University of Virginia Library

Canto the Third. The grand Assault.

I.

II.

Before the faint wide smile of dawn, so wan
And grey, to steal up Night's sad face began,
Crammed in canoes bold Whetu-riri's host
With favouring breeze had to Mokoia crossed.
With hearts high-beating to the strand they spring,
Each band behind its Chief; without a check
Hasten through grove and garden—many a bed
That late in such luxuriant neatness spread,
Of melons, maize and taro—now a wreck.
The outer palisades the foremost reach;
Take the positions prearranged for each;
And close around the Fort, a swarming ring:—
Then—as no challenge came—no warrior stirred,
And not a sound about the Fort was heard;
At once, like one—six hundred throats or more
Sent thundering skyward such a sea-like roar
As old Mokoia never heard before:
Stern—silent—in determined mood
Within those loop-holed walls of wood,
Alert, be sure, old Tangi stood;
He and his stalwart warriors true,
Alert, well-armed and watchful too!
Each short sharp-edged batoon of stone
Grass-green, or white of polished bone,—
That from the hand no foe might wring
The weapon at close grips—was bound
With thongs each sinewy wrist around;
But loose the long-armed axe was left,
Both hardwood blade and pointed heft—
A dagger, or an axe to swing,
Just as the warrior thrust or cleft.
The precious muskets, rude and few,
Their blunted flints well-chipped anew,
All primed and cocked, were pointing through
The palisades, behind whose breast
Keen, eager, fierce, the clansmen pressed,
Like wild-beasts waiting for a spring.
But yet no tongue the stillness broke,
No shout of wild defiance woke;
For to that threatening, thundering strain,
The sole reply the Chief would deign
Was one brief proverb, as his hand
Waved silence to his eager band:
And that firm lip, comprest before,
A haughty smile contemptuous wore;
“Ay, come!” he growled—“come on to shell
Cockles on Kátikáti's shore!”
That long-disputed dangerous land,
As every Maori knew so well,
Fit for no tool but spear and brand;
On whose contested sands and rocks,
Who came got nothing but hard knocks;
For, plucked from that long home of strife
A limpet might have cost a life!
Hence grown a gibe for all who set
Their hearts on gain they ne'er would get.

IV.

But soon as Tangi's taunt was flung,
And while the roar redoubled rung,
The assailing ranks disparting wide,—
There forward rushed—a gloomy wood
It seemed, or some great tidal wave,
In doubtful light the dawning gave!
A hundred of the bravest brave
Swept darkling up in order good;
Each in his left hand holding high
A bundle huge of brushwood dry
And withered fern that hid him quite—
Him and the fire-brand in his right.
Against the fort their heaps they piled,
And soon the flames were raging wild;
For still the breeze that brought them o'er
Blew freshly from the further shore.
It lighted up, that sudden glare,
The fort—the shore—the swarming, bold,
Blue, ghastly faces writhing there
With wrath and frenzy uncontrolled!
The fern became a mass of fire,
A brilliant yeast of surging gold;
And whirling darkly from the pyre
The smoke in russet volumes rolled
With showers of sparks and frond and spray
Red-hot, or floating filmy-grey.
Old Tangi, Ranolf, and his train
Of warriors strove, and strove in vain
To heave the blazing heaps aside;
No naked limbs or clothed could bide
That heat—no lungs could long sustain
The smoke that, blinding, stifling, dense,
Drove ever thicker through the fence.
So forced from that first outwork, they
With teeth that gnashed in scornful rage,
And shouts of fury burst away
Leaping and clambering up to wage
The fight upon a higher stage;
Headlong as alligators bounce
With water-snakes and bull-frogs harsh,
Out of some rank rush-covered marsh,
In river-depths to plunge and flounce—
In Hayti or the Isle made glad
With springs perennial crystal-fed—
When some crab-hunting negro-lad
Has fired their reedy crackling bed.

V.

Then wild with joy the ‘Angry Star,’
At this success—the first the war
Vouchsafed his arms—let loose again
His rampant pride, his boastful vein.
By fear, by prudence undebarred,
Up to the fence, black, tottering, charred—
(His feet,—with green flax-sandals shod
Prepared for this, the reeking sod
And glowing embers safely trod)
He bounded; took his dauntless stand
With granite-headed axe in hand
Beneath it, and began to rain
A shower of blows with might and main,
As each had been his last for life,
On crumbling post and crashing stake,
Broad entrance for his band to make.
There,—bellowing loud his battle-song,
His favourite song in such a strife,
While all the less adventurous throng
(Save six or eight who lent their aid)
Until the breach might be essayed
A more respectful distance kept,—
Less man than frenzied fiend of hell
He raved and roared and danced and leapt
And right and left his weapon swept—
A blow at every leap and yell
Against that smoking citadel:

VI.

