Heapuy.—On Port Nicholson and the Natives in 1839. 39 
ately wounded, and supported themselves on the shoulder or hand of their 
neighbour, decorously to pay the melancholy rite. 
But a party of men were still out amongst the sand-hills burying the 
dead of the enemy, or bringing in the corpse of a friend. Before we en- 
tered the pa we noticed, standing on a provision stage high up above the 
stockade, a woman, who appeared by her violent gesticulations to be much 
excited. Closely following us as we passed into the stockade was a litter- 
party carrying a dead body, the last of the missing. Suddenly there was a 
heavy fall, or thud, close by us; it was the woman from the high stage, 
recognizing at last the corpse of her son she had frantically thrown herself 
down, nearly twenty feet, and lay there, apparently dead, while the litter- 
party passed on. Such matters were apparently of trifling moment while a 
tangt was proceeding. 
There were a number of seriously-wounded men to be attended to, and 
gun-shot to be extracted. One native had the tendon-achilles cut through, 
and the foot was drawn upward and powerless. To some bones of the arm 
and leg, fractured by shot, they had already applied splints, fairly made from 
the thick part of the leaf of the Phormium tenax. To cut and lacerated surfaces 
they had applied dressings of herbs. How far these were effective, medici- 
nally, it is impossible to say, but after a few days nearly all the wounded 
were progressing favourably and without fever. One man had his knee 
smashed by a bullet, and he was advised to submit to amputation. He 
agreed to have the operation performed, and was told about being able to 
walk with a wooden leg. The children considered there was fun to be 
found in wooden legs, and proceeded to manufacture them according to 
their lights—stumping about before the wounded man. At this ridicule he 
changed his views, and said that he would rather keep his leg and have it 
buried with him than live to be laughed at. 
Most of the wounds healed by what is termed ‘first intention." The 
severed tendon-achilles united, but with increased length and consequent 
loss of power in the foot. The Ngatiraukawa had 45 killed, and the 
defenders of the pa 14 killed and about 30 wounded. The man with the 
injured knee recovered for a time, but with a stiffened joint. Four years 
afterwards he had it removed by Dr. McShane, of Nelson. He smoked his 
pipe during the whole of the operation. 
