35C ADVENTURE IN NEW ZEALAND. Chap. XIV. 
On the same day, he received a letter from Mr. 
Clarke junior informing him, in answer to his proposal, 
that he considered all claims of the natives resident 
within the Port Nicholson district entitled to compen- 
sation to the amount of 1500/. 
Colonel Wakefield, however, still refused to re-open 
the negotiation ; especially as he had not yet received 
an answer from the Colonial Secretary to his applica- 
tion in January to be allowed to select blocks of land, 
in pursuance of a provision of the Agreement, and 
could not therefore know where he should have to 
extinguish the native claims. For he wished to make 
no payments unless the question could be definitively 
settled without intervals to make each claim on this 
coast greater than the preceding one. 
On my way back round the shore, I saw but little 
that was new. From immediately south of Sugar-loaf 
Point, the belt of open country between the coast and 
the wood reassumes its character of rich pasture 
mingled with the fern ; and this all the way to the 
spot where I had struck off to go inland of Mount 
Egmont. Cliffs form the coast, except just about 
Cape Egmont, where the country slopes down gra- 
dually to high-water mark. Between Ngumotu and 
a large pa called Otumatua the country is now thickly 
peopled, entirely by persons who have returned since 
the establishment of the English colony between them 
and the formerly dreaded fJ^aikato. 
At Otumatua I saw a very beautifully carved toata, or 
store-house, of which Mr. Heaphy had made a sketch 
on his visit in 1840 ; and it was pointed out to me on 
that account.* 
At H^aimate, which is only nine miles from TVain- 
* One of the Lithographic Illustrations before referred to repre- 
sents this building. 
