CHAP. XXVI.J LAKE OF KAREKA. 387 



a taua, or a robbing excursion, into the country of 

 the Waikato, with whom the tribe of Rotu-rua is 

 in constant hostility. When we arrived at Rotu- 

 rua Captain Symonds and myself found ourselves 

 each minus a shoe, which our guides had probably 

 pilfered; but we got them again for a salvage, as 

 they said that they had found them. At Kareka 

 they fired their muskets as a signal for a canoe from 

 the other side of the lake, and at length a woman 

 came paddling over in a perfect nutshell : it was so 

 small that the least movement would have upset it ; 

 and as there was no possibility of its carrying all of 

 us, I at first determined to walk with my natives 

 along the shore, but eventually we were carried 

 over in the same canoe at its second trip. The na- 

 tives of Rotu-rua did not cross the lake, but quitted 

 us at Kareka, following another road which led to 

 their own home. They did not like to have any- 

 thing to do with the Christian natives on the other 

 side of the lake. The lake of Kareka is of an irre- 

 gular shape, about six miles in circumference ; the 

 shores are hilly or rocky, generally wooded, and the 

 soil of a fertile description. The lake is as pic- 

 turesque as those I had already passed. I was told 

 that at a little distance from this lake is another, 

 the Rotu-Kakai, but I did not see it. We pitched 

 our tents in the evening at a small settlement, the 

 commencement of a village of natives who had lately 

 become Christians : they were all busily occupied in 

 building, and amongst the houses was a large struc- 



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