63 Transacttons.— Miscellaneous. 
window, so that they might take the tapu off the wood and stones which 
they had got ready to cook him and his friends with, as the intention had 
defiled them. Having clambered through the window and embraced his 
grandson, Tuahuriri felt that he was safe; nevertheless he did not forget 
the indignity to which he had been subjected by his own relations, and he 
determined to take the first opportunity of punishing them for it. When 
returning to his own home with Kahukura te paku a few weeks afterwards, 
the people of Waimea begged Tuahuriri to come back and visit them in the 
autumn, when food would be plentiful, and they could entertain him more 
hospitably. But instead of doing so, he waited till he knew that they had 
planted their fields, and had nothing in their storehouses, then, taking one 
hundred men in addition to the seventy who went with him before, he 
re-crossed the straits. When he landed with all his followers the inhabitants 
of Waimea weleomed him very warmly, but apologised for the smallness of 
the quantity of food which they set before him, which, they assured him, was 
owing, not to inhospitality, but to the emptiness of their stores. When 
every particle of food in the place was consumed Tuahuriri returned home. 
Shortly after his departure the house he occupied was accidentally burnt 
down ; the site of it was soon covered with a luxuriant crop of wild cabbage, 
which the people of the pa were driven by hunger to gather and eat, and 
in consequence of their doing so, they all died. For the greens were tapu, 
because grown on the site of a house once occupied by Kahukura te paku 
and his grandson. The colic produced by famished people gorging on 
greens ptoved fatal because the pain was attributed to the agency of the 
offended atuas of their chiefs. "This incident throws light upon the frequent 
occurrence in past years of fatal effects arising from breaches of tapu. 
The taking of Te mata ki kai poika is the next event of importance in 
the history of Ngai Tahu. 
Tuahuriri had from some cause incurred the ill-will of a powerful 
member of his own tribe, the veteran warrior Hika oro roa, who assembled 
his relations and dependents and led them to the attack of Tuahuriri's pa, 
situated somewhere on the east coast. They reached the place at dawn of 
day, and as the leader was preparing to take the foremost place in the 
assault, à youth named Turuki, eager to distinguish himself, rushed past 
Hika oro roa, who uttered an exclamation of surprise and indignation, 
asking, in sneering tones, ** Why a nameless warrior should dare to iry and 
snatch the credit of a victory he had done nothing to win?" Turuki, 
burning with shame at the taunt, rushed back to the rear and addressed 
himself to Tutekawa, who was the head of his family, and besought him to 
withdraw his contingent and to attack the pa himself from the other side, 
and for ever prevent such a reproach from being uttered again. Tutekawa, 
