At the Chathams.

In 1868 Mr. Smith was sent to Chatham Island to carry out some Government survey work and he was there when Te Kooti and his people to the number of nearly 300—men, women and children—escaped from their island of exile. The escape was most cleverly planned and skilfully carried out by Te Kooti, who had a just grievance against the Government, which had sent him there without trial two years before, and kept him there, with his companions, on a kind of indeterminate sentence. Mr. Smith happened to be some miles away, in the interior of the island, and knew nothing of the occurrence for several days. He made a number of sketches of the place, as was his way on survey duty, and one of these is reproduced with this article. It shows Waitangi Bay and settlement, the official and business headquarters of the Chathams, with the military redoubt on the low cliff above the beach terrace. This redoubt, a square earthwork with flanking bastions at diagonally opposite corners, was easily captured by Te Kooti from its unsuspecting small garrison under Captain Thomas, R.M. The magazine, armoury and Government safe were looted, and Te Kooti with his armed men and their families, put to sea in the three-masted schooner Rifleman, which had just ar-

(Continued on page 46.)