. A born leader of men, he contrived the capture of the Rifleman very cleverly, and sailed her back to the North Island successfully, taking with him one hundred and sixty-three men and one hundred and thirty-five women and children. The schooner was carrying a respectable cargo of ammunition, accoutrements, food, and tobacco; but the fugitives could muster between them only about thirty rifles and guns. Yet with this scanty supply of weapons Te Kooti managed to kindle a flame in the Poverty Bay district that took years to extinguish. Finally, after massacring many settlers, and winning or losing a series of fights with our militia and their native allies, his forces were scattered, and he was hunted away with a few followers into the country of the Maori king. There he was allowed to settle undisturbed. He lived long enough to be forgiven, to have his hand shaken by our Native Minister, and to have a house with a bit of land given to him by the Government. He was not a chivalrous opponent. A savage, he made war in savage fashion. But he was a capable person; and I cannot resist the conclusion that in being banished to the Chathams and kept there without trial, he was given reason to think himself most unjustly used.