as doubtful, but whose possession of two wives and of much money made by rum-selling was not doubtful.  Another notable steersman was Black Murray, who once made his boatmen row across Cook’s Straits at night and in a gale because they were drunk, and only by making them put out to sea could he prevent them from becoming more drunk.  A congener of his, Evans—­“Old Man Evans”—­boasted of a boat which was as spick and span as a post-captain’s gig, and of a crew who wore uniform.  Nor must the best of Maori whalers be forgotten—­the chief Tuhawaiki—­brave in war, shrewd and businesslike in peace, who could sail a schooner as cleverly as any white skipper, and who has been most unfairly damned to everlasting fame—­local fame—­by his whaler’s nickname of “Bloody Jack!” These, and the “hands” whom they ordered about, knocked down, caroused with, and steered, were the men who, between 1810 and 1845, taught the outside world to take its way along the hitherto dreaded shores of New Zealand as a matter of course and of business.  Half heroes, half ruffians, they did their work, and unconsciously brought the islands a stage nearer civilization.  Odd precursors of English law, nineteenth-century culture, and the peace of our lady the Queen, were these knights of the harpoon and companions of the rum-barrel.  But the isolated coasts and savage men among whom their lot was cast did not as yet call for refinement and reflection.  Such as their time wanted, such they were.  They played a part and fulfilled a purpose, and then moved off the stage.  It so happened that within a few years after the advent of the regular colonists whaling ceased to pay, and the rough crew who followed it, and their coarse, manly life, disappeared together.

Chapter VII

THE MUSKETS OF HONGI

  “He sang of battles, and the breath
  Of stormy war and violent death.”

Marsden’s notes help us to picture his first night in New Zealand.  The son of the Yorkshire blacksmith, the voyager in convict-ships, the chaplain of New South Wales in the days of rum and chain-gangs, was not the man to be troubled by nerves.  But even Marsden was wakeful on that night.  Thinking of many things—­thoughts not to be expressed—­the missionary paced up and down on the sea beach by which a tribe was encamped.  The air was pleasant, the stars shone brightly, in front of him the sea spread smoothly, peacefully folded among the wooded hills.  At the head of the harbour the ripple tapped lightly upon the charred timbers of the Boyd.  Around lay the Maori warriors sleeping, wrapped in their dyed mantles and with their spears stuck upright in the ground.  It was a quiet scene.  Most of the scenes of that time which have come down to us were not of quietness.  Some of them have been sketched in the last two chapters, and are examples of the condition of things which the missionaries landed to confront, and amidst which they worked.  More have now to be described, if only to show things as they were before annexation, and the miseries which the country, and the Maori along with it, suffered before the influences of White adventurers and their fatal gifts were tempered by a civilized government.