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carried in his hand, displaying it.) “See, this is my food, the food of my ancestors, the food of the Native people. Pshaw, Governor! To think of tempting men—us Natives—with baits of clothing and of food! Yes, I say we are the chiefs. If all were to be alike, all equal in rank with thee—but thou, the Governor up high—up, up, as this tall paddle” (here he held up a common canoe-paddle), “and I down, under, beneath! No, no, no. I will never say, ‘Yes, stay.’ Go back, return; make haste away. Let me see you [all] go, thee and thy ship. Go, go; return, return.”[1]
Tareha was clothed with a filthy piece of coarse old floor-matting, loosely tied round him, such as is used by the commonest Natives merely as a floor-mat under their bedding. He was evidently dressed up in this fashion in order the more effectually to ridicule the supposition of the New-Zealanders being in want of any extraneous aid of clothing, &c., from foreign nations. He also carried in his hand, by a string, a bunch of dried fern-root, formerly their common vegetable food, as bread with us. His habit, his immense size—tall and very robust (being by far the biggest Native of the whole district)—and his deep sepulchral voice, conspired to give him peculiar prominence, and his words striking effect: this last was unmistakably visible on the whole audience of Natives.
Rawiri, a chief of the Ngatitautahi Tribe, arose and said (first sentence in English), “Good morning, Mr. Governor! very good you! Our Governor, our Father! Stay here, O Governor! Sit, that we may be in peace. A good thing this for us—yes, for us, my friends, Native men, Stay, sit. Do thou remain, O Governor! to be a Governor for us.”
Hoani Heke, a chief of the Matarahurahu Tribe, arose and said, “To raise up, or to bring down? to raise up, or to bring down? Which? which? Who knows? Sit,
- ↑ Here I should state that those chiefs, Rewa, Moka, Tareha, and Hakiro, were all from Kororareka, their residence being close to the Roman Catholic bishop’s.
