As I shall have occasion to refer frequently to the horses we took on our journey I will give their names, with a brief description of each. Charlie, the horse which I rode, was bred on the Kaingaroa Plains, east of Lake Taupo, and was caught by Turner from a mob of wild horses. He stood about fifteen hands, was of a dark iron-grey colour, and possessed good points. Tommy, ridden by Turner, was a black pony, of about fourteen hands, bred near Auckland, and, although his points were not perfect, he was strongly built, and plucky to a degree. Our sumpter-horse, also bred near Auckland, was a gaunt, white-coated animal, well built, but somewhat long in the legs, and narrow-chested. His principal failing was an inordinate appetite. Moreover, although a fine-looking horse in many ways, he had the gait of a camel, and, I think, like the "ship of the desert" is said to do, he cursed his father when going up a hill, and his Creator when coming down. When everything was in readiness, and just as we were about to start from Wairakei, an event mingled with alarm occurred in connection with the native difficulty. Several of the principal Kingite chiefs, who had up to this time remained in sullen isolation, agreed to allow Mr. Hursthouse, a government surveyor, and his assistants, with a body-guard of friendly natives, to enter a part of the northern portion of the King Country, but immediately upon the party reaching the small settlement of Te Kumi, a few miles across the frontier-line, they were set upon and made prisoners by a band of Maoris headed by Te Mahuki, a fanatical follower of Te Whiti, the Maori prophet. No sooner were the surveyors in the hands of the desperadoes, than they were taken prisoners into the settlement, stripped of every particle of clothing, brutally maltreated, and chained up in a hut where they were detained until intelligence of their capture reached Alexandra. This brutal outrage upon a government officer in the face of the many delicate phases of the Maori difficulty, was naturally received with consternation throughout the colony, as at first glance it appeared little short of an act of open rebellion on the part of the natives. A few days after this event, on the 5th of April, we set out from Wairakei, and following along the banks of the Waikato for about six miles, reached Tapuwaeharuru, a small township at the northern end of Lake Taupo. Situated far from the centres of population, this settlement is not an important place, beyond its being one of the principal strategic positions of the armed constabulary. The flat, elevated plain upon which the township is situated, is formed entirely of pumice, and has a hollow, cavernous-like sound when riding over it, a circumstance which no doubt gave rise to its native name, which signifies "the place of sounding footsteps."