W. T. L. Travers. — The Life and Times of Te Rauparaha. 43 



Island, its entrance is somewhat impeded by sand-banks. The entrance is 

 narrow, but inside the Heads the waters spread out for many miles in length 

 and width, having numerous navigable channels leading to a series of small 

 rivers, which flow into the harbour from the eastward. At full tide, this sheet 

 of water is extremely beautiful, surrounded, as it is, with picturesque scenery, 

 which attains its highest effect at the north-east end, in the neighbourhood of 

 the Awaroa River. E-ock masses, assuming the forms of towers and castles, 

 occupy its shores, whilst the gullies and valleys of the streams which fall into 

 it contain tracts of fertile and highly cultivated soil. The character of the 

 landscape continues the same far up the slopes of the surrounding mountains, 

 the name of the " Castle Hills " hanng been given to them in allusion to the 

 masses of white limestone which emerge, in huge castellated forms, from the 

 forest with which these mountains are generally clothed. 



Between Kawhia and the Waipa valley, a little to the northward of the 

 former, is the beautiful Pirongia mountain, "an ancient, dilapidated volcano," 

 whose many peaks and ravines afford a grand spectacle when bathed in the 

 mellow light of the setting sun ; whilst the soil on its slopes, derived from the 

 decomposition of the trachytic rock of which it is composed, is of the most 

 fertile kind. The climate of the whole district is delightful, the orange and 

 the lemon yielding their fruit with a luxuriance unsurpassed even in the 

 delicious valleys of Granada. The seaward aspect of the mountain chain to 

 which I have alluded, as well as the slopes of the Pirongia, are, however, 

 densely wooded, rendering travelling through this country toilsome and 

 difficult. At the time I speak of, the Ngatimaniapoto occupied the country 

 lying along the coast to the northward, whilst the Waikato tribes, of whom 

 Te Wherowhero was the head chief, claimed the principal part of the valley of 

 the Waipa, and of the country extending to the inner shores of the Manukau. 

 To the eastward, beyond the range shutting in the Waipa valley on that side, 

 and stretching from Otawhao to Maungatautari, lay the possessions of Ngati- 

 raukawa proper, comprising some of the most fertile and beautiful country in 

 the North Island. The Ngatituwharetoa, or Taupo tribes, under the leader- 

 ship of Tukino Te Heuheu, one of the greatest of the old New Zealand 

 chieftains — a man of gigantic stature and commanding presence, and whose 

 deeds still form the theme of many a wild tale — clustered round the shores of 

 Lake Taupo, and the spurs of Tongariro. As is well known, Te Heuheu met 

 his death by an awful catastrophe in 1846, his village, Te Rapa, having been 

 overwhelmed during the night by a huge land-slip, under which he and his 

 six wives, with upwards of fifty other persons, were buried alive. 



I have thought it necessary to mention the tribe of this chief amongst the 

 others above referred to, for although he took a comparatively trifling part in 

 the events in which Te Rauparaha himself was concerned, his friendship and 



