The bombardment began long before all the guns were up. Moses Tawhai, one of the allied chiefs, just before daylight on the 29th of December stole through the thick bush with his men to a position six hundred yards from the _pa_. Ere the enemy detected their daring approach, they had "rushed up" a temporary stockade, and into this two hundred soldiers and a couple of guns were promptly conveyed.
Two days later, even as the enemy, as if inviting a beginning, hoisted their standard, every British gun in position--big guns, brass guns, little guns, mortars, rockets--roared, banged, cracked and fizzed an instant response. When the very first shot--fired from the gun served by the contingent from H.M.S. _Racehorse_, under Lieutenant Bland--cut the flagstaff in two and brought down the flag, "even the ranks of Tuscany could scarce forbear to cheer." Which is to say, the chivalrous gentlemen defending the _pa_ were as ungrudging in their admiration of the successful marksman as were the besiegers.
Next day, the 1st of January, 1846, the guns again roared out in chorus, this time in salute to the New Year; and old Kawiti, on the 2nd, tried one of his famous flank rushes. But the British were ready for him and drove him back with loss, so that he kept behind his defences for the remainder of the siege.
So the days wore on until the 10th, by which time every gun, heavy and light, was in position. All day long they thundered and crashed, and shot and shell thumped and smacked against the wooden walls with much more visible effect than at Oheawai, so that two very obvious breaches had been made by nightfall.
Heke arrived that night with a reinforcement, having dodged a column of friendlies who were blocking him in his home at Okerangi. When he saw the condition of things, he gave the very sound advice that the _pa_ should be evacuated before further mischief was done. "There is no sense in remaining here to be killed," he urged. "Let them have the _pa_ and, if they follow us into the bush, we shall have _them_; for they cannot bring their big guns there."
People who have for nearly a fortnight endured a bombardment do not require much persuasion to change their quarters, and the majority then and there followed Heke out into the dense bush in rear of the _pa_.