The first Maori decapitated was a young chief, who was shot while in the act of climbing a steep cliff in the bush. Being a _rangatira_, his was a £10 head. This man was a prominent Hauhau named Matangi-o-Rupé. He belonged to Titokowaru's own immediate clan, or _hapu_, Ngati-Manu-hiakai--"The Tribe of the Hungry Bird." It was a Ngati-Raukawa soldier in Kepa's contingent who took off the Hauhau's head with his tomahawk; later he duly delivered it at the _pakeha_ camp. Matangi's son, Kuku--now living at the village of Taiporohenui--on learning of his father's fate, swore to have _utu_--revenge--and vowed to Bent that if he ever encountered the man who beheaded his parent, he would "slice him to pieces like a piece of beef." Some years after the war, Bent, while on a visit to a Maori settlement at Oroua, in the Manawatu district, met this Ngati-Raukawa head-hunter--"an ugly, tattooed old villain," as he describes him. The _pakeha_, by way of imparting an interesting bit of news, informed the old warrior of Kuku's threat, but the tattooed veteran only smiled. The days of the _lex talionis_ were over. That _utu_ account has not been squared; but only because of the inconveniently peaceful rule of the _pakeha_. Kuku has by no means forgotten or forgiven the man who sold his father's head to the white man. Later on in the bush chase the advance-guard, hurrying along at the double, came upon a Hauhau family--a grey-haired, middle-aged man, his wife, and two or three children. They had not been able to travel so fast as their friends, on account of the tired children, and so had been left behind. The old warrior was fired on by one of the Arawa Maoris, and was severely wounded. He fell, but struggled to a squatting position, with his empty gun across his knees. The Arawa rushed at him, with tomahawk raised, to finish him off. The old Hauhau sprang up with a great effort, gripping his tomahawk. He was too badly wounded, however, to strike a blow, and the Arawa seized him and his tomahawk. Just at that moment a white man, dressed like a Maori in a waist-shawl, and bare-footed, rushed up, tomahawk in hand. He seized the Hauhau by the hair, and, with a couple of furious strokes, chopped off his head, and dropped it, all bloody as it was, into the flax kit he carried slung at his back, and in which there were already other heads.