250 GENERAL ACCOUNT OF NEW ZEALAND CHAP, x 



by the tribe to whom they belong, and who probably 

 administer justice to them, though we never saw an instance 

 of it, except in the case of theft on board the ship, when 

 upon our complaint the offender received kicks and blows 

 from the chief with whom he came on board. 



These chiefs were generally old men : whether they had 

 the office of chief by birth or on account of their age, we 

 never learnt ; but in the other parts, where Teratu was not 

 acknowledged, we plainly learnt that the chiefs whom they 

 obeyed, of which every tribe had some, received their dignity 

 by inheritance. In the northern parts their societies seemed 

 to have many things in common, particularly their fine 

 clothes and nets ; of the former they had but few, and we 

 never saw anybody employed in making them. It might be 

 that what they had were the spoils of war. They were 

 kept in a small hut erected for that purpose in the middle 

 of the town. The latter seemed to be the joint work of 

 the whole society. Every house had in it pieces of netting 

 upon which they were engaged ; by joining these together it 

 is probable that they made the large seines which we saw. 



The women are less regarded here than in the South 

 Sea Islands, so, at least, thought Tupia, who complained of 

 it as an insult upon the sex. They eat with the men, how- 

 ever. How the sexes divide labour I do not know, but I 

 am inclined to believe that the men till the ground, fish in 

 boats, make nets, and take birds, while the women dig up 

 fern roots, collect shell -fish and lobsters near the beach, 

 dress the victuals, and weave cloth. Thus, at least, have 

 these employments been distributed, when I had an oppor- 

 tunity of observing them, which was very seldom ; for our 

 approach generally made a holiday wherever we went, men, 

 women, and children flocking to us either to satisfy their 

 curiosity or trade with us for whatever they might have. 

 They took in exchange cloth of any kind, especially linen 

 or the Indian cloth we had brought from the islands, paper, 

 glass bottles, sometimes pieces of broken glass, nails, etc. 



We saw few or no signs of religion among these people ; 

 they had no public places of worship, as the inhabitants of 





