ed to guide the party across the country. The officers were
obliged to leave their horses, and the party of forty half-starved men,
of whom a fourth were wounded--two so severely that it was necessary to
carry them--set out. It was a terrible march for the exhausted men, up
the bed of a mountain creek, often waist-deep in water, and over steep
fern-covered hills, until, just as day was breaking, they reached an
out-station. Here they managed to get two sheep, and just as they had
cooked and eaten these Colonel Whitmore, the commander of the colonial
forces, arrived with thirty volunteers from Napier, who had reached the
bay on the previous day.

He at once paraded the men, thanked them for their behaviour on the
previous day, and warned them to be ready to start in pursuit of the
enemy at once. One of the settlers, acting as spokesman for the rest,
stepped forward, pointed out that they had been fighting without
intermission for twenty-four hours, that they had been for the last
forty-eight hours almost without food, and that it was impossible for
them to set out on a fresh march until they had taken some rest. Colonel
Whitmore was a hot-tempered man, and expressed himself so strongly that
he caused deep offence among the settlers.

They remained firm in their determination not to move until the
following day, and the forward movement was therefore necessarily
abandoned. On the day previous to the fight Lieutenant Gascoigne had
been despatched by Major Biggs to Te Wairoa with despatches for Mr.
Deighton, who commanded at that station, warning him to muster all the
force at his disposal, and prepare to intercept Te Kooti at the Waihau
Lakes in case he should fight his way through Captain Westrupp's force.
Orders were sent to the friendly Mahia tribe to muster, and a hundred
men at once assembled; but as they had only four rounds of ammunition
apiece, nothing could be done until three casks of ammunition were
obtained from some of the Wairoa chiefs.

Two days were lost in consequence, and this gave time to Te Kooti; they
then started--eighteen European volunteers and eighty natives; a larger
body of natives preparing to follow as soon as possible. After being met
by messengers with several contradictory orders, they arrived at Waihau,
and just before dark Te Kooti was seen crossing the hills towards them
with his whole force. Captain Richardson determined to fight them in the
position he occupied, but the native chief,