means a spring suitable for bathing.
[19] Tenakoe, pakeha, "I salute you, stranger," is the usual Maori salutation addressed to Europeans.
CHAPTER VI.
TRADITION, IDOLATRY, AND ROMANCE.
Origin of the Maoris—Te Kupe—First canoes—The runanga house—Maori carving—Renowned ancestors—Tama te Kapua—Stratagem of the stilts—Legend of the whale—The Arawa canoe—Noted braves—Mokia—A curious relic—Gods of the Arawas—Mokia by night—Hinemoa—A love song.
When I went to Te Ruapeka to view the runanga house, it was in company with Mr. C.O. Davis, a gentleman well-known throughout the colony as an accomplished Maori scholar, and as one who has done much to advance the spiritual welfare of the natives; and it was to his kindly assistance I am indebted for much of the information I gained on that occasion respecting the singular history of the Maori race, and the remarkable legends connected with the graven images of their curious temple of ancestor-worship.
From the earliest period of Maori history Te Ruapeka has been the principal home of the Ngatiwhakaue, a section of the great Arawa tribe, whose territory extends over the Lake Country to the East Coast. Attracted, as it were, from their first landing upon the island to the magnificent scenery of this portion of the newly discovered land, the Arawas made their homes among the lakes, whose very shores and mountains echo even to the present day with their songs and legends. Whence they and the remainder of their race came, or at what period they arrived from their mysterious dwelling-place beyond the sea, is one of those interesting events in connection with their history which have been lost in the dim vista of the past. The Maoris of the present day refer to Hawaiki as the fatherland of their race, and hence the proverb: I kune mai i Hawaiki te kune kai te kune tangata, "the seed of our coming is from Hawaiki, the seed of man"; but of the locality of this place, beside the belief that it was an island somewhere in the broad waters of the Pacific, absolutely nothing beyond conjecture is known. They have, however, a distinct tradition that their ancestors migrated to New Zealand in certain canoes, the names of which, with the principal historical events connected with them, have been handed down from father to son through countless generations,[20] and although these ancestral reminiscences may appear to the ordinary mind like a labyrinth of mythical fancies, since many of the incidents upon which they have been founded appear to have been dimmed and distorted by the march of time, yet when considered in connection with the rude monuments which serve to perpetuate their memory, they form, as it were, the missing links in the unwritten annals of a splendid, albeit savage, race of people, who by their singular intelligence and chivalrous valour will be remembered in the history of the world so long as the brilliant record of the rise and progress of the British Empire shall endure.
According to general tradition, the first of the Maori race to reach Aotearoa, as the North Island was termed by its original discoverers, was Te Kupe. This hero, who may be looked upon as a kind of Maori Columbus endowed with supernatural power, is said to have severed the North Island from the Middle Island, and thus to have formed the wide channel of water now known as Cook's Strait. His achievements are thus commemorated in a characteristic native song:—
I'll sing, I'll sing of Kupe, great and brave,
Who launch'd his bark and cross'd the mighty wave;
He—when the world from chaos rose to birth—
Divided into continents the earth;
He form'd the valleys, and the mountains too,
And gave the fruitful earth its vernal hue;
Alighting as a bird upon the deep,
He call'd the islands from their death-like sleep;
Then Kapiti and Mana[21] kiss'd the wave, And Aropaoa[22] left its ocean grave; These are the signs which my ancestor wrought, When Aotearoa first his vision caught, And now will I explore each nook and strand, And take possession of this fertile land.[23]
When Te Kupe returned to Hawaiki, he gave such a glowing account of the size, beauty, and products of Aotearoa, that a fleet of canoes was immediately raised by his people to proceed to the newly discovered country.[24] Each canoe was under a separate navigator, and contained representatives of the principal Hawaikian tribes with their head chiefs and arikis, or high priests, and it was the final dispersion of these canoes to different parts of the North Island which gave rise to the great tribal divisions of the race as resented at the present day by the Arawas, the Ngapuhi,[25] the Waikatos, Ngatimaniapoto, Ngatituwharetoa, Ngatiawa, Ngatiruanui, Ngatihau, and others, with their various intertribal hapus, or families.
We found the runanga house to be a well-built structure, about seventy feet long, by forty feet in breadth. The carving about the portals was of a very elaborate kind, and formed an interesting specimen of native decorative art. On the left-hand side of the entrance was a grotesquely carved figure, about twenty feet high, of Pukaki, of the fifth generation of ancestors, and on the right-hand side was an equally remarkable one of Pimiomarama, also of the fifth generation.[26] At a short distance in front of the entrance was a tall square flag-staff of singular design, and at the bottom of it a figure of the chief Puruohutaiki elaborately tattooed in pink and white. He is represented as grasping a mere, and is said, according to Maori legend, to have been a noted ancestor in the mysterious land of Hawaiki, and to have lived three generations before Tama te Kapua, to whom the temple is dedicated.
SPECIMEN OF MAORI CARVING.
Stepping inside the runanga house, a very curious sight presented itself. The roof, high and slanting, was supported by a decorated ridge-pole, while the rafters, painted in bright colours of red, black, and white, presented all those singular varieties of curved and twisted lines which form one of the most remarkable features in the varied designs of Maori decoration. In fact, it is the wonderful blending of the circle and sweeping curve which adds to the carving and painting of this ingenious race its special and most attractive charm, and places it far beyond that of any other savage people for beauty combined with a unique and graceful simplicity.
The lower walls of the temple were entirely surrounded by grotesque figures, representing renowned ancestors of the Arawa tribe, and whose genealogy dated back both before and after the landing of the first immigrants. All these singular effigies appeared at the first glance to have been carved after the same model, but, upon closer examination, it could be seen that each one had some peculiarity of feature, some distinctive turn or twist in the singular design of its elaborate carving, while each had some facial expression or bodily characteristic for which the particular hero represented was supposed to have been remarkable when in the flesh. One and all were depicted with distorted features, protruding tongues, and defiant mien, while their big staring eyes were formed of the pearly shell of the fresh-water mussel.
As already stated, the runanga house is dedicated to the memory of Tama te Kapua, the captain of the Arawa canoe. Before the canoe landed, he acted the part of a primitive Lothario, and won the favours of the wife of Ngatoroirangi, the ariki,[27] or chief priest of the war craft. Indeed, he would appear to have been both a "gallant captain and a bold."