The crews of these found among the rum-shops and Maori houris of Kororareka a veritable South Sea Island paradise.

The Maori chiefs of the neighbourhood shared their orgies, pandered to their vices, and grew rich thereby.

An occasional murder reminded the Whites that Maori forbearance was limited.
But even Kororareka drew the line.

In 1827 a brig, the _Wellington_, arrived in the bay in the hands of a gang of convicts, who had preferred the chances of mutiny to the certainties of Norfolk Island.
Forthwith Alsatia was up in arms for society and a triple alliance of missionaries, whalers, and cannibals combined to intercept the runaways.

The ship's guns of the whalers drove the convicts to take refuge on shore, where the Maoris promptly secured them.