"There may be differences of opinion as to the advantages of their proximity," thought the white stranger, as he scanned the grand and majestic features of the wide landscape before him, "but none can deny their sublimity." He could scarce refrain from exclaiming aloud-- "Lives there the man with soul so dead, Who never to himself hath said," etc. If he had carried out the unspoken thought he would have raised himself in the estimation of his newly found acquaintances, as no nation has had a higher appreciation of elocutionary effort; and a free translation by his guide would have doubtless confirmed the _entente cordiale_. As it was, however, the few sentences uttered by his companion, in which, among others, he recognized the words Pakeha, Rangatira, and Mata Kawana, were sufficiently satisfactory. This was, of course, after the formal greeting of "_Haere mai!_" had been pronounced by the elders and principal personages of the assembly, as well as by all the women, and the rank and file. A venerable and imposing-looking personage, apparently of great age, approached to greet the strangers, and, after exchanging a few sentences of an interrogatory nature, pointed the way to an unoccupied _whare_ of larger dimensions than the others. In this, Mr. Massinger was told, through the interpreter, to place his possessions, and to consider himself at home for the present. An adjoining tenement was indicated, in a less formal way, as provided for his companion, the difference of their positions being accurately understood. Indeed, the socialists of the day would be rather scandalized at the gulf which separates the Maori aristocrat, or _rangatira_, from the "common people" (if one may use such an expression) of the tribe. The _rangatira_ was, indeed, a personage of no ordinary distinction. Served from his childhood by his "inferiors," in the most true and literal sense of the word; waited upon with deference, mingled with apprehension, by the women, the slaves and the rank and file of the tribal section, or _hapu_, to which he was born, no wonder that he grew up with the traditional qualities imputed to the mediæval aristocrat. He was the robber-baron of the Rhine; he was the untrammelled seigneur of the time of Louis Quatorze; he was the piratical Viking of the Norse legends.