"D----d nuisance!" said Mr. Slyde, resuming his garments. "Left arms at camp, or we might have had a throw in. Other chaps got all the fun. Oh, here comes Warwick, _heavily_ armed, and no mistake." It was even so. That resourceful henchman had bolted back to camp and returned with his arms full of their carbines and revolvers. "And, by Jove! here comes Von Tempsky and part of our company," exclaimed Massinger, unusually excited. "Was there ever such luck?" No time was lost in joining the Rangers, who had just been ordered to cross the river and clear the scrub. Without a moment's hesitation, headed by Von Tempsky, they plunged into the stream, and emerging like modern river-gods dripping with the Mangopiko, rushed on the enemy. A desperate hand-to-hand fight ensued. The natives retreated, leaving eight dead, side by side, amid the trampled fern. The Rangers only had three men wounded, including Mr. Massinger, in the arm--his first title to distinction, as having bled in the cause of his Queen and country. Like many other small wars and skirmishes, it led to complications. A body of natives came out from the pah at Paterangi to help their people. The skirmishers of the 40th were thrown forward to check them. Five men killed and six wounded of the 40th, while the natives from Paterangi lost over forty killed and thirty wounded. Mr. Massinger's arm was sore enough that night, though he was loth to admit it. "'Quite enough to get,' as the soldier remarked in 'Pickwick.' Deuced hot work while it lasted. New style of bathing-party. Have to look up a tree before you sit under it next. Maoris everywhere." "'All's well that ends well,'" rejoined Massinger, with his arm in a sling. "Lucky that Warwick brought the carbines. I wouldn't have missed that dash across the river for worlds. We also covered the rear effectually, Von Tempsky marching as if he was on parade." "He wasn't the only one who was cool," said Warwick. "The adjutant-surgeon stopped the bleeding in your arm as steady as if he was in the hospital tent. Bullets pretty thick, too." The colonel commanding did justice to the merits of all concerned, and when Lieutenant Roland Massinger's name occurred in the list of wounded among the Forest Rangers, under Major Von Tempsky, that gentleman felt himself more than recompensed for any trifling inconvenience he might have undergone. CHAPTER XII The campaign dragged on till June, the antipodean mid-winter, was reached. Dark were the long cold nights, ceaseless the rain, as the troops and volunteers struggled through forests knee-deep in mud, with creeks to ford and flax swamps to wade through.