On the 6th of April 1864 a party of the 57th Regiment and a few military settlers, in all about one hundred strong, under the command of Captains Page and Lloyd, were destroying crops in the Taranaki district. They had piled their arms while at work, when they were surprised and rushed by a large band of natives. Captain Lloyd and six men were killed, twelve more were wounded and hid in the fern, the remainder falling back in something like a stampede to the Potuka redoubt and the town of Taranaki. Reinforcements were quickly on the ground, and found the bodies of the slain shamefully mutilated, the heads having been carried away. This brutality was quite a new feature in Maori warfare, and was the intimation of the barbarities that were to follow. The 57th regimental call was sounded, when the wounded and a few fugitives crept out of the fern. They informed their comrades that the natives had rushed upon them, barking like dogs, and seemingly quite regardless of their own lives. Our men were much astonished at this conduct, as little was known of the new faith at this time, but it was soon discovered that it was the result of the fanatical belief of the Maoris in their invulnerability. Now it is a strange thing, but none of the four men whom the Maoris had lost in the above skirmish had joined the Pai Marire faith, and this fact added to the natives’ belief in its virtue. The heads of Captain Lloyd and his men were carried round the district as a proof of this victory, and were buried, but Gabriel ordered Te Ua to exhume and preserve the Captain’s head, and to use it as a medium through which the angel could communicate with himself and his disciples. There was no delay or ambiguity in Gabriel’s orders through this oracle, for the head spoke at once to Te Ua, saying, “You are the chief prophet of Pai Marire. Matene and Hepanaia will be your apostles.” Te Ua was also informed that all his followers should be called Pai Marire, that the head should be carried peacefully round all the tribes, and, that having been done, Gabriel with legions of angels would assist the Maoris in their general rising, help them to slaughter all the white men, and then bestow upon the faithful a complete knowledge of all the languages, arts and sciences in the world. These supposed instructions were admirably conceived, and reflect great credit on Te Ua, who, it must be remembered, was a man of weak intellect; for had the head been carried by its escort of fanatics peacefully through the country, and had these fanatics abstained from hostility towards the tribes who professed friendship to the white man, there is but little doubt that all the tribes would have been converted and that when the general rising took place it would have been most disastrous to the Europeans even if Gabriel and his promised hosts had not rendered the looked-for active assistance.