to
shower into the place, from slings, red-hot stones, which, sinking into
the dry thatch of the houses, would cause a general conflagration.
Should this once occur the place was sure to be taken. This mode of
attack was consequently much feared; all hands not engaged at the outer
defences, and all women and non-combatants, being employed guarding
against this danger, by pouring water out of calabashes on every smoke
that appeared. The natives also practised both mining and escalade in
attacking a hill fort.

The natives attribute their decrease in numbers, before the arrival of
the Europeans, to war and sickness; disease possibly arising from the
destruction of food and the forced neglect of cultivation caused by the
constant and furious wars which devastated the country for a long
period before the arrival of the Europeans: and to such an extent that
the natives at last believed a constant state of warfare to be the
natural condition of life, and their sentiments, feelings, and maxims
became gradually formed on this belief. Nothing was so valuable or
respectable as strength and courage, and to acquire property by war and
plunder was more honourable and also more desirable than by labour.
Cannibalism was glorious. In a word, the island was a pandemonium.

A rugged wight, the worst of brutes, was man;
On his own wretched kind he ruthless prey'd.
The strongest then the weakest overran,
In every country mighty robbers sway'd,
And guile and ruffian force was all their trade.

Since the arrival of the Europeans the decrease of the natives has also
been rapid. In that part of the country where I have had means of
accurate observation, they have decreased in number since my arrival
rather more than one-third. I have, however, observed that this
decrease has for the last ten years been very considerably checked;
though I do not believe this improvement is general through the
country, or even permanent where I have observed it.

The first grand cause of the decrease of the natives since the arrival
of the Europeans is the musket. The nature of the ancient Maori weapons
prompted them to seek out vantage ground, and to take up positions on
precipitous hill-tops, and make those high, dry, airy situations their
regular fixed residences. Their ordinary course of life, when not
engaged in warfare, was regular, and not necessarily unhealthy; their
labour, though constant in one shape or other, and