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Rh bushmen, who had served in the Forest Rangers and other corps; they had carried their carbines on many a dangerous forest trail, and fought the Hauhaus again and again, and they were led by officers of ability, coolness, and bravery. Under McDonnell there was, for one, that soldier of fortune, Major Gustavus von Tempsky, most picturesque of guerilla fighters, the central figure in many stories of daring and adventure, the adored of his bushwhackers and the terror of the Maoris.

"Wawahi-waka," the Waikato Maoris called him—"The Splitter-of-Canoes"—because of his exploits in war. "Manu-rau"—"Hundred Birds"—was the name by which he was known amongst the Taranaki Hauhaus. The name had been given him because of his activity in rushing from place to place, fighting here and fighting there, as swiftly as the forest-birds that flitted from tree to tree. Every Maori knew of "Manu-rau," and many of those in arms had been chased by him at one time or another during the three years of war since he led his Forest Rangers to the assault at Otapawa stockade.

Von Tempsky was of aristocratic Polish blood. He had begun soldiering life as a Prussian chasseur, had served under the unfortunate Emperor Maximilian in Mexico, and fought in several little wars in Central America; had been a gold-digger on the great tented fields of Victoria and the Hauraki;