W. T. L. Travers.—The Life and Times of Te Rauparaha. 41 
even to Taranaki ; and they also came in their canoes as far South as Ahuriri 
or Hawke’s Bay, remorselessly destroying everywhere as they went. The tribes 
further North were also fighting against each other—the Rarawa destroying 
the Aopuri, who were very numerous about the North Cape. Te Wherowhero, 
at the head of his people, was slaughtering, for many years, on the West 
Coast, from Taranaki to Wanganui; Te Waharoa, and other chiefs, in the 
interior and overland to Hawke’s Bay ; the Rotorua tribes in the Bay of 
Plenty ; and Te Rauparaha exterminating in the neighbourhood of Cook 
Straits and along the East Coast of the Middle Island. From 1822 to 1837 
was truly a fearful period in New Zealand. Blood flowed like water, and 
there can be no doubt that the numbers killed during this period of twenty 
years, including those who perished in consequence of the wars, far exceeded 
60,000 persons.” 
The preliminary sketch contained in the foregoing chapters, though brief, 
will, I hope, convey to my readers a sufliciently clear idea of the manners 
and customs, and character of the New Zealanders, and of the condition of 
the tribes previously to the systematic colonization of the Islands, and will, 
be found to aid them materially in understanding the events which will 
be detailed in the following pages. It shows, moreover, the frightful results 
brought about by placing the deadly weapons of European warfare, in the 
hands of a savage and warlike race, whilst still uncontrolled by those milder 
influences, to which, notwithstanding their ferocity, the New Zealanders have 
shown themselves so singularly open and amenable. 
CHAPTER IIL. 
Ar the time of the birth of Te Rauparaha, and, indeed, for many genera- 
tions before that event, the Ngatitoa tribe occupied the country lying between 
Kawhia and Mokau on the western side of the North Island, and extending 
backward, from the coast line, to the seaward slopes of the beautiful Pirongia 
mountain, and of the chain of hills to the southward, which bounds the 
valleys of the Waipa and the Mangarama. This tribe, in fact, claims to have 
held the country in question ever since its settlement by their ancestor, 
Hoturoa, a leading chief amongst those who are said to have come from 
Hawaiki in the “Tainui” canoe. It will be remembered that this canoe was 
dragged across the portage at Otahuhu after the disputes between Tama 
Te Kapu and Manaia about the dead whale, its chiefs and their followers 
settling in and around Kawhia, and their descendants gradually spreading to 
the eastward as far as Maungatautari. The Maoris, in various parts of the 
Islands, believe that several of the canoes in which their ancestors came from 
Hawaiki have been transformed into stone, and a remarkable block of lime- 
stone, close to the sea-shore, on the north side of the harbour of Kawhia, is 
F 
