Next day, pretty early in the morning, I saw our chief (as I must call him for distinction) with a few of the principal men of the tribe, dressed in their best Maori costume, taking their way towards the shed of the visitors. When they got pretty near, a cry of _haere mai!_ hailed them. They went on gravely, and observing where the principal chief was seated, our chief advanced towards him, fell upon his neck, embracing him in the most affectionate manner, and commenced a _tangi_, or melancholy sort of ditty, which lasted a full half-hour; during which, both parties, as in duty bound and in compliance with custom, shed floods of tears. How they managed to do it is more than I can tell to this day; except that I suppose you may train a man to do anything. Right well do I know that either party would have almost given his life for a chance to exterminate the other with all his tribe; and twenty-seven years afterwards I saw the two tribes fighting in the very quarrel which was pretended to have been made up that day. Before this, however, both these chiefs were dead, and others reigned in their stead.
While the _tangi_ was going on between the two principals, the companions of our chief each selected one of the visitors, and, rushing into his arms, went through a similar scene. Old "Relation Eater" singled out the horrific savage who had begun the war dance, and these two tenderhearted individuals, for a full half-hour, seated on the ground, hanging on each other's necks, gave vent to such a chorus of skilfully modulated howling as would have given Momus the blue devils to listen to.
After the _tangi_ was ended, the two tribes seated themselves in a large irregular circle on the plain; into this circle strode an orator, who, having said his say, was followed by another, and so the greater part of the day was consumed. No arms were to be seen in the hands of either party, except the greenstone _mere_ of the principal chiefs; but I took notice that about thirty of our people never left the nearest gate of the pa, and that their loaded muskets, although out of sight, were close at hand, standing against the fence inside the gate: I also perceived that under their cloaks or mats they wore their cartridge boxes and tomahawks. This caused me to observe the other party more closely. They also, I perceived, had some forty men sleeping in the shed; these fellows had not removed their cartridge boxes either, and all their companions' arms were carefully ranged behind them in a row, six or seven deep, against the back wall of the shed.