W. Dittmer

“ Carved is there Tama-te-Kapua, the great Chief—Tohunga, her ancestor, who came from Hawaiki.
Silent is the whare-puni; silent are the carved ancestors; and silent is Ngawai, watching the mist covering the snow-clad mountains in the distance.
It is the hour of the fairies and the spells; the hour when the sun hides; and Tawhiri-matea, [81] the God of the Winds, is resting—the happy hour when man forgets his wishes, and the path of his mind is guided by the spirits of his destination: it is the hour when the woman-Rangatira knows that she is a woman, and will be a slave. ”

“ Ah, the multitude of voices of the past are in my heart, and my hands can touch the spirits of my ancestors, as they can touch my waka-paparanga-rakau; and they come and feed me with joy, like children feed the aged, and my heart is glowing with the power of my ancestors—of Maui the Strong.
Ah! his great power attempted his greatest deed: to take the heart of Hine-nui-te-po, that man may live for ever; but his incantations were overcome by the Mother of All, and she swallowed him, as she swallows all—Maui-i-tiki-tiki-a-taranga. ”

“ Ah, the sons, whose dwelling-place was upon the earth, they had to live in darkness and night—ah!—ha!; but the sons!, ha, but the sons! Their hearts filled with the longing for the light, that happiness might grow again; and their hearts filled with the longing for space, that the power, living in them, might be born.
Ha, the longing in the hearts of the children of Rangi and Papa became the mother of the great incantations which gave them the power to create space again between heaven and earth so that the light could come to them like a wife to all. ”

“ Maui-roto, living in the Lower World, created the Earth, which has, like the Sun, a body of granite; and Maui-waho then nourishes her with his blood, which he streams down upon her as the red Evening-glow. This Evening-glow, covering the earth, does not die away with the Sun, but it cools and forms a new layer upon Earth, and thus, with layer upon layer of Evening-glows, he nourishes his child. ”

“ Open the eyes of your mind—as you have opened your ears and your eyes. Open the eyes of your mind that they may perceive how Tane separated Heaven and Earth. See how he presses the head of his god-power on the breasts of Papa—See his hair grow and take root——ah,—See how his body and his limbs begin to stretch:—high, high above, his feet grow into branches and boughs—See how his power grows—oh, how he grows all-powerful into the heaven——Ah, see how his power overcomes the strength of Rangi! ”

“ The life of man became like the life of ever-renewing Nature, producing and again destroying, giving birth, and again killing, to enable life to be sustained: the souls of man grew into the rigid wisdom of incantations; the food of man became man.
He who wishes for art must till the soil, but he who tills the soil must have faith; for art, though a fruit of Nature, is a child of god.
With the rising Sun came the old friend, and placed fresh wood on the camp-fire, a work of love; for he is a Rangatira-Tohunga (chief priest) of great mana in his tribe, and his tapu forbids menial labour. ”

“ The vast world stretches all around, and the people who surround the dead Rangatira seem tiny and powerless as the mountain defends his sacred crater with mighty bursts of steam and smoke and rolling thunder and suffocating fumes. Overawed by terror the strength of the bearers fails: they let fall their burden upon a rock; the hearts of the bravest are trembling.
The sanctity of Tongariro-tapu cannot be violated; no, not even by the sacred bones of the Rangatira; and fear grows overpowering beneath the still high-towering, angry crater-summit. ”

“ In the extreme north of the North Island of New Zealand is the Muri-whenua, the Land’s End, where the never-resting surges thunder at the feet of the bare rocky capes, and the giant sea-kelp swirls in long snaky masses round the fabled gateway to the Maori spirit-land. For here is Te Reinga, otherwise called Te Rerenga-Wairua, or the Place where the Spirits take their Flight. Te Reinga is a long craggy ridge that dips down to the ocean, ending in a rocky point whence the ghosts of the departed take their final plunge into the realms of darkness and oblivion. ”

“ Like the elves of other countries, these fairies of Maori Land dread daylight, and appear only by night. Sometimes, on dark and gloomy days, when the thick mists descend and envelop the bare crags and deep ravines of the mountains of the South, the fairy people will be heard chanting songs in a thin sweet cadence, and then too will be heard the doleful sound of the fairy trumpet, and the faint and plaintive music of the Koauau, or nose-flute, and the voices of the fairy children laughing and singing above the clouds. ”

