HISTORICAL REVIEW OF NEW ZEALAND. 



997 



New Zealand language. Hongi, on his return, settled his feud and killed a large number 

 of his foes, and for the subsequent five years, aided by the superiority of his weapons, 

 carried death and destruction wherever he led the Ngapuhi people and their allies. His 

 ravages extended as far south as the East Cape, while in the Waikato some two 

 thousand persons were killed and partly eaten at a pah situated near the site of the 

 present town of Alexandra. Probably ten thousand persons were killed in his various 



A MAORI WAR-DANCE. 



raids, though many writers have not hesitated to double the number of this estimate. 

 The New Zcalanders, it may be said, do not appear to have ever been- so numerous 

 as Captain Cook, Dr. Forster and others imagined them to have been. Only the 

 harbours were visited by the early voyagers, and the natives being a race of fishermen 

 were found congregating at fishing-stations from which circumstance their numbers were 

 somewhat disproportionately estimated. 



Tin: FAII.UKI-: 01 THI: FIRST COLONIZING COMPANY. 



In 1825 the first New Zealand Association was formed in London. It was composed 

 of men of influence, among whom was Lord Durham. A vessel was fitted out for the 

 purpose of exploring the country and conveying settlers to New Zealand. The command 

 of the ship, called the Rosanna, was given to a Captain James Herd, a seaman well 

 acquainted with the New Zealand Coast. No later than the year 1822 he had been in 

 the River Hokianga in the ship rro-i'idcncc, when he witnessed a deed of conveyance 

 of land from native chiefs to one Charles, Baron de Thierry, who in his absence was 



