How Waikaremoana was formed

Maahu took Kau-Ariki to wife and had eight children. Daughter called "Hau-Mapuhia" was special.

One evening  Maahu asked Hau-Mapuhia to go to a spring to fetch some water.  Typical teenager even today there's no difference, Hau-Mapuhia politely refused.

This enraged Maahu so he went to the spring himself. So enraged was he that when he stayed there a long time, Hau-Mapuhia went after him. Now Maahu was really angry that he took Hau-Mapuhia and thrust her under the water and held her there.

The Gods taking pity on her turned her into a taniwha and endowed her with great and beautiful powers. Breaking away from her fathers grasp Hau-Mapuhia forced her way through the solid ground and formed the great hollow in which lie the waters of Waikare. In her quest to reach the ocean "Moana Nui a Kiwa" Hau-Mapuhia formed the many arms and inlets around the lake.

However when Hau-Mapuhia reached the Komore at the outlet of the lake where the waters rush and flow quickly, she became fixed and so lies to this day with her hair waving in the rushing waters in the form of Kohuwai, a green water plant.

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Same story different version

Long ago before there was a great lake a Chief called Maahu lived with his wife and eight children. His people drew their water from two springs: Waikotikoti and Te Puna a Taupara.

Waikotikoti was very tapu and the water from here was used for sacred purposes only, while the other was for general domestic use.

One night the Chief sent all his children to fetch water to quench his thirst. However six of his children brought water from the sacred spring which was closer. When the Chief discovered this he flew into a rage and turned all six to stone.

Meanwhile Haumapuhia, the remaining daughter, went searching for her father to give him the water that she had got from the domestic spring. She found him at the sacred Waikotikoti.

When her father saw her arrive he thought she too planned to collect water from the sacred spring; outraged he grabbed her and thrust her under the water intent on drowning her.

Knowing she had no chance against her fathers might she cried out to the gods of the land for help, they headed her pleas and turned her into a powerful Taniwha (water monster). As a Taniwha she knew the light of day would bring her death so she tried to escape to the sea where she could hide in its depths.

First she set out north but was barred by the Huiarau Range, and so the Whanganui Inlet was gouged out. Next she thrust eastward and the Whanganui o Parua arm was formed. One by one the arms of the lake were carved out in this fashion until she finally managed to force her way through a narrow gorge at Te Wharawhara near Onepoto.

Alas, as she emerged she was over taken by daylight and turned to stone. She still lies in the bed of the Waikaretaheke River.

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Children of Heaven and Earth

( NGA TAMA A RANGI )

MEN had but one pair of primitive ancestors; they sprang from the vast heaven that exists above us, and from the earth which lies beneath us. according to the traditions of our race, Rangi and Papa, or Heaven and Earth, were the source from which, in the beginning, all things originated. Darkness then rested upon the heaven and upon the earth, and they still both work together, because they had not yet been pulled apart; and the children they had were ever thinking amongst themselves what might be the difference between darkness and light; they knew that beings had multiplied and increased, and yet light had never broken them, but it ever continued dark. So  these sayings are found in our ancient religious services: 'There was darkness from the first division of time, unto the tenth, to the hundredth, to the thousandth', that is, for a vast space of time; and these divisions of times were considered as beings, and were each termed 'a Po'; and on their account there was as yet no world with its bright light, but darkness only for the beings which existed.

At last the beings who had been begotten by Heaven and Earth, worn out by the continued darkness, consulted amongst themselves, saying:

"Let us now determine what we should do with Rangi and Papa, whether it would be better to slay them or to pull  them apart.' Then spoke Tu-matauenga, the fiercest of the children of Rangi and Papa: 'It is well, let us slay them.'

Then spake Tane-mahuta, the father of forests and of all things that inhabit them, or that are constructed from trees: 'Nay, not so. It is better to rend them apart, and to let the heaven stand far above us, and the earth lie under our feet. Let the sky become as a stranger to us, but the earth remain close to us as our nursing mother.'

The brothers all consented to this proposal, with the exception of Tawhiri-ma-tea, the father of winds and storms, and he, fearing that his kingdom was about to be overthrown, grieved greatly at the thought of his parents being torn apart. Five of the brothers willingly consented to the separation of their parents, but one of them would not agree to it.

These sayings are found in our prayers: 'Darkness, darkness, light, light, the seeking, the searching, in chaos, in chaos'; these signified the way in which the offspring of heaven and earth sought for some mode of dealing with their parents, so that human beings might increase and live.

So, also, these sayings of old. 'The multitude, the length , signified the multitude of the thoughts of the children of Rangi and Papa, and the length of time they considered whether they should slay their parents, that human beings might be called into existence; for it was in this manner that they talked and consulted amongst themselves.

But at length their plans having been agreed on, Rongo-ma-tane, the god and father of the cultivated food of man, rises up, that he may rend apart the heavens and the earth; he struggles, but he tends them not apart.  next, Tangaroa, the god and father of fish and reptiles, rises up, that he may rend apart the heavens and the earth; he also struggles, but he rends them not apart, next, Haumia-tikitiki, the god and father of the food of man which springs without cultivation, rises up and struggles, but ineffectually, then, Tu-matauenga, the god and father of fierce human beings, rises up and struggles, but he, too, fails in his efforts. Then, at last, slowly uprises Tane-mahuta, the god and father of forests, of birds, and of insects, and he struggles. With his parents; in vain he strives to rend them apart with his hands and arms, he pauses; his head is now firmly planted on his mother the earth, his feet he raises up and rests against his father the skies, he strains his back and limbs with mighty effort. Now are pulled apart Rangi and Papa, and with cries and groans of woe they shriek aloud: 'Wherefore slay you thus your parents? Why commit you so dreadful a crime as to slay us, as to pull your parents apart? But Tane-mahuta pauses not, he regards not their shrieks and cries; far, far beneath him he presses down the earth; far, far above him he thrusts up the sky.

It was the fierce thrusting of Tane which tore the heaven from the earth, so that they were apart, and darkness was made dark no more, and so was the light.'

No sooner was heaven pulled from earth than the multitude of human beings were discovered whom they had begotten, and who had lain concealed between the bodies of Rangi and Papa.

There rose in the breast of Tawhiri-ma-tea, the god and father of winds and storms, a fierce desire to wage war with his brothers, because they had rent apart their common parents. He from the first had refused to consent to his mother being torn from her lord and children; it was his brothers alone that wished for this separation, and desired that Papa-tu-a-nuku, or the Earth alone, should be left as a parent for them.

The god of hurricanes and storms dreads also that the world should become too fair and beautiful, so he rises, follows his father to the realm above, and hurries to the sheltered hollows in the boundless skies; there he hides and clings, and nestling in this place of rest he consults long with his parent, and as the vast Heaven listens to the suggestions of Tawhiri-ma-tea, thoughts and plans are formed in his breast, and Tawhiri-ma-tea also understands what he should do. Then by himself and the vast Heaven were begotten his numerous brood, and they rapidly increased and grew. Tawhiri-ma-tea despatches one of them to the westward, and one to the southward, and one to the eastward, and one to the northward; and he gives corresponding names to himself and to his progeny the mighty winds.

He next sends forth fierce squalls, whirlwinds, dense clouds, massy clouds, dark clouds, gloomy thick clouds, fiery clouds, clouds which precede hurricanes, clouds of fiery black, clouds reflecting glowing red light, clouds wildly drifting from all quarters and wildly bursting, clouds of thunder storms, and clouds hurriedly flying. in the midst of these Tawhiri-ma-tea himself sweeps wildly on. Alas! alas! then rages the fierce hurricane; and whilst Tane-mahuta and his gigantic forests still stand, unconscious and unsuspecting, the blast of the breath of the mouth of Tawhiri-ma-tea smites them, the gigantic trees are snapt off right in the middle; alas! alas! they are rent to atoms, dashed to the earth, with boughs and branches torn and scattered, and lying on the earth, trees and branches all alike left for the insect, for the grub, and for loathsome rottenness.

From the forests and their inhabitants Tawhiri-ma-tea next swoops down upon the seas, and lashes in his wrath the ocean. Ah! ah! waves steep as cliffs arise, whose summits are so lofty that to look from them would make the beholder giddy; these soon eddy in whirlpools, and Tangaroa, the god of ocean, and father of all that dwell there, flies affrighted through his seas; but before he fled, his children consulted together how they might secure their safety, for Tangaroa had gotten Punga, and he had gotten two children, Ika-tere, the father of fish, and Tu-te-wehiwehi, or Tu-te-wanawana, the father of reptiles.

When Tangaroa fled for safety to the ocean, Tu-te-wehiwehi and Ika-tere, and their children, disputed together as to what they should do to escape from the storms, and Tu-te-wehiwehi and his party cried aloud: 'Let us fly inland'; but Ika-tere and his party cried aloud: 'Let us fly to the sea.' Some would not obey one order, some would not obey the other, and they escaped in two parties: the party of Tu-te-wehiwehi, or the reptiles, hid themselves ashore; the party of Punga rushed to the sea. This is what, in our ancient religious services, is called the separation of Tawhiri-ma-tea.

These traditions have been handed down: 'Ika-tere, the father of things which inhabit water, cried aloud to Tu-te-wehiwehi: "Ho, ho, let us all escape to the sea."

'But Tu-te-wehiwehi shouted in answer: "Nay, nay, let us rather fly inland."

'Then Ika-tere warned him, saying: "Fly inland, then; and the fate of you and your race will be, that when they catch you, before you are cooked, they will singe off your scales over a lighted wisp of dry fern."

'But Tu-te-wehiwehi answered him, saying: "Seek safety, then, in the sea; and the future fate of your race will be, that when they serve out little baskets of cooked vegetable food to each person, you will be laid upon the top of the food to give a relish to it."

'Then without delay these two races of beings separated. The fish fled in confusion to the sea, the reptiles sought safety in the forests and scrubs.'

Tangaroa, enraged at some of his children deserting him, and, being sheltered by the god of the forests on dry land, has ever since waged war on his brother Tane, who, in return, has waged war against him.

Hence Tane supplies the offspring of his brother Tu-matauenga with canoes, with spears and with fish-hooks made from his trees, and with nets woven from his fibrous plants, that they may destroy the offspring of Tangaroa; whilst Tangaroa, in return, swallows up the offspring of Tane, overwhelming canoes with the surges of his sea, swallowing up the lands, trees, and houses that are swept off by floods, and ever wastes away, with his lapping waves, the shores that confine him, that the giants of the forests may be washed down and swept out into his boundless ocean, that he may then swallow up the insects, the young birds, and the various animals which inhabit them--all which things are recorded in the prayers which were offered to these gods.

