W. T. L. Tr AVERS. — The Life and Times of Te Rauparaha. 55 



care to provide for such supplies of food as would carry them through the 

 first stage of their intended journey, whilst he also determined in detail the 

 principal arrangements , for the entire march. These preparations having all 

 been satisfactorily completed by the beginning of the year 1819, he visited 

 Waikato, for the last time, in order to bid farewell to Kukutai, to Pehikorehu, 

 to Wherowhero, to Te Kanawa, and to all the chiefs of Waikato, saying to 

 them, " Farewell ; remtiin on our land at Kawhia ; I am- going to take Kapiti 

 for myself, do not follow me." He then returned to Kawhia, where he at 

 once assembled his tribe and started for the South, the number )ea\dng 

 Kawhia itself, including persons of all ages, being about 400, of whom 170 

 were tried fighting men. On the morning of the day of their departure, he 

 and his people came out of their pa at Te Arawi, having previously burned 

 the carved house named Te Urungu-Paraoa-a-te-Titi-Matama. They then 

 ascended the hill at Moeatoa, and looking back to Kawhia were very sad at 

 leaving the home of their fathers. They cried over it, and bade it farewell, 

 saying, " Kawhia remain here ! The people of Kawhia are going to Kapiti, 

 to Waipounamu." 



Savage, even ruthless, as those people may have been, we can still under- 

 stand their sorrow at leaving their ancestral possessions. " The love of the 

 New Zealander for his land is not," says Mr. White (from whom I have 

 before quoted on this point), " the love of a child for his toys. His title is 

 connected with many and powerful associations in his mind ; his love for the 

 homes of his fathers being connected with the deeds of their bravery, with 

 the feats of his own boyhood, and the long rest of his ancestors for genera- 

 tions." Every nook and inlet of the beautiful harbour of Kawhia was 

 endeared to the departing people, not only by its picturesque beauty, which 

 the New Zealander fully appreciates, but also by its association with the 

 most ancient traditions of the tribe. Every hill, every valley, was connected, 

 in their memory, with scenes of childish joy, whilst many of the singular and 

 gloomy caverns in which the district abounds, were crowded with the remains 

 of their ancestors, and were the subjects of their reverence and awe ; and from 

 these circumstances, not less than from the uncertainty which necessarily hung 

 over the future of the tribe, we may estimate the strength of their faith in 

 the sagacity of the chief who had induced them to embark in so remarkable a 

 project. 



The march was at length commenced, and at the end of the third or fourth 

 day the people arrived at the Pa of Puohoki, where Te Rauparaha determined 

 on leaving, under a sujQScient guard, a number of the women (including his 

 own wife, Akau) who, by reason of pregnancy, was unfit for travel. The 

 remainder of the tribe continued their journey, and settled for the season at 

 Waitara, Kaweka, and Taranaki, living in the pas of the Ngatiawa and 



