“More than ten years are now dead since we joined the coalition of tribes who had lately elected the new Maori king, we doing so not that we were so hungry to fight against the soldiers, but had we not done so we could not have withstood the anger of the Waikato and the other tribes who had elected him. About this time also we were visited by prophets who preached the new Pai Marire faith, and we who had discovered that the white missionaries were humbugs gave ear to them, and many of us joined the Hau Haus, as they promised that we should acquire much mana through their incantations, they also promising us immunity from wounds and death in battle; but we soon found out that they also were humbugs. Yes, friend, the white missionaries are humbugs and the Hau Hau prophets are humbugs, all of them talking about matters not to be understood even by themselves, as no two missionaries or prophets agree on the matters they talk about. Let these men pass you by, oh children! The best things in life are war, rum and tobacco, these a warrior can understand. “Pass me, my white friend, the bottle, and now I have moistened my throat I will tell you first of all about our victory, and it is right that I should do so, because it happened to take place before our defeat, and it is well to speak of events in their due and proper order, also in recounting our glory I may perchance gain courage to tell you better about the way the soldiers took utu on the Ngaiterangi for their brothers we had killed. “Now it fell out in this way. News had come to us of the fighting at Orakau and how the Taupo and Uriwera Maoris had cloaked themselves with glory defending that pah, and we all determined to do likewise provided the big white chief saw fit to honour us with war. Yes; true there had been plenty of soldiers in Tauranga for a long time, but up to this time they had remained quietly in their forts, and had not come out to molest us, we therefore took no notice of them, but proceeded with our peaceful avocations which at that time of the year was for the young men fishing, and as the soldiers occupied Tauranga, our usual fishing ground, we occupied the kainga near the sea-beach, close to the spot you white men now call the Gate Pah. No; it was not a fighting pah. It had no defences, nor was the position a fit one on which to build a fighting pah. It was simply a few raupo huts surrounded by a light fence, just strong enough to keep the pigs out from destroying the fish we were drying on low stages, for, as you know well, friend, there is no timber suitable for building a pah or anything else within a long distance of the place. Besides, the nature of the ground was such that had we built a pah there the soldiers and ships with their big guns could have destroyed it at once.