Tawhiri-ma-tea next rushed on to attack his brothers Rongo-ma-tane and Haumia-tikitiki, the gods and progenitors of cultivated and uncultivated food; but Papa, to save these for her other children, caught them up, and hid them in a place of safety; and so well were these children of hers concealed by their mother Earth, that Tawhiri-ma-tea sought for them in vain.

Tawhiri-ma-tea having thus vanquished all his other brothers, next rushed against Tu-matauenga, to try his strength against his; he exerted all his force against him, but he could neither shake him nor prevail against him. What did Tu-matauenga care for his brother's wrath? he was the only one of the whole party of brothers who had planned the destruction of their parents, and had shown himself brave and fierce in war; his brothers had yielded at once before the tremendous assaults of Tawhiri-ma-tea and his progeny--Tane-mahuta and his offspring had been broken and torn in pieces-Tangaroa and his children had fled to the depths of the ocean or the recesses of the shore--Rongo-ma-tane and Haumia-tikitiki had been hidden from him in the earth-but Tu-matauenga, or man, still stood erect and unshaken upon the breast of his mother Earth; and now at length the hearts of Heaven and of the god of storms became tranquil, and their passions were assuaged.

Tu-matauenga, or fierce man, having thus successfully resisted his brother, the god of hurricanes and storms, next took thought how he could turn upon his brothers and slay them, because they had not assisted him or fought bravely when Tawhiri-ma-tea had attacked them to avenge the separation of their parents, and because they had left him alone to show his prowess in the fight. As yet death had no power over man. It was not until the birth of the children of Taranga and of Makea-tu-tara, of Maui-taha, of Maui-roto, of Maui-pae, of Maui-waho, and of Maui-tikitiki-o-Taranga, the demi-god who tried to beguile Hine-nui-te-po, that death had power over men. If that goddess had not been deceived by Maui-tikitiki, men would not have died, but would in that case have lived for ever; it was from his deceiving Hine-nui-te-po that death obtained power over mankind, and penetrated to every part of the earth.

Tu-matauenga continued to reflect upon the cowardly manner in which his brothers had acted, in leaving him to show his courage alone, and he first sought some means of injuring Tane-mahuta, because he had not come to aid him in his combat with Tawhiri-ma-tea, and partly because he was aware that Tane had had a numerous progeny, who were rapidly increasing, and might at last prove hostile to him, and injure him, so he began to collect leaves of the whanake tree, and twisted them into nooses, and when his work was ended, he went to the forest to put up his snares, and hung them up--ha! ha! the children of Tane fell before him, none of them could any longer fly or move in safety.

Then he next determined to take revenge on his brother Tangaroa, who had also deserted him in the combat; so he sought for his offspring, and found them leaping or swimming in the water; then he cut many leaves from the flax-plant, and netted nets with the flax, and dragged these, and hauled the children of Tangaroa ashore.

After that, he determined also to be revenged upon his brothers Rongo-ma-tane and Haumia-tikitiki; he soon found them by their peculiar leaves, and he scraped into shape a wooden hoe, and plaited a basket, and dug In the earth and pulled up all kinds of plants with edible roots, and the plants which had been dug up withered in the sun.

Thus Tu-matauenga devoured all his brothers, and consumed the whole of them, in revenge for their having deserted him and left him to fight alone against Tawhiri-ma-tea and Rangi.

When his brothers had all thus been overcome by Tu', he assumed several names, namely, Tu-ka-riri, Tu-ka-nguha, Tu-ka-taua, Tu-whaka-heke-tan-gata, Tu-mata-wha-iti, and Tu-matauenga; he assumed one name for each of his attributes displayed in the victories over his brothers. Four of his brothers were entirely deposed by him, and became his food; but one of them, Tawhiri-ma-tea, he could not vanquish or make common, by eating him for food, so he, the last born child of Heaven and Earth, was left as an enemy for man, and still, with a rage equal to that of Man, this elder brother ever attacks him in storms and hurricanes, endeavouring to destroy him alike by sea and land.

Now, the meanings of these names of the children of the Heaven and Earth are as follows:

Tangaroa signifies fish of every kind; Rongo-ma-tane signifies the sweet potato, and all vegetables cultivated as food; Haumia-tikitiki signifies fern root, and all kinds of food which grow wild; Tane-mahuta signifies forests, the birds and insects which inhabit them, and all things fashioned from wood; Tawhiri-ma-tea signifies winds and storms; and Tu-matauenga signifies man.

Four of his brothers having, as before stated, been made common, or articles of food, by Tu-matauenga, he assigned for each of them fitting incantations, that they might be abundant, and that he might easily obtain them.

Some incantations were proper to Tane-mahuta, they were called Tane.

Some incantations were for Tangaroa, they were called Tangaroa.

Some were for Rongo-ma-tane, they were called Rongo-ma-tane.

Some were for Haumia-tikitiki, they were called Haumia.

The reason that he sought out these incantations was, that his brothers might be made common by him, and serve for his food. There were also incantations for Tawhiri-ma-tea to cause favourable winds, and prayers to the vast Heaven for fair weather, as also for mother Earth that she might produce all things abundantly. But it was the great God that taught these prayers to man.

There were also many prayers and incantations composed for man, suited to the different times and circumstances of his life--prayers at the baptism of an infant; prayers for abundance of food, for wealth; prayers in illness; prayers to spirits, and for many other things.

The bursting forth of the wrathful fury of Tawhiri-ma-tea against his brothers, was the cause of the disappearance of a great part of the dry land; during that contest a great part of mother Earth was submerged. The names of those beings of ancient days who submerged so large a portion of the earth were--Terrible-rain, Long-continued rain, Fierce-hailstorms; and their progeny were, Mist, Heavy-dew, and Light-dew, and these together submerged the greater part of the earth, so that only a small portion of dry land projected above the sea.

From that time clear light increased upon the earth, and all the beings which were hidden between Rangi and Papa before they were separated, now multiplied upon the earth. The first beings begotten by Rangi and Papa were not like human beings; but Tu-matauenga bore the likeness of a man, as did all his brothers, as also did a Po, a Ao, a Kore, te Kimihanga and Runuku, and thus it continued until the times of Ngainui and his generation, and of Whiro-te-tupua and his generation, and of Tiki-tawhito-ariki and his generation, and it has so continued to this day.

The children of Tu-matauenga were begotten on this earth, and they increased,, and continued to multiply, until we reach at last the generation of Maui-taha, and of his brothers Maui-roto, Maui-waho, Maui-pae, and Maui-tikitiki-o-Taranga.

Up to this time the vast Heaven has still ever remained separated from his spouse the Earth. Yet their mutual love still continues--the soft warm sighs of her loving bosom still ever rise up to him, ascending from the woody mountains and valleys and men can these mists; and the vast Heaven, as he mourns through the long nights his separation from his beloved, drops frequent tears upon her bosom, and men seeing these, term them dew-drops.

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The Legend of Maui

ONE day Maui asked his brothers to tell him the place where their father and mother dwelt; he begged earnestly that they would make this known to him in order that he might go and visit the place where the two old people dwelt; and they replied to him: 'We don't know; how can we tell whether they dwell up above the earth, or down under the earth, or at a distance from up.' Then he answered them: 'Never mind, I think I'll find them out'; and his brothers replied: 'Nonsense, how can you tell where they are--you, the last born of all of us, when we your elders have no knowledge where they are concealed from us; after you first appeared to us, and made yourself known to us and to our mother as our brother, you know that our mother used to come and sleep with us every night, and as soon as the day broke she was gone, and, lo, there was nobody but ourselves sleeping in the house, and this took place night after night, and how can we tell then where she went or where she lives? But he answered: 'Very well, you stop here and listen; by and by you will hear news of me.'

For he had found something out after he was discovered by his mother, by his relations, and by his brothers. They discovered him one night whilst they were all dancing in the great House of Assembly. Whilst his relations were all dancing there, they found out who he was in this manner. For little Maui, the infant, crept into the house, and went and sat behind one of his brothers, and hid himself, so when their mother counted her children that they might stand up ready for the dance, she said: 'One, that's Maui-taha; two, that's Maui-roto; three, that's Maui-pae, four, that's Maui-waho'; and then she saw another, and cried out: 'Hallo, where did this fifth come from? Then little Maui, the infant, answered: 'Ah, I'm your child too.' Then the old woman counted them all over again, and said: 'Oh, no, there ought to be only four of you; now for the first time I've seen you.' Then little Maui and his mother stood for a long time disputing about this in the very middle of the ranks of all the dancers.

At last she got angry, and cried out: 'Come, you be off now, out of the house at once; you are no child of mine, you belong to someone else.' Then little Maui spoke out quite boldly, and said: 'Very well, I'd better be off then, for I suppose, as you say it, I must be the child of some other person; but indeed I did think I was your child when I said so, because I knew I was born at the side of the sea, 1 and was thrown by you into the foam of the surf, after you had wrapped me up in a tuft of your hair, which you cut off for the purpose; then the seaweed formed and fashioned me, as caught in its long tangles the ever-heaving surges of the sea rolled me, folded as I was in them, from side to side; at length the breezes and squalls which blew from the ocean drifted me on shore again, and the soft jelly-fish of the long sandy beaches rolled themselves round me to protect me; then again myriads of flies alighted on me to buzz about me and lay their eggs, that maggots might eat me, and flocks of birds collected round me to peck me to pieces, but at that moment appeared there also my great ancestor, Tama-nui-ki-te-Rangi, and he saw the flies and the birds collected in clusters and flocks above the jelly-fish, and the old man ran, as fast as he could, and stripped off the encircling jelly-fish, and behold within there lay a human being; then he caught me up and carried me to his house, and he hung me up in the roof that I might feel the warm smoke and the heat of the fire, so I was saved alive by the kindness of that old man. At last I grew, and then I heard of the fame of the dancing of this great House of Assembly. It was that which brought me here. But from the time I was in your womb, I have heard the names of these your first born children, as you have been calling them over until this very night, when I again heard you repeating them. in proof of this I will now recite your names to you, my brothers. You are Maui-taha, and you are Maui-roto, and you are Maui-pae, and you are Maui-waho, and as for me, I'm little Maui-the-baby, and here I am sitting before you.'

