At this moment I cast an anxious glance around the field of battle. The old Maori woman had, as I expected, saved a good half of my shirt; she had got on the top of an outhouse, and was waving it in a "Sister Anne" sort of manner, and calling to an imaginary friendly host which she pretended to see advancing to the rescue. The old sailor had fallen under, but not surrendered to, superior force. Three natives had got him down; but it took all they could do to _keep_ him down: he was evidently carrying out his original idea of making a fight of it, and gaining time. The striped shirt and canvas trowsers still hung proudly on the fence; none of his assailants could spare a second to pull them down. I was kicking and flinging in the endeavour to extricate myself; or, at least, to turn round, so as to carry out a "face to face" policy: which it would be a grand mistake to suppose was not understood long ago in the good old times. I had nearly succeeded, and was thinking what particular form of destruction I should shower on the foe, when a tremendous shout was heard. It was "our mob" coming to the rescue; and, like heroes of old, "sending their voice before them." In an instant both myself and the gallant old tar were released; the enemy dashed on board their canoe, and in another moment were off, darting away before a gale of wind and a fair tide at a rate that put half a mile at least between them and us before our protectors came up. "Load the gun!" cried the sailor--(there was a nine-pound carronade on the cliff before the house, overlooking the river). A cartridge was soon found, and a shot, and the gun loaded. "Slew her a little," cried my now commander; "fetch a fire stick." "Aye, aye, sir" (from self). "Wait a little; that will do--Fire!"--(in a voice as if ordering the discharge of the whole broadside of a three-decker). Bang! The elevation was perfectly correct. The shot struck the water at exactly the right distance, and only a few feet to one side. A very few feet more to the right and the shot would have entered the stern of the canoe, and, as she was end on to us, would have killed half the people in her. A miss, however, is as good as a mile off. The canoe disappeared behind a point, and there we were with an army of armed friends around us, who, by making great expedition, had managed to come exactly in time to be too late.