Now all upon that windward side
The fallen fence left passage wide,
And Whetu-riri's raging host
The ditch and barrier swiftly crossed;
While Tangi's men retreating, threw
Themselves inside the rampart new;
And as the palisades they passed
Made every sliding panel fast,
Till round the fort the assailant horde
Upon the second platform poured.
Then out—unable to restrain
His pent-up wrath, his fierce disdain,
Or patient wait his foes' attack;
With all his bravest at his back,—
Just as the glorious Sun again
Slipped silvery from the mountains black
With panting disc upfloating free—
Out rushed at last the ‘Sounding Sea’
In wild ferocious majesty,
His battle-cry resounding loud
Above the tumult of the crowd!
“Now, forward, now, my Sons with me—
Now forward to the Land of Death!—”
That shout o'er all the hubbub swelled
Of casual shots and bulwarks felled
And stakes that crashed and fiends that yelled,
Distinct as—from the midnight's core
Where leaps the blue sheet-lightning's blaze
And hissing rains in torrents pour,
The dread Caffrarian lion's roar
That shakes the earth to which he lays
His head and thunders—rises o'er
And deeper-volumed rolls beneath
The angry bellowings that disclose
Where stamp, upstarting from repose
Whole herds of snorting buffaloes!
Where'er that Chieftain charged, dismayed
His foes fell back like huddling sheep
The wild-dog drives into a heap;
Or brief the fight the brave essayed:
So deadly swept as on he rushed
His ponderous battle-axe's blade;
Each chief who his encounter stayed
Just met him, and with right arm crushed
Disabled from the contest slunk;
Or down at once scarce groaning sunk
With cloven skull and quivering trunk.
—The ‘Angry Star,’ for all his boast,
Not yet the veteran's path had crossed,
But, as it seemed, preferred to close
With less renowned, less dangerous foes;
Or had a craftier game to play
More sure than such a doubtful fray.
So still resistless through the fight
Old Tangi raged; still rose on high
O'er all the noise that battle-cry,
“Now forward to the realms of Night!”—
Yet still for numbers beaten back
Fresh numbers pressed the fierce attack;
The platform mounted—haply dared
To charge the very gates across
The bridges left upon the fosse
By Tangi, for retreat prepared.
But vain their toil—their fury vain;
No hold, no entrance could they gain—
Resisted all—repulsed or slain.

VII.

VIII.

While thus engaged, it chanced the youth
Full upon Whetu-riri came;
And with a moment's shock in truth
That back his blood's quick current sent,
Found his revolver's barrels spent!
Himself in fact unarmed before
The Chief who down upon him bore,
But paused until he joyful saw
The pistol never raised to fire;
Then out his tongue was thrust—his jaw
Aside—his eyes turned back—his face
Distorted with the grim grimace,
His sign of hate, defiance, ire;
High whirled his axe for one sure blow
To lay his helpless victim low.
But Ranolf rallying swift as light
Or lightning, leaping forward, dashed
(Before the axe could downward sweep)
His clenched right hand with all his might
And the momentum of his leap,
Full into that grimacing grin;
And made the astonished savage spin—
While fast his rolling eyeballs flashed
With other gleams than fury lent—
Clean o'er the ditch's sheer descent
Amid the smouldering stakes that crashed
Beneath him as he headlong went,
Wondering what demon could assist
The weight of that hard English fist.—
“Kapai! ka nui pai!—Well done!
O right well done!” a hoarse voice cried—
Old Tangi's—at his topmost run
As rushing round the palisade
That brief encounter he espied
And hastened to the young man's aid.

IX.

—A grisly sight in sooth was he
That huge exulting Chief to see,
As there with lowered axe he stood
And Whetu's smashing fall surveyed!
From his broad axe-blade dripped and drained
The blood; and all with hostile blood
His hoary hair and beard were stained;
With drops of fierce exertion rained
His brow; his chest—so rugged, vast,
And muscle-woven like the twist
Of cable-cords some olive rears,
Some mighty trunk eight hundred years
Have seen in rocky strength resist
Their rending frost and raging heat;—
Like some great engine working fast,
That knotty chest quick-heaving beat:
So stood the Giant in his glee
In friendly hideous ecstasy!
But scarce could toil or triumph check
His course an instant; on he went
(As Ranolf leaving clear his road
Back to the barrier stepped to load)
On towards his prostrate breathless prey,—
That fallen ‘Star,’—with fell intent
To dash his life out where he lay.
But ere he reached him, to his feet
Up sprung Te Whetu, bold, erect—
Though still his blue-lined face streamed red
With that well-planted blow's effect;
At first prepared his foe to meet;
But seemed an instant to reflect;
The tough encounter seemed to dread:
Then shouting bade his men retreat,
And o'er the flat deliberate fled.
Swift passed the word from man to man,
And swiftly leaping down they ran
On all sides from the leaguered fort.
Three steps to follow, Tangi took,
With glad but half-astonished look;
And then in full career stopped short;
Smiled sternly with disdainful lip;
And pulling with his finger-tip
His under eyelid down in scorn—
“Is this your mutton-fish! Am I
Your greenhorn!” was his haughty cry;
For all the plan was patent then,—
To draw him to the open plain,
Where his slight force though stanch and good,
No chance against their numbers stood.
So, with the crowd though onward borne
A moment, back he forced his men;
Bade them for very shame restrain
Their shouts of ‘Victory,’ yet to gain;
And soon had all except the slain
Safe in the fort, to counsel there
How best they might the wall repair—
How best to meet—forestall—defeat,
The next assault their foes might dare.