When his Mother, Taranga, heard all this, she cried out: 'You dear little child, you are indeed my last-born, the son of my old age, therefore I now tell you your name shall be Maui-tikitiki-a-Taranga, or Maui-formed-in-the-top-knot-of-Taranga', and he was called by that name.

After the disputing which took place on that occasion, his mother, Taranga, called to her last-born: 'Come here, my child, and sleep with the mother who bore you, that I may kiss you, and that you may kiss me', and he ran to sleep with his mother. Then his elder brothers were jealous, and began to murmur about this to each other. 'Well, indeed, our mother never asks us to go and sleep with her; yet we are the children she saw actually born, and about whose birth there is no doubt. When we were little things she nursed us, laying us down gently on the large soft mats she had spread out for us--then why does she not ask us now to sleep with her? when we were little things she was fond enough of us, but now we are grown older she never caresses us, or treats us kindly. But as for this little abortion, who can really tell whether he was nursed by the sea-tangles or by whom, or whether he is not some other person's child, and here he is now sleeping with our mother. Who would ever have believed that a little abortion, thrown into the ocean, would have come back to the world again a living human being!--and now this little rogue has the impudence to call himself a relation of ours.'

Then the two elder brothers said to the two younger ones: 'Never mind, let him be our dear brother; in the days of peace remember the proverb--when you are on friendly terms, settle your disputes in a friendly way--when you are at war, you must redress your injuries by violence. It is better for us, oh, brothers, to be kind to other people; these are the ways by which men gain influence in the world--by labouring for abundance of food to feed others--by collecting property to give to others, and by similar means by which you promote the good of others, so that peace spreads through the world. Let us take care that we are not like the children of Rangi-nui and of Papa-tu-a-nuku, who turned over in their minds thoughts for slaying: their parents; four of them consented, but Tawhiri-ma-tea had little desire for this, for he loved his parents; but the rest of his brothers agreed to slay them; afterwards when Tawhiri, saw that the husband was separated far from his wife, then he thought what it was his duty to do, and he fought against his brothers. Thence sprang the cause which led Tu-matauenga to wage war against his brethren and his parents, and now at last this contest is carried on even between his own kindred, so that man fights against man. Therefore let us be careful not to foster divisions amongst ourselves, lest such wicked thoughts should finally turn us each against the other, and thus we should be like the children of Rangi-nui and of Papa-tu-a-nuku.' Two younger brothers, when they heard this, answered: 'Yes, yes, oh, eldest brothers of ours, you are quite right; let our murmuring end here.'

It was now night; but early in the morning Taranga rose up, and suddenly, In a moment of time, she was gone from the house where her children were. As soon as they woke up they looked all about to no purpose, as they could not see her; the elder brothers knew she had left them, and were accustomed to it; but the little child was exceedingly vexed; yet he thought, I cannot see her, 'tis true, but perhaps she has only gone to prepare some food for us. No--no--she was off, far, far away.

Now at nightfall when their mother came back to them, her children were dancing and singing as usual. As soon as they had finished, she called to her last born: 'Come here, my child, let us sleep together'; so they slept together; but as soon as day dawned, she disappeared; the little fellow now felt quite suspicious at such strange proceedings on the part of his mother every morning. But at last, upon another night, as he slept again with his mother, the rest of his brothers that night also sleeping with them, the little fellow crept out in the night and stole his mother's apron, her belt, and clothes, and hid them; then he went and stopped up every crevice in the wooden window, and in the doorway, so that the light of the dawn might not shine into the house, and make his mother

hurry to get up. But after he had done this, his little heart still felt very anxious and uneasy lest his mother should, in her impatience, rise in the darkness and defeat his plans. But the night dragged its slow length along without his mother moving; at last there came the faint light of early mom, so that at one end of a long house you could see the legs of the people sleeping at the other end of it, but his mother still slept on; then the sun rose up, and mounted far up above the horizon; now at last his mother moved, and began to think to herself, 'What kind of night can this be, to last so long? and having thought thus, she dropped asleep again. Again she woke, and began to think to herself, but could not tell that it was broad daylight outside, as the window and every chink in the house were stopped closely up.

At last up she jumped; and finding herself quite naked, began to look for her clothes, and apron, but could find neither; then she ran and pulled out the things with which the chinks in the windows and doors were stopped up, and whilst doing so, oh , dear! oh, dear! there she saw the sun high up in the heavens; then she snatched up, as she ran off, the old clout of a flax cloak, with which the door of the house had been stopped up, and carried it off as her only covering; getting, at last, outside the house, she hurried away, and ran crying at the thought of having been so badly treated by her own children.

As soon as his mother got outside the house, little Maui jumped up, and kneeling upon his hands and knees peeped after her though the doorway into the bright light. Whilst he was watching her, the old woman reached down to a tuft of rushes, and snatching it up from the ground, dropped into a hole underneath it, and clapping the tuft of rushes in the hole again, as if it were its covering, so disappeared. Then little Maui jumped on his feet,

and, as hard as he could go, ran out of the house, pulled up the tuft of rushes, and peeping down, discovered a beautiful open cave running quite deep into the earth.

He covered up the hole again and returned to the house, and waking up his brothers who were still sleeping, said: 'Come, come, my brothers, rouse up, you have slept long enough; come, get up; here we are again cajoled by our mother.' Then his brothers made haste and got up; alas! alas! the sun was quite high up in the heavens.

The little Maui now asked his brothers again: 'Where do you think the place is where our father and mother dwell? and they answered: 'How should we know, we have never seen it; although we are Maui-taha, and Maui-roto, and Maui-pae, and Maui-waho, we have never seen the place; and do you think you can find that place which you are so anxious to see? What does it signify to you? Cannot you stop quietly with us? What do we care about our father, or about our mother? Did she feed us with food till we grew up to be men?--not a bit of it. Why, without doubt, Rangi, or the heaven, is our father, who kindly sent his offspring down to us; Hau-whenua, or gentle breezes, to cool the earth and young plants; and Hau-ma-ringiringi, or mists, to moisten them; and Hau-ma-roto-roto, or fine weather, to make them grow; and Touarangi, or rain, to water them; and Tomairangi, or dews, to nourish them: he gave these his offspring to cause our food to grow, and then Papa-tu-a-nuku, or the earth, made her seeds to spring, and grow forth, and provide sustenance for her children in this long-continuing world.'

Little Maui then answered: 'What you say is truly quite correct; but such thoughts and sayings would better become me than you, for in the foaming bubbles of the sea I was nursed and fed: it would please me better if you would think over and remember the time when you were nursed at your mother's breast; it could not have been until after you had ceased to be nourished by her milk that you could have eaten the kinds of food you have mentioned; as for me, oh! my brothers, I have never partaken either of her milk or of her food; yet I love her, for this single reason alone--that I lay in her womb; and because I love her, I wish to know where is the place where she and my father dwell.'

His brothers felt quite surprised and pleased with their little brother when they heard him talk in this way, and when after a little time they had recovered from their amazement, they told him to try and find their father and mother. So he said he would go. It was a long time ago that he had finished his first labour, for when he first appeared to his relatives in their house of singing and dancing, he had on that occasion transformed himself into the likeness of all manner of birds, of every bird in the world, and yet no single form that he then assumed had pleased his brothers; but now when he showed himself to them, transformed into the semblance of a pigeon, his brothers said: 'Ah! now indeed, oh, brother, you do look very well indeed, very beautiful, very beautiful, much more beautiful than you looked in any of the other forms which you assumed, and then changed from, when you first discovered yourself to us.'

What made him now look so well in the shape he had assumed was the belt of his mother, and her apron, which he had stolen from her while she was asleep in the house; for the very thing which looked so white upon the breast of the pigeon was his mother's broad belt, and he also had on her little apron of burnished hair from the tail of a dog, and the fastening of her belt was what formed the beautiful black feathers on his throat. He had once changed himself into this form a long time ago, and now that he was going to look for his father and mother, and had quitted his brothers to transform himself into the likeness of a pigeon, he assumed exactly the same form as on the previous occasion, and when his brothers saw him thus again, they said: 'Oh, brother, oh, brother! you do really look well indeed'; and when he sat upon the bough of a tree, oh, dear! he never moved, or jumped about from spray to spray, but sat quite still, cooing to himself, so that no one who had seen him could have helped thinking of the proverb: 'A stupid pigeon sits on one bough, and jumps not from spray to spray'. Early the next morning, he said to his brothers, as was first stated: 'Now do you remain here, and you will hear something of me after I am gone; it is my great love for my parents that leads me to search for them; now listen to me, and then say whether or not my recent feats were not remarkable. For the feat of transforming oneself into birds can only be accomplished by a man who is skilled in magic, and yet here I, the youngest of you all, have assumed the form of all birds, and now, perhaps, after all, I shall quite lose my art and become old and weakened in the long journey to the place where I am going.' His brothers answered him thus: 'That might be indeed, if you were going upon a warlike expedition, but, in truth, you are only going to look for those parents whom we all so long to see, and if they are found by you, we shall ever after all dwell happily, our present sorrow will be ended, and we shall continually pass backwards and forwards between our dwelling-place and theirs, paying them happy visits.'

He answered them: 'It is certainly a very good cause which leads me to undertake this journey, and if, when reaching the place I am going to, I find everything agreeable and nice, then I shall, perhaps, be pleased with it, but if I find it a bad, disagreeable place, I shall be disgusted with it.' [paragraph continues] They replied to him: 'What you say is exceedingly true, depart then upon your journey, with your great knowledge and skill in magic.' Then their brother went into the wood, and came back to them again, looking just as if he were a real pigeon. His brothers were quite delighted, and they had no power left to do anything but admire him.

Then off he flew, until he came to the cave which his mother had run down into, and he lifted up the tuft of rushes; then down he went and disappeared in the cave, and shut up its mouth again so as to hide the entrance; away he flew very fast indeed, and twice he dipped his wing, because the cave was narrow; soon he reached nearly to the bottom of the cave, and flew along it; and again, because the cave was so narrow, he dips first one wing and then the other, but the cave now widened, and he dashed straight on.

At last he saw a party of people coming alone under a grove of trees, they were manapau trees, 1 and flying on, he perched upon the top of one of these trees, under which the people had seated themselves; and when he saw his mother lying down on the grass by the side of her husband, he guessed at once who they were, and he thought: 'Ah! there sit my father and mother right under me'; and he soon heard their names, as they were called to by their friends who were sitting with them; then the pigeon hopped down, and perched on another spray a little lower, and it pecked off one of the berries of the tree and dropped it gently down, and bit the father with it on the forehead; and some of the party said: 'Was it a bird which threw that down? but the father said: 'Oh no, it was only a berry that fell by chance.'