“ Ha, the brothers hold; they hold tight. Oh, see Maui!—Maui springs forward with his sacred weapon—Te Ra cries!—Ah, Maui beats him; look, he bleeds!—ha, again he beats the Sun; again—again—Te Ra cries wildly!—ah, ah—Maui has broken his wing—O Maui, the hero!—Ha, that is a terrible battle! Oh, see the eyes on Maui’s fish-hook flashing light—see the carvings; ha, see the adornment of sacred dog’s-hair—Ah, his weapon is superbly beautiful! ”

“ But most of all they love the thickly-wooded mountains of the North, the Fish of Maui, where they live in their little pas, palisaded like those of the Maoris, and adorned with quaint little carvings and diminutive figures of fairy ancestors. Few mortals can discover those pas. They are hidden far away in the shadiest recesses of the bush, where the mist-maidens hover all day long, and where the Goddess of the Clouds descends nightly and covers her fairy children with her loving mantle. A Tohunga alone can perceive those stockades and houses of the Patu-paiarehe. ”

“ I am a slave till I free my sister Matike; but soon I will show your warriors that they are women, for they fought women!’ And Te-marama spoke: ‘If you are Tihi-o-te-Rangi, truly then you are the best of all warriors, for you lower yourself to a slave to free a woman; but listen, Tihi: Matike is a slave no longer—for her beauty she is taken by the chief Takerangi to share his resting-place and his mana.’ When Tihi heard Te-marama speaking thus, joy entered in his heart and he said: ‘Sweet is it for the eyes to rest upon the Flower of the North, and her words give gladness to my heart! ”

“ Cold and pale at first appear the long stripes painted over the floor, till they change slowly into warmer and more glowing colours, lighting up the calabashes, the nets, the paddles, and the mats, which hang on the walls smoke-blackened under the raupo roof. The stripes of daylight are able, too, to light up Ngawai’s eyes, which stare into the nearly burnt-out embers. More fiery glow the stripes, and suddenly they flood the whare with wonderful golden light: it is pure gold, through which, like music, the blue smoke ascends to the roof. ”

“ Maui alone, the great hero—ah, Maui, my tupuna! (ancestor) .—Oh listen, my wanderer—Maui alone had the courage to go to Mahuika to ask her for one of her fingers! He wandered through the caves of the Lower World, and nearer and nearer he approached Mahuika, his heart full of courage and cunning; but, ha, when his eyes beheld his ancestress, he began to tremble so that he could not speak—ah, friend, Mahuika was beautiful to look upon in her dark cave surrounded by her children, who shone forth out of the darkness. ”

“ Wrathful over the insult Tama-te-Kapua had done to him, Ngatoro now steers the canoe into the western precipice: the Sun is setting, and night swallows the canoe; and in vain does Tama-te-Kapua call for help from Ngatoro: everything is swallowed in darkness. But at last Ngatoro takes pity and saves the canoe: the Sun ascends again in the East, and steers the canoe against the West, to Ao-tea-roa. Far from Hawaiki now they landed. ”

“ A beautiful straight form gave the mass of fire and ashes to Taranaki—but he shook in terrible rage! He tore himself out of the ground, shaking the earth and breaking the lands asunder; he tried to fly at Ruapehu, to kill him with his weight. But Ruapehu made the water of his lake, high up in the snows, boil, and, hurling it down, it filled all the rends Taranaki had made in the earth, and burned all the inside of the earth and of Taranaki himself. ”

“ Ngawai commences her narrative while the sun paints a blue halo in the black hair around her head. The light plays in the sunburnt face, the lips quiver, and the large eyes, full of light, see in the distance what the lips utter.
“Oh, Hinemoa was full of gladness and was smiling at her image for joy, for over the sea sweetly sounds the music of the flute and the horn played by Tutanekai and his friend Tiki, far off in the middle of the lake on the island of Mokoia, Tutanekai’s home.” ”

