Te Heuheu Tukino was the second chief of that name, and was a leader endowed with exceptional power, being large of body and of brain. His home was on the shores of Lake Taupo, and by claiming certain geographical features as portions of his own body, he had thereby rendered his domain sacred, and so limited the right to dispose of it to himself. He was not amongst the chiefs present at Waitangi, for under the limited notice given by Captain Hobson, that was not possible. It is even within the bounds of probability that had the messengers of the Lieutenant-Governor reached him he would have dismissed them as they came, for of this he was firmly convinced--that he was "a law unto himself," asserting his own _rangatiratanga_ as sufficiently strong to rule his own people, for which he neither needed nor desired foreign assistance. His first introduction to the treaty came to him through his younger brother Iwikau, who, together with another chief of Taupo, Te Korohiko, were at the then small settlement which has now grown into the city of Auckland, when they were met by Captain Hobson's messengers, and invited to Waitangi. Iwikau and his companion was in charge of a company of Taupo natives who had gone to the shores of Waitemata harbour for the purpose of acquiring European goods. They had packed bundles of flax fibre on the backs of their slaves, who had carried this medium of trade over trackless miles to the coast in order that it might be exchanged for guns and powder. While trafficking with the _Pakehas_ news came of the projected meeting at Waitangi, and some of the Nga-Puhi chiefs--so we are told--thus addressed Iwikau: "Go you to Waitangi, for you are the fish of the stomach of the island.[130] The _mana_ of Queen Victoria is about to be drawn as a cover over the island. All we chiefs of the native people will pass under her and her _mana_, that we may not be assailed by the other great nations of the world." To this Iwikau answered: "I will not be able to attend that meeting if such is its object, namely consenting to the _mana_ of Queen Victoria being placed over us. The right man to consent to or reject such a course is my elder brother, Te Heuheu, at Taupo; and any action on my part might be condemned by him." This objection was combated by the messengers from Nga-Puhi, who replied: "By all means go, that you may acquire red blankets to take back to your elder brother at Taupo." Iwikau was still obdurate, feeling that he had no authority to compromise his tribe in the absence of his superior chief, but the vision of the red blankets was more than Te Korohiko could resist, and he joined to those of the Nga-Puhi chiefs his own solicitations: "Oh, let us go that we may acquire the red blankets."