Then the pigeon again pecked off some of the berries from the tree, and threw them down with all its force, and struck both father and mother, so that he really hurt them; then they cried out, and the whole party jumped up and looked into the tree, and as the pigeon began to coo, they soon found out from the noise, where it was sitting amongst the leaves and branches, and the whole of them, the chiefs and common people alike, caught up stones to pelt the pigeon with, but they threw for a very long time, Without hitting it; at last the father tried to throw up at it; ah, he struck it, but Maui had himself contrived that he should be struck by the stone which his father threw; for, but by his own choice, no one could have bit him; he was struck exactly upon his left leg, and down he fell, and as he lay fluttering and struggling upon the ground, they all ran to catch him, but lo, the pigeon had turned into a man.

Then all those who saw him were frightened at his fierce glaring eyes, which were red as if painted with red ochre, and they said: 'Oh, it is now no wonder that he so long sat still up in the tree; had he been a bird he would have flown off long before, but he is a man': and some of them said: 'No, indeed, rather a god--just look at his form and appearance, the like has never been seen before, since Rangi and Papa-tu-a-nuku were torn apart.' Then Taranga said, 'I used to see one who looked like this person every night when I went to visit my children, but what I saw then excelled what I see now; just listen to me.

Once as I was wandering upon the sea-shore, I prematurely gave birth to one of my children, and I cut off the long tresses of my hair, and bound him up in them, and threw him into the foam of the sea, and after that be was found by his ancestor Tama-nui-ki-te-Rangi'; and then she told his history nearly in the same words that Maui-the-infant had told it to herself and his

brothers in their house, and having finished his history, Taranga ended her discourse to her husband and his friends.

Then his mother asked Maui, who was sitting near her, 'Where do you come from? from the westward? and he answered: 'No.' 'From the north-east then? 'No.' 'From the south-east then? 'No.' 'From the south then?' 'No.' 'Was it the wind which blows upon me, which brought you here to me then?' when she asked this, he opened his mouth and answered 'Yes.' And she cried out: 'Oh, this then is indeed my child'; and she said: 'Are you Maui-taha?' he answered, 'No.' Then said she: 'Are you Maui-tikitiki-o-Taranga?' and he answered 'Yes.' And she cried aloud: 'This is, indeed, my child. By the winds and storms and wave-uplifting gales he was fashioned and became a human being; welcome, oh my child, welcome; you shall climb the threshold of the house of your great ancestor Hine-nui-te-po, and death shall thenceforth have no power over man.'

Then the lad was taken by his father to the water, to be baptized, and after the ceremony prayers were offered to make him sacred, and clean from all impurities; but when it was completed, his father Makea-tu-tara felt greatly alarmed, because he remembered that he had, from mistake, hurriedly skipped over part of the prayers of the baptismal service, and of the services to purify Maui; he knew that the gods would be certain to punish this fault, by causing Maui to die, and his alarm and anxiety were therefore extreme. At nightfall they all went into his house.

Maui, after these things, returned to his brothers to tell them that he had found his parents, and to explain to them where they dwelt.

Shortly after Maui had thus returned to his brothers, he slew and carried off his first victim, who was the daughter of Maru-te-whare-aitu; afterwards, by enchantments, he destroyed the crops of Maru-te-whare-aitu, so that they all withered.

He then again paid a visit to his parents, and remained for some time with them, and whilst he was there he remarked that some of their people daily carried away a present of food for some person; at length, surprised at this, he one day asked them: 'Who is that you are taking that present of food to? And the people who were going with it answered him: 'It is for your ancestress, for Muri-ranga-whenua.'

He asked again: 'Where does she dwell?' They answered: 'Yonder.'

Thereupon he says: 'That will do; leave here the present of food, I will carry it to her myself.'

From that time the daily presents of food for his ancestress were carried by Maui himself; but he never took and gave them to her that she might eat them, but he quietly laid them by on one side, and this he did for many days. At last, Muri-ranga-whenua suspected that something wrong was going on, and the next time he came along the path carrying the present of food, the old chieftainess sniffed and sniffed until she thought she smelt something coming, and she was very much exasperated, and her stomach began to distend itself, that she might be ready to devour Maui as soon as he came there.

Then she turned to the southward, and smelt and sniffed, but not a scent of anything reached her; then she turned round from the south to the north, by the east, with her nose up in the air sniffing and smelling to every point as she turned slowly round, but she could not detect the slightest scent of a human being, and almost thought that she must have been mistaken; but she made one more trial, and sniffed the breeze towards the westward. Ah! then the scent of a man came plainly to her, so she called aloud: 'I know from the smell wafted here to me by the breeze that somebody is close to me', and Maui murmured assent. Thus the old woman knew that be was a descendant of hers, and her stomach, which was quite large and distended immediately began to shrink, and contract itself again. If the smell of Maui had not been carried to her by the western breeze, undoubtedly she would have eaten him up.

When the stomach of Muri-ranga-whenua had quietly sunk down to its usual size, her voice was again heard saying: 'Art thou Maui? and he answered: 'Even so.'

Then she asked him: 'Wherefore has thou served thine old ancestress in this deceitful way? and Maui answered: 'I was anxious that thy jaw-bone, by which the great enchantments can be wrought, should be given to me.'

She answered: 'Take it, it has been reserved for thee.' And Maui took it, and having done so returned to the place where he and his brothers dwelt.

The young hero, Maui, had not been long at home with his brothers when he began to think, that it was too soon after the rising of the sun that it became night again, and that the sun again sank down below the horizon, every day, every day; in the same manner the days appeared too short to him. So at last, one day he said to his brothers: 'Let us now catch the sun in a noose, so that we may compel him to move more slowly, in order that mankind may have long days to labour in to procure subsistence for themselves'; but they answered him: 'Why, no man could approach it on account of its warmth, and the fierceness of its heat'; but the young hero said to them: 'Have you not seen the multitude of things I have already achieved?

Did not you see me change myself into the likeness of every bird of the forest; you and I equally had the aspect and appearance of men, yet I by my enchantments changed suddenly from the appearance of a man and became a bird, and then, continuing to change my form, I resembled this bird or that bird, one after the other, until I had by degrees transformed myself into every bird in the world, small or great; and did I not after all this again assume the form of a man? [This he did soon after he was born, and it was after that he snared the sun.] Therefore, as for that feat, oh, my brothers, the changing myself into birds, I accomplished it by enchantments, and I will by the same means accomplish also this other thing which I have in my mind.' When his brothers heard this, they consented on his persuasions to aid him in the conquest of the sun.

Then they began to spin and twist ropes to form a noose to catch the sun in, and in doing this they discovered the mode of plaiting flax into stout square-shaped ropes, (tuamaka); and the manner of plaiting flat ropes, (paharahara); and of spinning round ropes; at last, they finished making all the ropes which they required. Then Maw took up his enchanted weapon, and he took his brothers with him, and they carried their provisions, ropes, and other things with them, in their hands. They travelled all night, and as soon as day broke, they halted in the desert, and hid themselves that they might not be seen by the sun; and at night they renewed their journey, and before dawn they halted, and hid themselves again; at length they got very far, very far, to the eastward, and came to the very edge of the place out of which the sun rises.

Then they set to work and built on each side of this place a long high wall of clay, with huts of boughs of trees at each end to hide themselves in; when these were finished, they made the loops of the noose, and the brothers of Maui then lay in wait on one side of the place out of which the sun rises, and Maui himself lay in wait upon the other side.

The young hero held in his hand his enchanted weapon, the jaw-bone of his ancestress--of Muri-ranga-whenua, and said to his brothers: 'Mind now, keep yourselves hid, and do not go showing yourselves foolishly to the sun; if you do, you will frighten him; but wait patiently until his head and fore-legs have got well into the snare, then I will shout out; haul away as hard as you can on the ropes on both sides, and then I'll rush out and attack him, but do you keep your ropes tight for a good long time (while I attack him), until he is nearly dead, when we will let him go; but mind, now, my brothers, do not let him move you to pity with his shrieks and screams.'

At last the sun came rising up out of his place, like a fire spreading far and wide over the mountains and forests; he rises up, his head passes through the noose, and it takes in more and more of his body, until his fore-paws pass through; then were pulled tight the ropes, and the monster began to struggle and roll himself about, whilst the snare jerked backwards and forwards as he struggled. Ah! was not he held fast in the ropes of his enemies!

Then forth rushed that bold hero, Mau-tikitiki-o-Taranga, with his enchanted weapon. Alas! the sun screams aloud; he roars; Maui strikes him fiercely with many blows; they hold him for a long time, at last they let him go, and then weak from wounds the sun crept along its course. Then was learnt by men the second name of the sun, for in its agony the sun screamed out: 'Why am I thus smitten by you! oh, man! do you know what you are doing? Why should you wish to kill Tama-nui-te-Ra? Thus was learnt his second name. At last they let him go. Oh, then, Tama-nui-te-Ra went very slowly and feebly on his course.

Maui-taha and his brothers after this feat returned again to their own house, and dwelt there, and dwelt there, and dwelt there; and after a long time his brothers went out fishing, whilst Maui-tikitiki-o-Taranga stopped idly at home doing nothing, although indeed he had to listen to the sulky grumblings of his wives and children, at his laziness in not catching fish for them. Then he called out to the women, 'Never mind, oh, mothers, yourselves and your children need not fear. Have not I accomplished all things, and as for this little feat, this trifling work of getting food for you, do you think I cannot do that? certainly; if I go and get a fish for you, it will be one so large that when I bring it to land you will not be able to eat it all, and the sun will shine on it and make it putrid before it is consumed.' Then Maui snooded his enchanted fish-hook, which was pointed with part of the jaw-bone of Muri-ranga-whenua, and when he had finished this, he twisted a stout fishing-line to his hook.

His brothers in the meantime had arranged amongst themselves to make fast the lashings of the top side of their canoe, in order to go out for a good day's fishing. When all was made ready they launched their canoe, and as soon as it was afloat Maui jumped into it, and his brothers, who were afraid of his enchantments, cried out: 'Come, get out again, we will not let you go with us; your magical arts will get us into some difficulty.' So he was compelled to remain ashore whilst his brothers paddled off, and when they reached the fishing ground they lay upon their paddles and fished, and after a good day's sport returned ashore.

