A Narrative of a Nine Months' Residence in New Zealand in 1827Earle, Augustus
History
A Narrative of a Nine Months' Residence in New Zealand in 1827
Earle, Augustus
New Zealand -- Description and travel
small one, and the savages were both numerous, fierce, and much
irritated. While we remained almost stupefied on the spot, Mr. Fannen
said that he heard the cannibals assembling in the woods, on which we
returned to our boat, and having hauled alongside the canoes, we
demolished three of them. During this transaction the fire on the top of
the hill disappeared, and we could hear the savages in the woods at high
words, quarrelling, perhaps, on account of their different opinions,
whether they should attack us and try to save their canoes. They were
armed with long lances, and weapons not unlike a sergeant's halbert in
shape, made of hard wood, and mounted with bone instead of iron. We
suspected that the dead bodies of our people had been divided among those
different parties of cannibals who had been concerned in the massacre,
and it was not improbable that the group we saw at a distance by the fire
were feasting upon some of them, as those on shore had been where the
remains were found, before they had been disturbed by our unexpected
visit. Be that as it may, we could discover no traces of more than four
of our friends' bodies, nor could we find the place where the cutter was
concealed. It now grew dark, on which account we collected carefully the
remains of our mangled friends, and, putting off, made the best of our
way from this polluted place. When we opened the upper part of the Sound,
we saw a very large fire about three or four miles higher up, which
formed a complete oval, reaching from the top of a hill down almost to
the water-side, the middle space being enclosed all round by the fire,
like a hedge. Mr. Burney and Mr. Fannen having consulted together, they
were both of opinion that we could, by an attempt, reap no other
advantage than the poor satisfaction of killing some more of the savages.
Upon leaving Grass Cove we had fired a volley towards where we heard the
Indians talking, but by going in and out of the boat our pieces had got
wet, and four of them missed fire. What rendered our situation more
critical, it began to rain, and our ammunition was more than half
expended. We, for these reasons, without spending time where nothing
could be hoped for but revenge, proceeded for the ship, and arrived safe
aboard before midnight.'"
It is a little remarkable that Captain Furneaux had been several times up
Grass Cove with Captain Cook, where they saw no inhabitants, and no other
signs of any but a few deserted villages, which appeared as if they had
not been occupied for many years, and yet, in Mr. Burney's opinion, when
he entered the same cove, there could not be less than fifteen hundred or
two thousand people.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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