nt member, collect at his back, all armed with
spear and club, to show that they could resist, if they would: a thing,
however, not to be thought of under the circumstances.

On comes the _taua_. The mother begins to cry in proper form; the tribe
shout the call of welcome to the approaching robbers; and then with a
grand rush, all armed, and looking as if they intended to exterminate
all before them, the _kai muru_ appear on the scene. They dance the war
dance, which the villagers answer with another. Then the chief's
brother-in-law advances, spear in hand, with the most alarming
gestures. "Stand up!--stand up!--I will kill you this day," is his cry.
The defendant is not slow to answer the challenge. A most exciting, and
what to a new pakeha would appear a most desperately dangerous, fencing
bout with spears, instantly commences. The attack and defence are in
the highest degree scientific; the spear shafts keep up a continuous
rattle; the thrust, and parry, and stroke with the spear shaft follow
each other with almost incredible rapidity, and are too rapid to be
followed by an unpractised eye. At last the brother-in-law is slightly
touched; blood also drops from our chief's thigh. The fight instantly
ceases; leaning on their spears, probably a little badinage takes place
between them, and then the brother-in-law roars out, "_Murua! murua!
murua!_" Then the new arrivals commence a regular sack, and the two
principals sit down quietly with a few others for a friendly chat, in
which the child's name is never mentioned, or the inquiry as to whether
he is dead or alive even made.

The case I have just described would, however, be one of more than
ordinary importance; slighter "accidents and offences" would be atoned
for by a milder form of operation. But the general effect was to keep
personal property circulating from hand to hand pretty briskly, or
indeed to convert it into public property; for no man could say who
would be the owner of his canoe, or blanket, in a month's time. Indeed,
in that space of time, I once saw a nice coat, which a native had got
from the captain of a trading schooner, and which was an article much
coveted in those days, pass through the hands, and over the backs, of
six different owners, and return, considerably the worse for wear, to
the original purchaser; and all these transfers had been made by legal
process of _muru_. I have been often myself paid the compliment of
being robbed for little ac