“ Irawaru, the husband of Hinauri, had followed Maui in the morning upon the sea, to catch fish—Irawaru is the reflexion of the sun over the sea, wandering forth with the sun in the mornings to catch fish—what else could a man do on the sea? ”

“ Honewaka is a leader of great mana; he knows every ripple in the river, and he knows men. He knows where the canoe glides onward whilst the spirits of his men are not in the paddles, and he knows how to incite their spirits by powerful songs so that, when the rapids are fighting their strongest, the spirits of men uniting to their greatest strength in the paddles will be victorious. ”

“ Then, springing out of his canoe, he jumped and danced upon Irawaru till his body grew longer and longer and took the form of a tail; and then with incantations Maui changed Irawaru into a dog.”
So sings Hupene. The blood-red Sun seems to tremble and dance, before he sinks below the sea: he changes Irawaru into a dog which is now running as the last shade of light upon the mountains, whilst the Sun is entering the Lower World. ”

“ Little only is known of the sacred wisdom of the Maoris. The dread of the old gods is still living in the hearts of the Maoris, but the last hour has come for them as they now bend their tattoed heads over the fire and murmur regretfully of the great Past. ”

“ It came through the paths of the Lower World and it burst through the earth on many places: at Roto-ehu, Roto-rua, Tarawera, and at many more places; but at last it ascended Tongariro, and created a volcano, and the fire and heat of the volcano saved Ngatoro-i-Rangi from a frightful death.
“Ngatoro-i-Rangi, my listener is the ancestor of the tribe of the Ngati-tu-wharetoa; we all are the descendants of Ngatoro-i-Rangi, and the sacred Tongariro is the guardian of my people.”
Out of a wonderful spectacle of colours springs the new day into life. ”

“ Then she broke the canoes on the large stones and took the strong men and beautiful women into her dark cave for food. Disdainfully looks Ngawai back, for now the battle is won, and women despise the conquered foe, be it man or spirit.
Great is the power of the Spirits who live in the image of a beautiful woman; greater is the power of the spirits awakened by incantations to the gods; and the power of man lies in the incantations which capture the gods into their weapon—but twice powerful is such a weapon when used in the service of a beautiful woman. ”

“ The rising sun condenses the steam which is hanging, a large white cloud, over the landscape. Like granades are the geysers shooting into the mass of steam, and from everywhere is steam ascending thickening the silvery mass, which hangs swaying and broadening, and bordered with a golden rim, over our heads. ”

“ An uninterrupted whirling around the heads, around the shoulders, in the out-stretched arms, now through the air, before the breasts or behind the backs, beaten again and again with the dull thud upon hand, head, shoulder, or floor under the rhythmical movements of the bodies, the soft stamping of the bare feet, the slapping of the piu-pius and the clapping of hands, ending again in the four times repeated thud in the open hands.
Enjoyment is in the eyes of the spectators, and happiness seems to enliven the monotonous song; the clapping of hands sounds joyful, and the bosoms heave quicker. ”

“ The God of Winds is often rushing over them from one end of the heavens to the other, and that makes the waters spray and splash, and causes them to fall as rain down upon earth. Rehua once, in terrible wrath, stamped upon the bottom of this heaven so that it broke, and all the waters rushed down upon the earth as a Deluge.
In these three heavens is Maru, the governing god; from here it is that he inspires the children of earth with great deeds, that the spirits of the slain braves may live here as stars on the heavens of Maru, the God of War. ”

“ None dares touch the remains of Te Heu-heu again; one and all let them be where they are, upon the rock, overtowered and defended by the majestic summit, with its rolling, thundering, steaming crater—and down they tumble, down, down, helter skelter, in wild and fearful fright they run, a shouting, shrieking body of men, possessed by overpowering terror of the sacred giant. ”

“ Now the Sunshine pours in at the door, and with it the wonderful picture of the mountain-lake, reflecting the mountain giants, to the astonished eye. And in all the beautiful world life commences again with laughter and happiness—the laughter and happiness of the parting day. ”

“ A canoe is putting off the shore, and voices of children are heard leading it light-hearted with mirth and laughter and splashing of water over the lake, which looks clear and glittering green up to the stars. ”