The whole pa was now in a roar of battle-excitement. The Maoris, as they fired, raised their fearful yells and war-shouts, an infernal din that almost drowned the cracks of the fire-arms. Kimble Bent was there, sitting on the parapet inside the stockade, and watching the encounter. A burly framed Hauhau, a herculean savage known as Big Kereopa—one of those who had shared in the cannibal feast at Papa-tihakehake—dashed out from the rear of the stockade, armed with a long-handled tomahawk, and rushed at the helpless pakeha. Trooper Lingard instantly put his plunging horse at the Hauhau, and cut at him with his sword. Another trooper, Tom D. Cummins (now of Wanganui) took a hand in the combat, and with a shot from his carbine stopped the charging Hauhau. He put a bullet into Kereopa, and the big fellow clapping a hand to his wound—which was in his posterior parts—bolted back into the pa nearly as quickly as he had come, yelling "I'm shot! I'm shot!" Lingard, leaning over, got Wright by the hand, and, though almost dismounted himself, succeeded in dragging his comrade from under the fallen horse. Then, noticing a white horse—which was usually ridden by one of the Maori scouts—tethered to a tutu-bush a short distance from the palisades, Lingard galloped at it, cut the tether-line with his sword, and soon had Wright mounted again antl riding down the hill out of range, with