As soon as it was dark night Maui went down to the shore, got into his brothers' canoe, and hid himself under the bottom boards of it. The next forenoon his brothers came down to the shore to go fishing again, and they had their canoe launched, and paddled out to sea without ever seeing Maw, who lay hid in the hollow of the canoe under the bottom boards. When they got well out to sea Maui crept out of his hiding place; as soon as his brothers saw him, they said: 'We had better get back to the shore again as fast as we can, since this fellow is on board'; but Maui, by his enchantments, stretched out the sea so that the shore instantly became very distant from them, and by the time they could turn themselves round to look for it, it was out of view.

Maui now said to them: 'You had better let me go on with you, I shall at least be useful to bail the water out of our canoe.' To this they consented, and they paddled on again and speedily arrived at the fishing ground where they used to fish upon former occasions. As soon as they got there his brothers said: 'Let us drop the anchor and fish here'; and he answered: 'Oh no, don't; we had much better paddle a long distance farther out.' Upon this they paddle on, and paddle as far as the farthest fishing ground, a long way out to sea, and then his brothers at last say: 'Come now, we must drop anchor and fish here.' And he replies again: 'Oh, the fish here are very fine I suppose, but we had much better pull right out to sea, and drop anchor there. If we go out to the place where I wish the anchor to be let go, before you can get a hook to the bottom, a fish will come following it back to the top of the water.

You won't have to stop there a longer time than you can wink your eye in, and our canoe will come back to shore full of fish.' As soon as they hear this they paddle away--they paddle away until they reach a very long distance off, and his brothers then say: 'We are now far enough.' And he replies: 'No, no, let us go out of sight of land, and when we have quite lost sight of it, then let the anchor be dropped, but let it be very far off, quite out in the open sea.'

At last they reach the open sea, and his brothers begin to fish. Lo, lo, they had hardly let their hooks down to the bottom, when they each pulled up a fish into the canoe. Twice only they let down their lines, when behold the canoe was filled up with the number of fish they had caught. Then his brothers said: 'Oh, brother, let us all return now.' And he answered them: 'Stay a little; let me also throw my hook into the sea.' And his brothers replied: 'Where did you get a hook? And he answered: 'Oh, never mind, I have a hook of my own.' And his brothers replied again: 'Make haste and throw it then.' And as he pulled it out from under his garments, the light flashed from the beautiful mother-of-pearl shell in the hollow of the hook, and his brothers saw that the hook was carved and ornamented with tufts of hair pulled from the tail of a dog, and it looked exceedingly beautiful.

Maui then asked his brothers to give him a little bait to bait his hook with; but they replied: 'We will not give you any of our bait.' So he doubled his fist and struck his nose violently, and the blood gushed out, and he smeared his hook with his own blood for bait, and then be cast it into the sea, and it sank down, and sank down, till it reached to the small carved figure on the roof of a house at the bottom of the sea, then passing by the figure, it descended along the outside carved rafters of the roof, and fell in at the doorway of the house, and the hook of Maui-tikitiki-o-Taranga caught first in the sill of the doorway.

Then, feeling something on his hook, he began to haul in his line. Ah, ah!--there ascended on his hook the house of that old fellow Tonga-nui. It came up, up; and as it rose high, oh, dear! how his hook was strained with its great weight; and then there came gurgling up foam and bubbles from the earth, as of an island emerging from the water, and his brothers opened their mouths and cried aloud.

Maui all this time continued to chant forth his incantations amidst the murmurings and wailings of his brothers, who were weeping and lamenting, and saying: 'See now, how he has brought us out into the open sea, that we may be upset in it, and devoured by the fish.' Then he raised aloud his voice, and repeated the incantation called Hiki which makes heavy weights fight, in order that the fish he had caught might come up easily, and he chanted an incantation beginning thus:

'Wherefore, then, oh! Tonga-nui,

Dost thou hold fast so obstinately below there?'

When he had finished his incantation, there floated up, hanging to his line, the fish of Maui, a portion of the earth, of Papa-tu-a-Nuku. Alas! alas! their canoe lay aground.

Maui then left his brothers with their canoe, and returned to the village; but before he went he said to them: 'After I am gone, be courageous and patient; do not eat food until I return, and do not let our fish be cut up, but rather leave it until I have carried an offering to the gods from this great haul of fish, and until I have found a priest, that fitting prayers and sacrifices may be offered to the god, and the necessary rites be completed in order. We shall thus all be purified. I will then return, and we can cut up this fish in safety, and it shall be fairly portioned out to this one, and to that one, and to that other; and on my arrival you shall each have your due share of it, and return to your homes joyfully; and what we leave behind us will keep good, and that which we take away With us, returning, will be good too.'

Maui had hardly gone, after saying all this to them, than his brothers trampled under their feet the words they had heard him speak. They began at once to eat food, and to cut up the fish. When they did this, Maui had not yet arrived at the sacred place, in the presence of the god; had he previously reached the sacred place, the heart of the deity would have been appeased with the offering of a portion of the fish which had been caught by his disciples, and all the male and female deities would have partaken of their portions of the sacrifice. Alas! alas! those foolish, thoughtless brothers of his cut up the fish, and behold the gods turned with wrath upon them, on account of the fish which they had thus cut up without having made a fitting sacrifice. Then indeed, the fish began to toss about his head from side to side, and to lash his tail, and the fins upon his back, and his lower jaw. Ah! ah! well done Tangaroa, it springs about on shore as briskly as if it was in the water.

That is the reason that this island is now so rough and uneven--that here stands a mountain--and there lies a plain--that here descends a valley--that there rises a cliff. If the brothers of Maui had not acted so deceitfully, the huge fish would have lain flat and smooth, and would have remained as a model for the rest of the earth, for the present generation of men. This, which has just been recounted, is the second evil which took place after the separation of Heaven from Earth.

Thus was dry land fished up by Maui after it had been hidden under the ocean by Rangi and Tawhiri-ma-tea. It was with an enchanted fish-hook that he drew it up, which was pointed with a bit of the jaw-bone of his ancestress Muri-ranga-whenua; and in the district of Heretaunga they still show the fish-hook of Maui, which became a cape stretching far out into the sea, and now forms the southern extremity of Hawke's Bay.

The hero now thought that he would extinguish and destroy the fires of his ancestress of Mahu-ika. So he got up in the night, and put out the fires left in the cooking-houses of each family in the village; then, quite early in the morning, he called aloud to the servants: 'I hunger, I hunger; quick, cook some food for me.' One of the servants thereupon ran as fast as he could to make up the fire to cook some food, but the fire was out; and as he ran round from house to house in the village to get a light, he found every fire quite out-he could nowhere get a light.

When Maui's mother heard this, she called out to the servants, and said: 'Some of you repair to my great ancestress Mahu-ika; tell her that fire has been lost upon earth, and ask her to give some to the world again.' But the slaves were alarmed, and refused to obey the commands which their masters, the sacred old people gave them; and they persisted in refusing to go, notwithstanding the old people repeatedly ordered them to do so.

At last, Maui said to his mother: 'Well, then I will fetch down fire for the world; but which is the path by which I must go? And his parents, who knew the country well, said to him: 'If you will go, follow that broad path that lies just before you there; and you will at last reach the dwelling of an ancestress of yours; and if she asks you who you are, you had better call out your name to her, then she will know you are a descendant of hers; but be cautious, and do not play any tricks with her, because we have heard that your deeds are greater than the deeds of men, and that you are fond of deceiving and injuring others, and perhaps you even now intend in many ways, to deceive this old ancestress of yours, but pray be cautious not to do so.'

But Maui said: 'No, I only want to bring fire away for men, that is all, and I'll return again as soon as I can do that.' Then he went, and reached the abode of the goddess of fire; and he was so filled with wonder at what he saw, that for a long time he could say nothing. At last he said: 'Oh, lady, would you rise up? Where is your fire kept? I have come to beg some from you.'

Then the aged lady rose right up, and said: 'Au-e! who can this mortal be? And he answered:  'It's I.' 'Where do you come from? said she; and he answered: 'I belong to this country.' 'You are not from this country', said she; 'your appearance is not like that of the inhabitants of this country. Do you come from the north-east? He replied: 'No.' 'Do you come from the south-east? He replied: 'No.' 'Are you from the south? He replied: 'No.' 'Are you from the westward? He answered: 'No.' 'Come you, then, from the direction of the wind which blows right upon me? And he said: I do.' 'Oh, then', cried she, 'you are my grand-child; what do you want here? He answered: 'I am come to beg fire from you.' She replied: 'Welcome, welcome; here then is fire for you.'

Then the aged woman pulled out her nail; and as she pulled it out fire flowed from it, and she gave it to him. And when Maui saw she had drawn out her nail to produce fire for him, he thought it a most wonderful thing! Then he went a short distance off, and when not very far from her, he put the fire out, quite out; and returning to her again, said: 'The light you gave me has gone out, give me another.' Then she caught hold of another nail, and pulled it out as a light for him; and he left her, and went a little on one side, and put that light out also; then he went back to her again, and said: 'Oh, lady, give me, I pray you, another light for the last one has also gone out.' And thus he went on and on, until she had pulled out all the nails of the fingers of one of her hands; and then she began with the other hand, until she had pulled all the fingernails out of that hand, too; and then she commenced upon the nails of her feet, and pulled them also out in the same manner, except the nail of one of her big toes. Then the aged woman said to herself at last: 'This fellow is surely playing tricks with me.'

Then out she pulled the one toe-nail that she had left, and it, too, became fire, and as she dashed it down on the ground the whole place caught fire. And she cried out to Maui: 'There, you have it all now!' And Maui ran off, and made a rush to escape, but the fire followed hard after him, close behind him; so he changed himself into a fleet-winged eagle, and flew with rapid flight, but the fire pursued, and almost caught him as he flew. Then the eagle dashed down into a pool of water; but when he got into the water he found that almost boiling too: the forests just then also caught fire, so that it could not alight anywhere, and the earth and the sea both caught fire too, and Maui was very near perishing in the flames.

Then he called on his ancestors Tawhiri-ma-tea and Whatitiri-matakataka, to send down an abundant supply of water, and he cried aloud: 'Oh, let water be given to me to quench this fire which pursues after me'; and lo, then appeared squalls and gales, and Tawhiri-ma-tea sent heavy lasting rain, and the fire was quenched; and before Mahu-ika could reach her place of shelter, she almost perished in the rain, and her shrieks and screams became as loud as those of Maui had been, when he was scorched by the pursuing fire; thus Maui ended this proceeding. In this manner was extinguished the fire of Mahu-ika, the goddess of fire; but before it was all lost, she saved a few sparks which she threw, to protect them, into the Kaiko-mako, and a few other trees, where they are still cherished; hence, men yet use portions of the wood of these trees for fire when they require a light.

