34 Transactions. 



assumed a more friendly aspect, and began to trade ; but as soon as they had 

 obtained what they wanted, they refused to give up the equivalent, and 

 laughed at all menace of consequences, till they suffered wounds or death as a 

 punishment, and then the survivors paddled off for a time. These accounts 

 are confirmed, in all particulars, by other voyagers who visited New Zealand 

 during the latter part of the last, and the earlier part of the present century, 

 and lead to the conclusion that, prior to the year 1818, the native population 

 was very large ; and although we know, as I have before observed, that 

 neighbouring tribes had been for ages constantly engaged in war with one 

 another, it would also seem that the general results of their conflicts had not, 

 until after the introduction of fire-arms, been such as materially to interfere 

 with the maintenance of their numbers. 



Mr. Manning, one of the judges of the Native Lands Court, a gentleman 

 whose opportunities of acquiring knowledge on this subject have been 

 unrivalled, also bears testimony to the former large numbers of the native 

 people. " The natives," he says, " are unanimous in affirming that they were 

 much more numerous in former times than they are now, and I am convinced 

 that such was the case for many reasons." In support of this opinion, he 

 refers to the existence, in most parts of the North Island, of numerous hill- 

 forts or pas, many of them so large as to have required immense labour to 

 trench, terrace, and fence. As he points out, the absence of iron tools must 

 have greatly increased the difficulty of constructing these fortresses; whilst, even 

 with the aid of such tools, the present population of the surrounding districts 

 would, in most cases, be insufficient to erect them within any reasonable time. 

 He also mentions that many of these forts were of such an extent that, taking 

 into consideration the system of attack and defence necessarily used before the 

 introduction of fire-arms, they would have been utterly untenable, unless held 

 by at least ten times the number of men which the whole neighbourhood, for 

 a distance of two or three days' journey, can now produce ; and as, in those 

 times of constant war, the natives, as a rule, slept in their hill-forts with 

 closed gates, the bridges over the trenches removed, and the ladders of the 

 terraces drawn up, it is evident that the inhabitants of each fort, though 

 numerous, consisted only of the population of the country in its close 

 vicinity. 



" From the top of one of these pointed, trenched, and terraced hilk," says 

 Mr. Manning, " I have counted twenty others, all of equally large dimensions, 

 and all within a distance, in every direction, of fifteen to twenty miles ; and 

 native tradition affirms, that each of these hills was the stronghold of a separate 

 hapu, or clan, bearing its distinctive name." We have, moreover, evidence 

 that vast tracts of land which are now wild, and have been so for time 

 out of mind, were once fully and carefully cultivated. The ditches for 



