246 -ADVENTURE IN NEW ZEALAND. Chap. VIII- 
shoulder like a Roman toga, so as to have his right 
arm free ; the woman ties it over her hreast, and holds 
the sides together with her hands. In carrying a child, 
the man dresses like a woman, as the child clings round 
the neck of the person who carries him, and is sustained 
by the blanket, grasped tight round both their bodies. 
There were very few blankets among the Jf^anganui 
natives. Indeed, they had begged me very naively to 
see " how many things of the pakeha they had among 
" them," when I read to them Mr. Williams's manu- 
script imsc. 
I was much pleased by the conduct of E Kuru on 
one of these days. A cringing, sneaking Ngatiawa 
native, who stated himself to be a relation of TVare- 
pori, had brought a porera for sale. Thinking it 
better than any which I had yet seen, and ignorant as 
yet of the price-current here, I modestly inquired 
whether he would take an axe for it, fully expecting 
to be indignantly refused. He immediately, however, 
jumped at the offer ; threw the mat into my tent, and 
ran away to the village as hard as he could, Avith the 
axe under his mat. This had been done in E Kurus 
absence, and under cover of the tent from the natives 
sitting in the neighbourhood. On the return of E 
Kuru about half an hour afterwards, he gave me two 
or three mats of different kinds which he had collected, 
and then, seeing the new porera, asked how much to- 
bacco I had paid for it. When I had related the 
whole transaction to him, he became very angry ; and 
without more words, took the porera, and started off 
at a run for the village, more than a mile ofiP. He was 
back, pufl&ng and blowing, in little more than half an 
hour, with my axe. " There," said he, " don't buy any 
" more mats without speaking to me : the man is a 
" thief; he would be glad to sell his mat for six heads 
