#7. Rangiriri.#--They now made themselves very secure at a place called Rangiriri, where a narrow road was left between the Waikato River and a boggy lake. This space they had blocked with a fence of thick trees twenty feet high, and with two ditches running across the whole length. In the midst of this strong line they had set up a redoubt, a sort of square fortress, from the walls of which they could fire down upon the attackers in any direction. About 500 Maoris well armed took up their position in this stronghold. Cameron advanced against them with 770 men and two guns, each throwing shot of forty pounds weight. At the same time four gunboats with 500 soldiers were sent up the river to take the Maori position in flank. At half-past four on a July morning the British bugles sounded the attack, and the fight lasted until the darkness of night put an end to it. During that fierce day the British charged again and again, to be met by a murderous fire from behind the palisades and from the walls of the redoubt. Forty-one soldiers had been killed and ninety-one wounded, the line of palisades had been captured, but the Maoris had all gathered safely within the redoubt. During the night the troops were quartered all round so as to prevent them from escaping, and a trench was cut to lead to a mine under the redoubt so that it could be blown up with gunpowder in the morning. The Maoris saw this project and could not prevent it. In the early dawn, after a night spent in war dances and hideous yelling, some of them burst out by the side towards the lake, and rushed past or jumped over the soldiers who were resting there. A heavy fire, poured into them from their rear, killed a great many of them. Seeing this, a large party of the Maoris, and among them Te Waharoa and the Maori king, stayed in the redoubt. But they knew that they were trapped, and next day they surrendered, in all 183 men with a few women. Sixty or seventy of the Maoris had been killed, but several hundreds escaped. [Illustration: RANGIRIRI, FROM THE WAIKATO.]