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
We inquired why and how he had murdered the poor girl. He replied that
running away from him to her own relations was her only crime. He then
took us outside his village, and showed us the post to which she had been
tied, and laughed to think how he had cheated her: "For," said he, "I
told her I only intended to give her a flogging; but I fired, and shot
her through the heart!" My blood ran cold at this relation, and I looked
with feelings of horror at the savage while he related it. Shall I be
credited when I again affirm that he was not only a handsome young man,
but mild and genteel in his demeanour? He was a man we had admitted to
our table, and was a general favourite with us all; and the poor victim
to his bloody cruelty was a pretty girl of about sixteen years of age!
While listening to this frightful detail, we felt sick almost to
fainting. We left Atoi, and again strolled towards the spot where this
disgusting mess was cooking. Not a native was now near it: a hot, fetid
steam kept occasionally bursting from the smothered mass; and the same
dog we had seen with the head now crept from beneath the bushes, and
sneaked towards the village. To add to the gloominess of the whole, a
large hawk rose heavily from the very spot where the poor victim had been
cut in pieces. My friend and I sat gazing on this melancholy place; it
was a lowering, gusty day, and the moaning of the wind through the
bushes, as it swept round the hill on which we were, seemed in unison
with our feelings.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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