Then he returned to the village, and his mother and father said to him: 'You heard when we warned you before you went, nevertheless you played tricks with your ancestress; it served you right that you got into such trouble'; and the young fellow answered his parents: 'Oh, what do I care for that; do you think that my perverse proceedings are put a stop to by this? certainly not; I intend to go on in the same way for ever, ever, ever.' And his father answered him: 'Yes, then, you may just please yourself about living or dying; if you will only attend to me you will save your life; if you do not attend to what I say, it will be worse for you, that is all.' As soon as this conversation was ended, off the young fellow went to find some more companions for his other scrapes.

Maui had a young sister named Hinauri, who was exceedingly beautiful; she married Irawaru. One day Maui and his brother-in-law went down to the sea to fish: Maui caught not a single fish with his hook, which had no barb to it, but as long as they went on fishing Maui observed that Irawaru continued catching plenty of fish; so be thought to himself: 'Well, how is this? how does that fellow catch so many whilst I cannot catch one? just as he thought this, Irawaru had another bite, and up he pulled his line in haste, but it had got entangled with that of Maui, and Maui thinking he felt a fish pulling at his own line, drew it in quite delighted; but when he had hauled up a good deal of it, there were himself and his brother-in-law pulling in their lines in different directions, one drawing the line towards the bow of the canoe, the other towards the stem.

Maui, who was already provoked at his own ill-luck, and the good luck of his brother-in-law, now called out quite angrily: 'Come, let go my line, the fish is on my hook.' But Irawaru answered: 'No, it is not, it is on mine.'

Maui again called out very angrily: 'Come, let go, I tell you it is on mine.'

Irawaru then slacked out his line, and let Maui pull in the fish; and as soon as he had hauled it into the canoe, Maui found that Irawaru was right, and that the fish was on his hook; when Irawaru saw this too, he called out: 'Come now, let go my line and hook.' Maui answered him: 'Cannot you wait a minute, until I take the hook out of the fish.'

As soon as he got the hook out of the fish's mouth, he looked at it, and saw that it was barbed; Maui, who was already exceedingly wrath with his brother-in-law, on observing this, thought he had no chance with his barbless hook of catching as many fish as his brother-in-law, so he said: 'Don't you think we had better go on shore now? Irawaru answered: 'Very well, let us return to the land again.'

So they paddled back towards the land, and when they reached it, and were going to haul the canoe up on to the beach, Maui said to his brother-in-law: 'Do you get under the outrigger of the canoe, and lift it up with your back'; so he got under it, and as soon as he had done so, Maui jumped on it, and pressed the whole weight of the canoe down upon him, and almost killed Irawaru.

When he was on the point of death, Maui trampled on his body, and lengthened his back-bone, and by his enchantments drew it out into the form of a tall, and he transformed Irawaru into a dog, and fed him with dung. 1

As soon as he had done this, Maui went back to his place of abode, just as if nothing unusual had taken place, and his young sister, who was watching for the return of her husband, as soon as she saw Maui coming, ran to him and asked him, saying: 'Maui, where is your brother-in-law? Maui answered: 'I left him at the canoe.'

But his young sister said: 'Why did not you both come home together', and Maui answered: 'He desired me to tell you that he wanted you to go down to the beach to help him carry up the fish; you had better go therefore, and if you do not see him, just call out, and if he does not answer you, why then call out to him in this way, 'Mo-i, mo-i, mo-i.'

Upon learning this, Hinauri hurried down to the beach as fast as she could, and not seeing her husband she went about calling out his name, but no answer was made to her; she then called out as Maui had told her: 'Mo-i, mo-i, mo-i'; then Irawaru, who was running about in the bushes near there, in the form of a dog, at once recognized the voice of Hinauri, and answered: 'Ao! ao! ao! ao-ao-o!' howling like a dog, and he followed her back to the village, frisking along and wagging his tail with pleasure at seeing her; and from him sprang all dogs, so that he is regarded as their progenitor, and all Maoris still call their dogs to them by the words: 'Mo-i, mo-i, mo-i.'

Hinauri, when she saw that her husband had been changed into a dog, was quite distracted with grief, and wept bitterly the whole way as she went back to the village, and as soon as ever she got into her house, she caught up an enchanted girdle which she had, and ran back to the sea with it, determined to destroy herself, by throwing herself into the ocean, so that the dragons and monsters of the deep might devour her; when she reached the sea-shore, she sat down upon the rocks at the ocean's very edge, and as she sat there she first lamented aloud her cruel fate, and repeated an incantation, and then threw herself into the sea, and the tide swept her off from the shore.

Maui now felt it necessary to leave the village where Irawaru had lived, so he returned to his parents, and when he had been with them for some time, his father said to him one day: 'Oh, my son, I have heard from your mother and others that you are very valiant, and that you have succeeded in all feats that you have undertaken in your own country, whether they were small or great; but now that you have arrived in your father's country, you will, perhaps, at last be overcome.'

Then Maui asked him: 'What do you mean, what things are there that I can be vanquished by?' And his father answered him: 'By your great ancestress, by Hine-nui-te-po, who, if you look, you may see flashing, and as it were, opening and shutting there, where the horizon meets the sky.' And Maui replied: 'Lay aside such idle thoughts, and let us both fearlessly seek whether men are to die or live for ever.' And his father said: 'My child, there has been an ill omen for us; when I was baptizing you, I omitted a portion of the fitting prayers, and that I know will be the cause of your perishing.'

Then Maui asked his father: 'What is my ancestress Hine-nui-te-po like?' and he answered: 'What you see yonder shining so brightly red are her eyes, and her teeth are as sharp and hard as pieces of volcanic glass; her body is like that of a man, and as for the pupils of her eyes, they are jasper; and her hair is like tangles of long seaweed, and her mouth is like that of a barracouta.' Then his son answered him: 'Do you think her strength is as great as that of Tama-nui-te-Ra, who consumes man, and the earth, and the very waters, by the fierceness of his heat?--was not the world formerly saved alive by the speed with which he travelled?--if he had then, in the days of his full strength and power, gone as slowly as he does now, not a remnant of mankind would have been left living upon the earth, nor, indeed, would anything else have survived.

But I laid hold of Tama-nui-te-Ra, and now he goes slowly for I smote him again and again, so that be is now feeble, and long in travelling his course, and he now gives but very little heat, having been weakened by the blows of my enchanted weapon; I then, too, split him open in many places, and from the wounds so made, many rays now issue forth, and spread in all directions. So, also I found the sea much larger than the earth, but by the power of the last born of your children, part of the earth was drawn up again, and dry land came forth.' And his father answered him: 'That is all very true, O, my last born, and the strength of my old age; well, then, be bold, go and visit your great ancestress who flashes so fiercely there, where the edge of the horizon meets the sky.'

Hardly was this conversation concluded with his father, when the young hero went forth to look for companions to accompany him upon this enterprise: and so there came to him for companions, the small robin, and the large robin, and the thrush, and the yellow-hammer, and every kind of little bird, and the fantail, and these all assembled together, and they all started with Maui in the evening, and arrived at the dwelling of Hine-nui-te-po, and found her fast asleep.

Then Maui addressed them all, and said: 'My little friends, now if you see me creep into this old chieftainess, do not laugh at what you see. Nay, nay, do not I pray you, but when I have got altogether inside her, and just as I am coming out of her mouth, then you may shout with laughter if you please.' And his little friends, who were frightened at what they saw, replied: 'Oh, sir, you will certainly be killed.' And he answered them: 'If you burst out laughing at me as soon as I get inside her, you will wake her up, and she will certainly kill me at once, but if you do not laugh until I am quite inside her, and am on the point of coming out of her mouth, I shall live, and Hine-nui-te-po will die.' And his little friends answered: 'Go on then, brave Sir, but pray take good care of yourself.'

Then the young hero started off, and twisted the strings of his weapon tight round his wrist, and went into the house, and stripped off his clothes, and the skin on his hips looked mottled and beautiful as that of a mackerel, from the tattoo marks, cut on it with the chisel of Uetonga, and he entered the old chieftainess.

The little birds now screwed up their tiny cheeks, trying to suppress their laughter; at last, the little Tiwakawaka could no longer keep it in, and laughed out loud, with its merry cheerful note; this woke the old woman up, she opened her eyes, started up, and killed Maui.

Thus died this Maui we have spoken of, but before he died he had children, and sons were born to him; some of his descendants yet live in Hawaiki, some in Aotearoa (or in these islands); the greater part of his descendants remained in. Hawaiki, but a few of them came here to Aotearoa. According to the traditions of the Maori 1, this was the cause of the introduction of death into the world (Hine-nui-te-po being the goddess of death: if Maui had passed safely through her, then no more human beings would have died, but death itself would have been destroyed), and we express it by saying: 'The water-wagtail laughing at Maui-tikitiki-o-Taranga made Hine-nui-te-po squeeze him to death.' And we have this proverb: 'Men make heirs, but death carries them off.'

Thus end the deeds of the son of Makea-tu-tara, and of Taranga, and the deeds of the sons of Rangi-nui, and of Papa-tu-a-Nuku; this is the narrative about the generations of the ancestors of the Maori, and therefore, we the people of that country, preserve closely these traditions of old times, as a thing to be taught to the generations that come after us, so we repeat them in our prayers, and whenever we relate the deeds of the ancestors from whom each family is descended, and upon other similar occasions.

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The Legend Tawhaki

NOW quitting the deeds of Maui, let those of Tawhaki be recounted. He was the son of Hema and Urutonga, and he had a younger brother named Karihi. Tawhaki, having taken Hinepiri-piri as a wife, went one day with his brothers-in-law to fish from a flat reef of rocks which ran far out into the sea; he had four brothers-in-law, two of these when tired of fishing returned towards their village, and he went with them; when they drew near the village, they attempted to murder him, and thinking they had slain him, buried him; they then went on their way to the village, and when they reached it, their young sister said to them: 'Why, where is your brother-in-law? and they replied: 'Oh, they're all fishing.' So the young wife waited until the other two brothers came back, and when they reached the village they were questioned by their young sister, who asked: 'Where is your brother-in-law?' and the two who had last arrived answered her: 'Why, the others all went home together long since.' So the young wife suspected that they had killed her husband, and ran off at once to search for him; and she found where he had been buried, and on examining him ascertained that he had only been insensible, and was not quite dead; then with great difficulty she got him upon her back, and carried him home to their house, and carefully washed his wounds, and staunched the bleeding.

