Chai-. XVIII. HAUNTS OF LAWLESS NATIVES. 503 
Mr. Halswell had thus the happy art of blending 
private kindness and attention to the nearest relations 
of the prisoner with a strict performance of the public 
ends of justice. 
About this time, the road was finished a mile above 
the gorge of the Hutt, so that you could ride thither 
on horseback; and a bridge was nearly completed by 
the Company over the river just above Mr. Moles- 
worth's large barn and thrashing-machine. In various 
spots on the lower valley, settlers were daily being 
driven off land which they attempted to occupy, by the 
natives living near Mr. Swainson's curtailed farm. 
The pas there had become the rendezvous for all the 
worst characters from many of the tribes, as well as 
for the immediate followers of Rauperaha and Ran- 
gihaeata. If an outrage, an insult, or a robbery was 
perpetrated, it almost always turned out that the cul- 
prit was an inhabitant of these villages, or, at any rate, 
he soon after became one. These fugitives and repro- 
bates, living almost without chiefs or subordination, 
were contented while they could grow potatoes for the 
market of the town, with a good road along which 
to carry them ; but seemed resolved to prevent the 
White people from entering into competition with 
them in the pursuit. They were not to be made 
friends of: missionaries, settlers, and sawyers, were 
alike laughed at and scorned. Mr. Clarke junior was 
on one occasion threatened and driven away for attempt- 
ing to interfere ; and they seemed to taint the air, like 
a loathsome and augmenting dung-heap, in the very 
path of settlement and civilization. 
