The earlier missions were organized by remarkable men. Their descendants occupy high positions, and inherit the respect which to their fathers was always accorded. But the most commanding figure in the little army of Christian soldiers, the most striking personality, was Selwyn, the first bishop of New Zealand. No ordinary cleric was the dauntless athlete, the apostolic prelate, the daring herald of good tidings, reckless of personal danger whether in war or peace. When the Waikato warriors, three hundred strong, went down the river from Ngarua-wahia under the young Matutauere, the bishop, travelling _on foot_, carried a message to friendly chiefs, who undertook to bar the war-party from passing through their territory. The settler at whose house the bishop arrived soon after sunrise, dripping with water from the fording of a creek, told the story. Had his remonstrances, strengthened by those of the venerable Henry Williams, Chief Justice Martin, and Sir William Denison, received the consideration to which they were entitled, "the great war of 1860, with its resultant, the greater war of 1863," would never have been fought. England's taxpayers would have been richer by the interest paid on a sum of several millions, and England's dead, whose bones are resting in distant cemeteries, or in unknown graves on many a ferny hillside, would have been saved to family and friends. However, at this stage all developments lay shrouded in the veil of the future. On whosoever lay the blame, war _had_ commenced in earnest, and, according to British traditions, must be fought out. It was arming and hurrying with all classes and all ages in Auckland, A.D. 1860. Volunteers, militia, regulars, marines, bluejackets, were all under marching orders; martial law was proclaimed around Taranaki; all the ingredients of the devil's cauldron were simmering and ready to burst forth. If Massinger had desired the excitements of danger, of battle, murder, and sudden death, this was the place and the time, to the very hour. He had found no difficulty in enrolling himself among the force known as Von Tempsky's Forest Rangers. It was composed of the most resolute, daring spirits of the colony, many of whom had either been born in New Zealand or been brought up there from infancy. As a rule, used to country life, they rode well, and were good marksmen. A large proportion of them were the sons of farmers, but there were also men who had held good positions in their day. Having lost their money, or otherwise drifted out of the ranks of the well-to-do, they cheerfully enlisted in this arm of the force, which, if irregular in discipline, had a prestige which the ordinary militia and volunteer regiments lacked.