The Review of Reviews. 



April *;, 130e. 



CcUis, Plu^Uy} IXea Phmoulh. 



Taniora Whapauroa, an old KIngite Warrior. 



felling timber. Roughly-built thatched huts were 

 dotted about under the arrowv-boiet] riintis, and as 

 we rode on the womenfoik. busv at the cooking- 

 ovens, called their invitations to stay and share their 

 food. But we cried them with one voice, " E noho 

 noi !" ('• Remain you there !"^ and pressed on to 

 Mataatua. 



We passed Maori hunters returning from the chase, 

 with their truculent-looking dogs : great-limbed men 

 wearing the rafaki k'ilt — a shawl, piece of blanket, 

 or a flax mat — with singed and dressed carcases of 

 wild pigs strapped across their shoulders ; and 

 fowlers laden with the spoil of the forest — Izaha par- 

 rots, parson-birds, and pigeons — and carrying their 

 bird-snares, consisting of carved perches not un'.ike 

 rrooked dead tree-branches in appearance, with 

 snaring-tackle of plaited flax fibre. The bushmen 

 of Tuhoe are expert in the capture of the " wing- 

 flapping children of Tane," without the aid of 

 powder and shot, ajid though the young generation 

 prefer the fowling-piece, the older men still on 

 occasion practise the olden arts and lures, particu- 



larly the pipe, or call-leaf, by which the birds are 

 cunningly enticed within easy striking distance. 



About evening \vt climbed out of the bed of a 

 rushing river, and before us, on the edge of the open 

 \alley of Ruatahuna, hemmed in on all sides bv 

 misty blue ranges, was our destination — a pretty 

 village, with its tree-clumps and its squares of cul- 

 tivations, some of its houses shingled, some covered 

 with great brown strips of /^/ara-bark, and the roof 

 of a great council-house gleaming in the setting sun. 

 Right over us, on a clifF-verge, rose the terraced 

 front and flat-topped citadel of a palisaded pa — a 

 stockade with posts carved in the semblance ol 

 gigantic human figures, whose baleful saucer-eyes, 

 inlaid ■nith haliotis-shell, glared defiance. Then as 

 we mounted the bank, we halted, and one of our 

 part)' went on to announce us, in accordance with 

 Maori etiquette, before we entered the village square. 



This Ruatahuna Valley has been the central home 

 of the Urewera people for many centuries. The his- 

 tor\- of this district, as handed down by word of 

 mouth from generation to generation, goes back for 

 nearly a thousand years. Mataatua village is named 

 after the famous ancestral canoe which brought the 

 Polynesian ancestors of the tribe to the shores of 

 the Bay of Plenty-. A conringent of warriors from 

 this valley marched to VVaikato in 1864, and fought 

 desperately against the British soldiers in the battle 

 of Orakau, side by side with Rewi and his Ngati- 

 maniapoto : one of the survivors of this war partv 

 is our old guide Paitini, who was wounded at 

 Orakau. Later, in the Hauhau wars of 1865-71. 

 Ruatahuna was an Alsatia for the fiercest spirits of 

 Maoridom, and here Te Kooti sheltered after his 

 escape from the prison-isle of the Chatharas in 1868. 

 Two columns of colonial troops, one marching from 

 Galatea under Colonel Whitmore, and the other 

 (Colonel St. John's) from Whakatane, fought their 

 way up to Mataatua. St. John's force stormed and 

 captured Orangikawa Pa, just at the back of the 

 \-ilIage, losing one officer. Captain Travers, shot 

 dead bv the Hauhaus. Afterwards several Govern- 

 ment war-parties, under European and Maori offi- 

 cers, skirmished up through these cafions and 

 forests ; and in the neighbourhood of Mataatua. 

 Major Kopata Wahawaha — ^the most notable of the 

 Maori chiefs who fought on the side of the white 

 man — built a redoubt and garrisoned it against the 

 bushmen of Tuhoe until 1871. 



The pa by which we halted is a modem model 

 fort, constructed by the Tuho6. It is of small size, 

 measuring about 110 feet by 90 feet, and is but a 

 " dummv " pa, but the fence {Kiri-tangata — literally 

 " The VVarrior's Skin ") is a good example of the 

 old-time palisading, with its boldly car\-ed Himu 

 posts, its lashings of Akaaka forest-vines, and its 

 gatewav (Waharoa) carved out of a solid block of 

 Totara! This little pa is named " Te Tahi te 

 Rangi," after an ancestral chief who, according to 

 legend, became a Maraki-hau, or merman, and 