Tawhaki, when he had a little recovered, said to her: 'Fetch some wood, and light a fire for me'; and as his wife was going to do this, he said to her: 'If you see any tall tree growing near you, fell it, and bring that with you for the fire.' His wife went, and saw a tree growing such as her husband spoke of; so she felled it, and put it upon her shoulder, and brought it along With her; and when she reached the house, she put the whole tree upon the fire without chopping it into pieces; and it was this circumstance that led her to give the name of Wahieroa (long-log-of-wood-for-the-fire) to their first son, for Tawhaki had told her to bring this log of wood home, and to call the child after it, that the duty of avenging his father's wrongs might often be recalled to his mind.

As soon as Tawhaki had recovered from his wounds, he left the place where his faithless brothers-in-law lived, and went away taking all his own warriors and their families with him, and built a fortified village upon the top of a very lofty mountain, where he could easily protect himself; and they dwelt there. Then he called aloud to the Gods, his ancestors, for revenge, and they let the floods of heaven descend, and the earth was overwhelmed by the waters and all human beings perished, and the name given to that event was 'The overwhelming of the Mataaho,' and the whole of the race perished.

When this feat was accomplished, Tawhaki and his younger brother next went to seek revenge for the death of their father. It was a different race who had carried off and slain the father of Tawhaki; the name of that race was the Ponaturi--the country they inhabited was underneath the waters, but they had a large house on the dry land to which they resorted to sleep at night; the name of that large house was 'Manawa-Tane'.

The Ponaturi had slain the father of Tawhaki and carried off his body, but his father's wife they had carried off alive and kept as a captive. Tawhaki and his younger brother went upon their way to seek out that people and to revenge themselves upon them. At length they reached a place from whence they could see the house called Manawa-Tane. At the time they arrived near the house there was no one there but their mother, who was sitting near the door; but the bones of their father were hung up inside the house under its high sloping roof The whole tribe of the Ponaturi were at that time in their country under the waters, but at the approach of night they would return to their house, to Manawa-Tane.

Whilst Tawhaki and his younger brother Karihi were coming along still at a great distance from the house, Tawhaki began to repeat an incantation, and the bones of his father, Hema, felt the influence of this, and rattled loudly together where they hung under the roof of the house, for gladness, when they heard Tawhaki repeating his incantations as he came along, for they knew that the hour of revenge had now come. As the brothers drew nearer, their mother, Urutonga, heard the voice of Tawhaki, and she wept for gladness in front of her children, who came repeating incantations upon their way. And when they reached at length the house, they wept over their mother, over old Urutonga. When they had ended weeping, their mother said to them: 'My children, hasten to return hence, or you will both certainly perish. The people who dwell here are a very fierce and savage race.' Karihi said to her: 'How low will the sun have descended when those you speak of return home? And she replied: 'They will return here when the sun sinks beneath the ocean.' Then Karihi asked her: 'What did they save you alive for? And she answered: 'They saved me alive that I might watch for the rising of the dawn; they make me ever sit watching here at the door of the house, hence this people have named me "Tatau", or "Door"; and they keep on throughout the night calling out to me: "Ho, Tatau, there! is it dawn yet?" And then I call out in answer: "No, no, it is deep night--it is lasting night--it is still night; compose yourselves to sleep, sleep on." '

Karihi then said to his mother: 'Cannot we hide ourselves somewhere here?'

Their mother answered: 'You had better return; you cannot hide yourselves here, the scent of you will be perceived by them.'

'But', said Karihi, 'we will hide ourselves away in the thick thatch of the house.'

Their mother, however, answered: '`Tis of no use, you cannot hide yourselves there.'

All this time Tawhaki sat quite silent; but Karihi said: 'We will hide ourselves here, for we know incantations which will render us invisible to all.'

On hearing this, their mother consented to their remaining, and attempting to avenge their father's death. So they climbed up to the ridge-pole of the house, upon the outside of the roof, and made holes in the thick layers of reeds which formed the thatch of the roof, and crept into them and covered themselves up; and their mother called to them, saying: 'When it draws near dawn, come down again and stop up every chink in the house, so that no single ray of light may shine in.'

At length the day closed, and the sun sank below the horizon, and the whole of that strange tribe left the water in a body, and ascended to the dry land; and, according to their custom from time immemorial, they sent one of their number in front of them, that he might carefully examine the road, and see that there were no hidden foes lying in wait for them either on the way or in their house. As soon as this scout arrived at the threshold of the house, he perceived the scent of Tawhaki and Karihi; so be lifted up his nose and turned sniffing all round the inside of the house. As he turned about, he was on the point of discovering that strangers were hidden there, when the rest of the tribe (whom long security had made careless) came hurrying on, and crowding into the house in thousands, so that from the denseness of the crowd the scent of the strange men was quite lost. The Ponaturi then stowed themselves away in the house until it was entirely filled up with them, and by degrees they arranged themselves In convenient places, and at length all fell fast asleep.

At midnight Tawhaki and Karihi stole down from the roof of the house, and found that their mother had crept out of the door to meet them, so they sat at the doorway whispering together.

Karihi then asked his mother: 'Which is the best way for us to destroy these people who are sleeping here? And their mother answered: 'You had better let the sun kill them, its rays will destroy them.'

Having said this, Tatau crept into the house again; presently an old man of the Ponaturi called out to her: 'Ho, Tatau, Tatau, there; is it dawn yet? And she answered: 'No, no, it is deep night-it is lasting night; `tis still night; sleep soundly, sleep on.'

When it was very near dawn, Tatau whispered to her children, who were still sitting just outside the door of the house: 'See that every chink in the doorway and window is stopped, so that not a ray of light can penetrate here.'

Presently another old man of the Ponaturi called out again: 'Ho, Tatau there, is not it near dawn yet? And she answered: 'No, no, it is night; it is lasting night; `tis still night; sleep Soundly, sleep on.'

This was the second time that Tatau had thus called out to them.

At last dawn had broken-at last the sun had shone brightly upon the earth, and rose high in the heavens; and the old man again called out: 'Ho, Tatau there; is not it dawn yet? And she answered: 'Yes.' And then she called out to her children: 'Be quick, pull out the things with which you have stopped up the window and the door.'

So they pulled them out, and the bright rays of the sun came streaming into the house, and the whole of the Ponaturi perished before the light; they perished not by the hand of man, but withered before the sun's rays. 1

When the Ponaturi had been all destroyed, Tawhaki and Karihi carefully took down their father's bones from the roof of the house, and burnt them with fire, and together with the bodies of all those who were in the house, who had perished, scorched by the bright rays of the sun; they then returned again to their own country, taking with them their mother, and carefully carrying the bones of their father.

The fame of Tawhaki's courage in thus destroying the race of Ponaturi, and a report also of his manly beauty, chanced to reach the ears of a young maiden of the heavenly race who live above in the skies; so one night she descended from the heavens to visit Tawhaki, and to judge for herself, whether these reports were true. She found him lying sound asleep, and after gazing on him for some time, she stole to his side and laid herself down by him. He, when disturbed by her, thought that it was only some female of this lower world, and slept again; but before dawn the young girl stole away again from his side, and ascended once more to the heavens. In the early morning Tawhaki awoke and felt all over his sleeping place with both his hands, but in vain, he could nowhere find the young girl.

From that time Tango-tango, 1 the girl of the heavenly race, stole every night to the side of Tawhaki, and lo, in the morning she was gone, until she found that she had conceived a child, who was afterwards named Arahuta; then full of love for Tawhaki, she disclosed herself fully to him and lived constantly in this world with him, deserting, for his sake, her friends above; and he discovered that she who had so loved him belonged to the race whose home is in the heavens.

Whilst thus living with him, this girl of the heavenly race, his second wife, said to him: 'Oh, Tawhaki, if our baby so shortly now to be born, should prove a son, I will wash the little thing before it is baptized; but if it should be a little girl then you shall wash it.' When the time came Tango-tango had a little girl, and before it was baptized Tawhaki took it to a spring to wash it, and afterwards held it away from him as if it smelt badly, and said: 'Faugh, how badly the little thing smells.' Then Tango-tango, when she heard this said of her own dear little baby, began to sob and cry bitterly, and at last rose up from her place with her child, and began to take flight towards the sky, but she paused for one minute with one foot resting upon the carved figure at the end of the ridge-pole of the house above the door. Then Tawhaki rushed forward, and springing up tried to catch hold of his young wife, but missing her, he entreatingly besought her: 'Mother of my child, oh, return once more to me!' But she in reply called down to him: 'No, no, I shall now never return to you again.

Tawhaki once more called up to her: 'At least, then, leave me some one remembrance of you.' Then his young wife called down to him: 'These are my parting words of remembrance to you--take care that you lay not hold with your hands of the loose root of the creeper, which dropping from aloft sways to and fro in the air; but rather lay fast hold on that which hanging down from on high has again struck its fibres into the earth.' Then she floated up into the air, and vanished from his sight.

Tawhaki remained plunged in grief, for his heart was torn by regrets for his wife and his little girl. One moon had waned after her departure, when Tawhaki, unable longer to endure such sufferings, called out to his younger brother, to Karihi, saying: 'Oh, brother, shall we go and search for my little girl? And Karihi consented, saying: 'Yes, let us go.' So they departed, taking two slaves with them as companions for their journey.

When they reached the pathway along which they intended to travel, Tawhaki said to the two slaves who were accompanying himself and his brother: 'You being unclean or unconsecrated persons must be careful when we come to the place where the road passes the fortress of Tongameha, not to look up at it for it is enchanted, and some evil will befall you if you do.' They then went along the road, and when they came to the place mentioned by Tawhaki, one of the slaves looked up at the fortress, and his eye was immediately torn out by the magical arts of Tongameha, and he perished. Tawhaki and Karihi then went upon the road accompanied by only one slave. They at last reached the spot where the ends of the vines which hung down from heaven reached the earth, and they there found an old woman who was quite blind. She was appointed to take care of the vines, and she sat at the place where they touched the earth, and held the ends of one of them in her hands.

