CHAP. XXII.] OPARAU RIVER. 311 



carry Mr. Best's knapsack. Te Kiwi had become a 

 convert to Christianity, and had a kind and feeling 

 heart, although in his younger days a renowned 

 cannibal. His costume was most peculiar : he was 

 dressed in a shabby black dress-coat and trousers, 

 the offcast of a missionary's clerical wardrobe, with 

 an extremely dilapidated gossamer hat on his head. 



On the 20th we went in a canoe to Oparau, a 

 small river a little to the northward of the Awaroa. 

 Its banks are of moderate height : the soil is a good 

 loamy earth, and covered with a luxuriant vegeta- 

 tion of fern and flax. We halted in a native potato- 

 plantation, not far from the harbour, as our com- 

 panions, amongst whom was Te Waro, a chief from 

 the river Waipa, who had offered to accompany us 

 into the interior, had not yet all arrived. 



The next day our road led us up the hills, which 

 ascend gently from the sea. We kept along the 

 ridges, and had to pass several ravines and narrow 

 valleys. The formation of the hills, as was shown 

 by the fragments which appeared on the surface, is 

 volcanic : they consisted of a solid basaltic matrix, 

 with numerous pentagonal columns of augite. Many 

 parts of these hills are covered only with fern ; others, 

 especially in the ravines, are still clothed with forest, 

 which seems to have formerly covered the whole. 

 We stopped at a very ancient rata-tree : its stem was 

 fifty-four feet round, and, having been hollowed 

 out by fire, served for a convenient shelter to the 

 natives. It was " tapu," that is, no one was allowed 



