We again proceeded up the side of the ravine, entered it high up and descended, guiding ourselves through the pitch darkness by feeling our way cautiously along the side of the track. This of course was running an awful risk, but I saw no other way of solving the problem. My men were all game; if we were cut off some firing must occur, the camp would be alarmed, and, if none of us reported, still the Colonel would know the enemy were in occupation of the gorge. Moving as quietly as death, and just as the dawn was lightening the sky, we reach the most dangerous point of the ravine, when M’Kenzie tripped in a rut and fell. Immediately a shot rang out, then two, and before you could say knife, both sides of the gully blazed with musketry. Hastily pulling Mac to his feet we all bolted, as, with the crashing of bush and yelling like fiends incarnate, a swarm of Hau Haus started in pursuit. Lord, how we did run, M’Kenzie and the settler being in front, while myself and Tim, who would not leave me, brought up the rear. Fortunately we were close to the end of the defile, and as we came out into the open we somehow got separated, as each man took what he considered to be the best line for camp, which he knew must be alarmed by the firing. It was much lighter when we got into the open and tore through the stunted fern and manuka scrub, but, although you have no time for debate or argument when some two hundred howling savages, armed with tomahawks, are close up to you, still I glanced to my right and left, and as there was no cover to hide a running man I saw M’Kenzie and the settler some fifty yards away to my right, while Pierre and George were running somewhat closer on my left. It was a case of, “Go it, shirt tails, bowie knives is a-gaining on you,” and you can bet your bottom dollar we did our level best. Nor was I hopeless, as I knew, with the little Colonel in command, all the troopers would be saddled up, and the camp on the qui vive at least an hour before the glimmer of dawn. The Hau Hau volley must have been heard, and the Maori did not exist who could catch the little Colonel on the hop. I had no fear of being hit, as, although an occasional Maori would squib off his gun at us, still they could not stop to take aim or load, so we only had to keep ahead to win through, and each of us sprinted for what he was worth. Tim and myself had kept to the road, and had still plenty of run left in us, when I heard the hoof-thuds of galloping horses and saw the troopers come charging through the fern. But, alas! at the same moment I heard from my right the triumphant yell a Maori warrior lets go (which being interpreted means, “I have caught the first man”).