422 Transactions. — Miscellaneous. 



were still living when I was at Tahiti in 1844. Each of these expeditions 

 had an influence upon our own land : Sydney, by the influx of settlers and 

 convicts, rapidly became populous ; ere long vessels were built there, and 

 trading or exploring voyages undertaken. Those colonists were early 

 stimulated to engage in the whaling trade, which London merchants, 

 aroused by the narratives of Wallis, Carteret, and Cook, by the beginning 

 of this century were pushing in the southern hemisphere (French priva- 

 teers having rendered cruising in the north too hazardous) ; and both 

 English and colonial whale-ships soon began to resort to New Zealand for 

 wood and water, pork and potatoes, these latter already abundant from 

 Cook's introduction of them. A life of adventure and excitement was 

 congenial to Maori temperament ; they shipped for a cruise, usually with a 

 proviso that then* discharge should take place at the port of departure, a 

 stipulation too often disregarded when its execution was inconvenient to the 

 master. Indeed, a New South Wales Governor (Macquarie) found it neces- 

 sary to issue a proclamation against kidnapping New Zealanders and 

 making them serve as sailors against their will. In these modes some 

 Maoris found their way both to London and Sydney ; whilst to this nearer 

 port others went in trading vessels as passengers, being intent upon pro- 

 curing axes and iron tools, but more especially covetous of the posses- 

 sion of firearms, whose deadly effects they had seen in all their early 

 communications with the whites. Cook, a fairly humane man, had 

 shot seven in his first week in New Zealand ; and three years later 

 Marion du Fresne, in retaliation for the slaughter of some of his crew, 

 attacked a fa at the Bay of Islands and shot a large number of its 

 inhabitants. 



Many years back I tried to find out when the northern natives first 

 became possessed of guns, and put the question to an aged chief of Ngati- 

 wai Jiajm — the same people who had come into collision with Marion. 

 He had not heard of any guns being captured when the Frenchmen were 

 killed at Manawaora, but told me that he had helped to get the first gun 

 that he knew of their possessing. He said that a party of sailors had 

 landed some casks to get water, and, as it was cold, had made a fire to 

 warm themselves by whilst the water was running by a spout into the 

 casks. One of the crew walked up and down with a musket, as a sentinel, 

 showing that amicable relations with the islanders could not be trusted to, 

 but as no Maoris were visible he rested his gun against the steep bank of 

 the gully, walked to the fire and, warming his hands, chatted to his com- 

 rades. Three young natives had, however, been watching the movements 

 of the sailors, and marking the opportunity, one of them crept from his 



