Censurable Supineness of the Government. 135 



countrymen, and supported by ambitious, crafty, intriguing 

 foreigners, was speedily master of the situation, and it is 

 much less matter of surprise that in 1858 a king was chosen 

 in the person of Potatau*-te- Where- Where, one of the most 

 renowned of tlie Waikato tribe, than that the Government, 

 from the year 1854, suffered this conduct to go unpunished, 

 and with cool indifference beheld the movement grow in pro- 

 portion without taking the slightest precautionary measures ! 



Only by such indulgence, not to say negligence, did it be- 

 come possible for the native league against the sale of land, 

 and the accompanying King movement, to have attained 

 their present importance, the number engaged in them hav- 

 ing risen to a total of 15,000 able-bodied warriors. Since 

 the restrictions recently placed on the importation of weapons 

 and ammunition, there have been imported during the last 

 three years fire-arms, powder, lead, and caps to the value of 

 £50,000, so that we may estimate their present supply of 

 gun-powder at 100,000 lbs. at the least, and the fire-arms, 

 exclusive of those imported at the time of Hongi, at about 

 20,000 stand. 



Already, at Christmas, 1858, when the staff of our Expedi' 

 tion were passing a week or two in Auckland, there was a 



* Potatau (i. e. shriek by night) was so far back as 1833, during the bloody con- 

 tests of the Waikatos against the Taranaki, a renowned warrior and cannibal, who at 

 that period, according to undoubted authority, had with his own hand slain 200 of 

 the foe, and had returned home from the battle-field satiated with human flesh, and 

 rich in slaves. In the evening of his days he was an advocate of peace, and a friend 

 of the whites. When he died, in 1860, his son, second of the name, was declared his 

 successor. 



