m
Poverty Bay diverted the attention of the Maoris from their prisoner,
who succeeded in getting on board the schooner's boat, and then, by
lying down underneath the thwarts, passed down the river unnoticed, and
gained the warship outside.

Meanwhile the position of the bishop of Waiapu and his family grew daily
worse. By the beginning of April all the converts in his immediate
neighbourhood had succumbed to the mesmerism of the Hauhaus, and to the
effects of a great _tangi_ which they held over the desolation of their
country. Accordingly, the bishop, with his family and other members of
the mission, left the station on the third of the month and took their
way northwards. They soon found a temporary home in the old Paihia
buildings at the Bay of Islands, and there the bishop strove to carry on
his school, while helping his brother, Archdeacon Henry, in his Sunday
duties. The bishop's son, Archdeacon Leonard Williams, remained at
Poverty Bay to combat the Hauhau influence, and to shepherd the remnant
of faithful Maoris.

At the end of the same month, April, 1865, the time arrived for the
General Synod to decide whether the Church in New Zealand should remain
united, or be divided into a northern and a southern organisation. The
synod was held in Christchurch, where the centre of disaffection lay.
Far removed as it was from the scene of the late troubles, the synod yet
met under the shadow of Volkner's death. Bishop Williams, too, with the
missionaries Clarke and Maunsell, had felt the heavy hand of war. It was
no time to fight over non-essentials. Canterbury was strong in its
peaceful prosperity: from the loft where the council sat the members
might look down on a scene of busy labour on the foundations of a great
cathedral, while another solid stone church (St. John Baptist) was
rising in a neighbouring square. But its lofty pretensions to local
independence could not be sustained. Archdeacon Wilson could find no
seconder for his secession motion. Men of wisdom, like Bishop Patteson
and Sir William Martin, made their influence felt on the side of peace.
The primate maintained from the outset that Christchurch was at liberty
to keep its endowments in its own hands, and its right to do so was now
definitely affirmed by the synod. The constitution also was improved by
some small changes in the direction desired by Canterbury churchmen.

But, on the whole, there was little change. Canterbury came down from
the "cloud-c