The Gun in the Canoe.

He had a large Maori canoe cut in two, lashed the gun in the bow end of the craft, made fast a five-inch hawser round the bow, with a clovehitch round the muzzle of the gun, had a relay of handspikes to place under the canoe, and then the sailors dragged it through the manuka on the riverside and up to the naval camp. The summit reached, the lively sailors, at the double, hauled the gun to the front of the pa, cheered themselves for their success, mounted the gun on its carriage, and fired three rounds blank out of it, by way of impressing the friendly natives, their allies. The gun was then placed on a bullock-dray and carted over the rough track sixteen miles to Despard's advanced camp in front of Kawiti's great stockade, at which it was soon battering away.