Page:Tales-of-Banks-Peninsula Jacobson 2ed 1893 cropped.pdf/273

fellow who came from Wairewa to Peraki, and who, knowing that Bloody Jack and his party were coming to Peraki, kept it a secret from Hempleman. When the party did come, and the boy Jacky was killed, and the other lad ransomed for the boat, Hempleman was so angry at not having received warning from this man of their danger, that he headed him up in a cask as a punishment, and kept him there for weeks, feeding him through the bunghole. It was only at the intercession of some other Maoris he at last consented to his release; and when the cask was broken open, and he was liberated, he was nearly dead with the frightful stench and the cramped position in which he had been kept so long. Mr. Simpson told me that a Maori girl was also killed here, and that the flesh was distributed; so that it has been the scene of more than one dark tragedy. It must indeed have been a lonely place in those days, and the brave fellows who lived there showed great courage. The bush then came down to the water’s edge, and rude and toilsome was the path leading to the Harbour of Akaroa. Even when they got there, it was a great chance if they could have had any aid, as for many months in the year there were no vessels there, so that it may be said they carried their lives in their hands. Hempleman must not only have been a courageous, but a very politic man, to save his little settlement in safety, when the fierce Natives could have murdered them whenever it suited their will. Many a weary night he must have spent, fearing the worst, and he certainly had a just claim on the Government for a good grant of land after surmounting so many perils. His first claim was, I believe, the whole of the Peraki valley, bounded by the crest of the two spurs and the summit of the main range; but, as we know, he afterwards grew more ambitious, and claimed a huge slice of the Peninsula. Simpson tells me that the