Summary
Leaving this delightful spot, we bent our course back to Wyemattee, and stopping at the little village where the natives had on our first approach received us so kindly, we experienced again the same proofs of their friendliness and hospitality. The wild duck that Shunghi had shot for us, was now boiled in the iron pot, and the villagers bringing us some potatoes as before, we fared as well as we could desire. While we were thus comfortably regaling ourselves, and all the inhabitants of the village sitting round us. Tenana, of whom I have had hitherto little occasion to speak, but who, the reader will recollect, had been at Port Jackson, made a very sensible remark on the difference of hospitality perceptible between his own countrymen and the people of New South Wales. In New Zealand, said he, they give you plenty of kiki every where you come to; but at Parramatta, you may walk about all day long, and no person will offer you any thing to eat. This remark was certainly just; and hence it is evident, that the poorer a people are, and the less capable of setting a defined value on property, the more open and hospitable will they always be found. The good chief for whom our visit was intended, was anxious to afford us the best treatment in his power, and procured a pig for us, which he had killed with his spear, and was to serve for our repast when we reached his hippah.
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- Narrative of a Voyage to New ZealandPerformed in the Years 1814 and 1815, in Company with the Rev. Samuel Marsden, pp. 349 - 381Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2010