se his mind was to tell him that if ever I heard any such
proposal I would let him know, protesting at the same time that no such
intention existed. This notion of the natives has since that time done
much harm, and will do more, for it is not yet quite given up.

He continued--"I give my _mere_ to my pakeha,"--"my two old wives will
hang themselves,"--(here a howl of assent from the two old women in the
rear rank)--"I am going; be brave after I am gone." Here he began to
rave; he fancied himself in some desperate battle, for he began to call
to celebrated comrades who had been dead forty or fifty years. I
remember every word--"Charge!" shouted he--"Charge! _Wata_, charge!
_Tara_, charge! charge!" Then after a short pause--"Rescue! rescue! to
my rescue! _ahau! ahau! rescue!_" The last cry for "rescue" was in such
a piercing tone of anguish and utter desperation, that involuntarily I
advanced a foot and hand, as if starting to his assistance; a movement,
as I found afterwards, not unnoticed by the superstitious tribe. At the
same instant that he gave the last despairing and most agonizing cry
for "rescue," I saw his eyes actually blaze, his square jaw locked, he
set his teeth, and rose nearly to a sitting position, and then fell
back dying. He only murmured--"How sweet is man's flesh," and then the
gasping breath and upturned eye announced the last moment.

The _tohunga_ now, bending close to the dying man's ear, roared out,
"_Kia kotahi ki te ao! Kia kotahi ki te ao! Kia kotahi ki te po!_" The
poor savage was now, as I believe, past hearing, and gasping his last
"_Kia kotahi ki te ao!_"--shouted the devil priest again in his ear,
and shaking his shoulder roughly with his hand--"_Kia kotahi ki te
ao!--Kia kotahi ki te po!_" Then giving a significant look to the
surrounding hundreds of natives, a roar of musketry burst forth. _Kia
kotahi ki te ao!_ Thus in a din like pandemonium, guns firing, women
screaming, and the accursed _tohunga_ shouting in his ear, died "Lizard
Skin," as good a fighting man as ever worshipped force or trusted in
the spear. His death on the whole was thought happy; for his last words
were full of good omen:--"How sweet is man's flesh."

Next morning the body had disappeared. This was contrary to ordinary
custom, but in accordance with the request of the old warrior. No one,
even of his own tribe, knows where his body is concealed, but the two
men who carried it off in the night. All I know is that