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140 Taramakau River, where the natives were digging, and with the exception of my storeman and Matthew Batty, a miner who came down with me to get the coal, there were no other white men left at the Grey.

“About a week later some Maoris came from the Greenstone and brought with them a parcel of about 50 ozs. of the finest gold I have ever seen. I was glad indeed to purchase it from them. These natives then informed me that the men who had gone to the Taramakau were coming back again to kill me, and soon after this two white men returned and advised me to get out of the way, as the rest of the party were close at hand and were going to ransack my store and hang me. From what I could learn they had not been to the Greenstone at all, but only to the Taramakau, the Maoris having led them astray. In this connection the natives, having heard that a large number of pakehas had arrived by a steamer at the Grey, decided to leave their claims at the Greenstone, and commence working in the Taramakau River, at a place where they could not earn their salt, for the purpose of leading the diggers to suppose that gold had been got in that quarter. Here let me add that shortly afterwards I was informed that the Maoris had completely blocked up the track to the Greenstone, and thus it was that the new arrivals went wrong. I cannot vouch for the truth of