seat myself beside him upon the unrolled mat. He scanned with 
his flashing , black eyes the group of my companions , who saluted 
him most reverentially, and then addressed to me the little ami- 
able question, whether I was aware, that the natives, I had with 
me as guides and carriers , were not slaves , but the sons of free 
and independent chiefs, which interrogatory was followed by a 
long expatiation. Te Heuheu stated that he was always glad to 
become acquainted with independent Europeans of better rank and 
station, they always being worthy people , who meet and treat the 
natives with due respect; that, on the other hand, the common 
Europeans such as run-away-sailors and other rabble, with which 
New Zealand was flooded from Europe and Australia, were detested 
by him as the worst and most contemptible kind of people; that, 
numbering me among the former class, he had expected my visit 
already the day before, and made all suitable preparations to receive 
me with all due form as well as with a cordial welcome; but that, 
as I did not choose to come at the expected time, it was my 
own fault, if I found him to-day in his ordinary every-day-clothes. 
It required repeated apologies, and various explanations to 
propitiate the offended pride of the noble chief; yet I must state 
to his credit, that he did not bear me a long grudge; 
for on the same day he ordered a fat pig to be killed 
for my Maoris, and, moreover, entertained them in his 
Pah through full five days without accepting any pay 
whatever in return. He also showed me a magnificent 
Mere punamu, a battle axe, 15 inches long, and cut out 
of the most beautiful, transparent nephrite, an heirloom 
of his illustrious ancestors, which he kept as a sacred 
relic. He explained to me that this murderous weapon 
was taken from a hostile chief in bloody combat, that 
five times already it had been buried with his ancestors, 
and that the notch on one side of it dated from the 
Te Heuheu’s last fatal blow struck at a hard skull. A second piece, 
Mere punamu. w pi c p p e showed me with much pride, was an English 
Battle-axe of . 
nephrit, saddle, which, with a horse, had been presented to him 
