CHAP. XI.] 191 



CHAPTER XL 



The Natives inhabiting the Shores of Cook's Straits. 



THE natives inhabiting both shores of Cook's Straits 

 were at the time of my arrival placed in a position 

 which could not fail to awaken my deepest interest. 

 Although their number is not large, taking them as 

 a whole, yet they live so much dispersed in small 

 tribes that they occupy a long coast-line. For the 

 last fifteen or twenty years they have associated 

 with Europeans, who have lived amongst them 

 as traders or as whalers ; and they were annually 

 visited by many whaling- vessels. Mutual advantage, 

 and the connection of almost all these Europeans 

 with native women, from which connection a healthy 

 and fine-looking half-caste race has sprung up (about 

 160 in number), kept the white men and natives in 

 harmony with each other, and has cemented their 

 union. Thus we find Europeans arrayed against 

 Europeans in the combats of the different tribes 

 amongst whom they lived, or emigrating with them 

 to another locality, or following the hazardous chase 

 of the whale with a crew of natives. When dead 

 they were bewailed as brothers by these sons of 

 nature, and a painted canoe erected as an ornament 



