onstant watching the hogs require to keep
them out of the plantations consumes more time than would effectually
fence in their whole country; but I have no doubt, as they already begin
to follow our advice and adopt our plans, they will soon see the utility
of fencing in their land. I have at various times held many conversations
with different chiefs on this subject, all of whom have acknowledged the
propriety of so doing.

A few miles after leaving this beautiful village we came to a spot
covered with heaps of cinders and hillocks of volcanic matter. I found
all these hillocks small craters, but none of them, burning; and for
miles our road lay through ashes and lava. These fires must have been
extinguished many ages since, as there is not the slightest tradition
among any of the natives of their ever having been burning.

After passing over this lava, our journey lay through a very swampy
country, intersected with streams. I got completely wearied with
stripping to wade through them, so that at length I plunged in clothes
and all. At the close of a most fatiguing day's march, we arrived in
sight of the bay, having travelled over an extent of about fifty miles
since the morning! No canoe being in sight, and we being too distant to
make signals to our brig, we had to pass another night in bivouac on a
part of the beach called Waitangi; and as it did not rain we slept pretty
comfortably. The next morning I procured a canoe, and went on board our
vessel.

The day following the brig took her final departure from New Zealand, and
we bade farewell to Captain Kent. We now formally placed ourselves under
the protection of King George, who seemed highly pleased with his charge;
and in a few days three good houses were ready for our reception--one for
ourselves, a second for our stores, and a third for our servants. But our
pleasant prospects were soon obscured by a circumstance totally
unexpected, which placed us in a most critical situation, and which we
had every reason to fear would lead to our total destruction.

CHAPTER XXIV.

VISIT OF A WAR PARTY.

I was roused one morning at daybreak by my servant running in with the
intelligence that a great number of war canoes were crossing the bay. As
King George had told us but the evening before that he expected a visit
from Ta-ri-ah, a chief of the tribe called Ngapuhis, whose territory lay
on the opposite side of the bay, and given us to understand that Ta-ri-ah
w