This old lady was at the moment employed in counting some taro roots, which she was about to have cooked, and as she was blind she was not aware of the strangers who stole quietly and silently up to her. There were ten taro roots lying in a heap before her. She began to count them, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine. Just at this moment Tawhaki quietly slipped away the tenth, the old lady felt everywhere for it, but she could not find it. She thought she must have made some mistake, and so began to count her taro over again very carefully. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. just then Tawhaki had slipped away the ninth. She was now quite surprised, so she counted them over again quite slowly, One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight; and as she could not find the two that were missing, she at last guessed that somebody was playing a trick upon her, so she pulled her weapon out, which she always sat upon to keep it safe, and standing up turned round, feeling about her as she moved, to try if she could find Tawhaki and Karihi; but they very gently stooped down to the ground and lay close there, so that her weapon passed over them, and she could not feel anybody; when she had thus swept her weapon all round her, she sat down and put it under her again. Karihi then struck her a blow upon the face, and she, quite frightened, threw up her bands to her face, pressing them on the place where she had been struck, and crying out: 'Oh! who did that?' Tawhaki then touched both her eyes, and, lo, she was at once restored to sight, and saw quite plainly, and she knew her grandchildren and wept over them.

When the old lady had finished weeping over them, she asked: 'Where are you going to?' And Tawhaki answered: 'I go to seek my little girl.' She replied: 'But where is she? He answered: 'Above there, in the skies.' Then she replied: 'But what made her go to the skies?' And Tawhaki answered: 'Her mother came from heaven. She was the daughter of Whatitiri-mata-ka-taka.' The old lady then pointed to the vines and said to them: 'Up there, then, lies your road; but do not begin the ascent so late in the day, wait until to-morrow, for the morning, and then commence to climb up.' He consented to follow this good advice, and called out to his slave: 'Cook some food for us.' The slave began at once to cook food, and when it was dressed, they all partook of it and slept there that night.

At the first peep of dawn Tawhaki called out to his slave: 'Cook some food for us, that we may have strength to undergo the fatigues of this great journey'; and when their meal was finished, Tawhaki took his slave, and presented him to the old woman, as an acknowledgment for her great kindness to them.

The old woman then called out to him, as he was starting: 'There lies the ascent before you, lay fast hold of the vine with your hands, and climb on; but when you get midway between heaven and earth, take care not to look down upon this lower world again, lest you become charmed and giddy, and fall down. Take care, also, that you do not by mistake lay hold of the vine which swings loose; but rather lay hold of the one which hanging down from above, has again firmly struck root into the earth.'

Just at that moment Karihi made a spring at the vines to catch them, and by mistake caught hold of the loose one, and away he swung to the very edge of the horizon, but a blast of wind blew forth from thence, and drove him back to the other side of the skies; on reaching that point, another strong land wind swept him right up heavenwards, and down he was blown again by the currents of air from above: then just as he reached near the earth again, Tawhaki called out: 'Now, my brother, loose your hands: now is the time!'--and he did so, and, lo, he stood upon the earth once more; and the two brothers wept together over Karihi's narrow escape from destruction. And when they had ceased lamenting, Tawhaki, who was alarmed lest any disaster should overtake his younger brother, said to him: 'It is my desire that you should return home, to take care of our families and our dependants.' Thereupon Karihi at once returned to the village of their tribe, as his eldest brother directed him.

Tawhaki now began to climb the ascent to heaven, and the old blind woman called out to him as he went up: 'Hold fast, my child; let your hands hold tight.' And Tawhaki made use of, and kept on repeating, a powerful incantation as he climbed up to the heavens, to preserve him from the dangers of that difficult and terrible road.

At length he reached the heavens, and pulled himself up into them, and then by enchantments he disguised himself, and changed his handsome and noble appearance, and assumed the likeness of a very ugly old man, and he followed the road he had at first struck upon, and entered a dense forest into which it ran, and still followed it until he came to a place in the forest where his brothers-in-law, with a party of their people, were hewing canoes from the trunks of trees; and they saw him, and little thinking who he was, called out: 'Here's an old fellow will make a nice slave for us': but Tawhaki went quietly on, and when he reached them he sat down with the people who were working at the canoes.

It now drew near evening, and his brothers-in-law finished their work, and called out to him: 'Ho! old fellow, there!--you just carry these heavy axes home for us, will you!' 1 He at once consented to do this, and they gave him the axes. The old man then said to them: 'You go on in front, do not mind, I am old and heavy laden, I cannot travel fast.' So they started off, the old man following slowly behind. When his brothers-in-law and their people were all out of sight, he turned back to the canoe, and taking an axe just adzed the canoe rapidly along from the bow to the stem, and lo, one side of the canoe was finished. Then he took the adze again, and ran it rapidly along the other side of the canoe, from the bow to the stem, and lo, that side also was beautifully finished.

He then walked quietly along the road again, like an old man, carrying the axes with him, and went on for some time without seeing anything; but when be drew near the village, he found two women from the village in the forest gathering firewood, and as soon as they saw him, one of them observed to her companion: 'I say here is a curious-looking old fellow, is he not?'--and her companion exclaimed: 'He shall be our slave'; to which the first answered: 'Make him carry the firewood for us, then.' So they took Tawhaki, and laid a load of firewood upon his back, and made him carry that as well as the axes, so was this mighty chief treated as a slave, even by female slaves.

When they all reached the village, the two women called out: 'We've caught an old man for a slave.' Then Tango-tango exclaimed in reply: 'That's right bring him along with you, then; he'll do for all of us.' Little did his wife Tango-tango think that the slave they were so insulting, and whom she was talking about in such a way, was her own husband Tawhaki.

When Tawhaki saw Tango-tango sitting at a fireplace near the upper end of the house with their little girl, he went straight up to the place, and all the persons present tried to stop him, calling out: 'Ho! ho! take care what you are doing; do not go there; you will become tapued from sitting near Tango-tango.' But the old man, without minding them, went rapidly straight on, and carried his load of firewood right up to the very fire of Tango-tango. Then they all said: 'There, the old fellow is tapu; it is his own fault.' But Tango-tango had not the least idea that this was Tawhaki; and yet there were her husband and herself seated, the one upon the one side, the other upon the opposite side of the very same fire.

They all stopped in the house until the sun rose next morning; then at daybreak his brothers-in-law called out to him: 'Holloa! old man, you bring the axes along, do you hear.' So the old man took up the axes, and started with them, and they all went off together to the forest, to work at dubbing out their canoes. When they reached them, and the brothers-in-law saw the canoe which Tawhaki had worked at, they looked at it with astonishment, saying: 'Why, the canoe is not at all as we left it; who can have been working at it? At last, when their wonder was somewhat abated, they all sat down, and set to work again to dub out another canoe, and worked until evening, when they again called out to the old man as on the previous one: 'Holloa! old fellow, come here, and carry the axes back to the village again.' As before, he said: 'Yes', and when they started he remained behind, and after the others were all out of sight he took an axe, and began again to adze away at the canoe they had been working at; and having finished his work he returned again to the village, and once more walked straight up to the fire of Tango-tango, and remained there until the sun rose upon the following morning.

When they were all going at early dawn to work at their canoes as usual, they again called out to Tawhaki: 'Holloa! old man, just bring these axes along with you'; and the old man went patiently and silently along with them, carrying the axes on his shoulder. When they reached the canoe they were about to work at, the brothers-in-law were quite astonished on seeing it, and shouted out: 'Why, here again, this canoe, too, is not at all as it was when we left it; who can have been at work at it?' Having wondered at this for some time, they at length sat down and set to again to dub out another canoe, and laboured away until evening, when a thought came into their minds that they would hide themselves in the forest, and wait to see who it was came every evening to work at their canoe; and Tawhaki overheard them arranging this plan.

They therefore started as if they were going home, and when they had got a little way they turned off the path on one side, and hid themselves in the thick clumps of bushes, in a place from whence they could see the canoes. Then Tawhaki, going a little way back into the forest, stripped off his old cloaks, and threw them on one side, and then repeating the necessary incantations he put off his disguise, and took again his own appearance, and made himself look noble and handsome, and commenced his work at the canoe. Then his brothers-in-law, when they saw him so employed, said one to another: 'Ah, that must be the old man whom we made a slave of who is working away at our canoe'; but again they called to one another and said: 'Come here, come here, just watch, why he is not in the least like that old man.' Then they said amongst themselves: 'This must be a demi-god'; and, without showing themselves to him, they ran off to the village, and as soon as they reached it they asked their sister Tango-tango to describe her husband for them; and she described his appearance as well as she could, representing him just like the man they had seen: and they said to her: 'Yes, that must be he; he is exactly like him you have described to us.' Their sister replied: 'Then that chief must certainly be your brother-in-law.'

Just at this moment Tawhaki reappeared at the village, having again disguised himself, and changed his appearance into that of an ugly old man. But Tango-tango immediately questioned him, saying: 'Now tell me, who are you? Tawhaki made no reply, but walked on straight towards her. She asked him again: 'Tell me, are you Tawhaki? He murmured 'Humph!' in assent, still walking on until he reached the side of his wife, and then he snatched up his little daughter, and, holding her fast in his arms, pressed her to his heart. The persons present all rushed out of the court-yard of the house to the neighbouring court-yards, for the whole place was made tapu by Tawhaki, and murmurs of gratification and surprise arose from the people upon every side at the splendour of his appearance, for in the days when he had been amongst them as an old man his figure was very different from the resplendent aspect which he presented on this day.

Then he retired to rest with his wife, and said to her: 'I came here that our little daughter might be made to undergo the ceremonies usual for the children of nobles, to secure them good fortune and happiness in this life'; and Tango-tango consented.

When in the morning the sun arose, they broke out an opening through the end of the house opposite to the door, that the little girl's rank might be seen by her being carried out that way instead of through the usual entrance to the house; and they repeated the prescribed prayers when she was carried through the wall out of the house.

The prayers and incantations being finished, lightnings flashed from the arm-pits of Tawhaki; 1 then they carried the little girl to the water, and plunged her into it, and repeated a baptismal incantation over her.

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Rupe's Ascent into Heaven

WE left Hinauri floating out into the ocean 1; we now return to her adventures: for many months she floated through the sea, and was at last thrown up by the surf on the beach at a place named Wairarawa; she was there found, lying as if dead, upon the sandy shore, by two brothers named Ihuatamai and Ihuwareware; her body was in many parts overgrown with seaweed and barnacles, from the length of time she had been in the water, but they could still see some traces of her beauty, and pitying the young girl, they lifted her up in their arms, and carried her home to their house, and laid her down carefully by the side of a fire, and scraped off very gently the seaweed and barnacles from her body, and thus by degrees restored her.

When she had quite recovered, Ihuatamai and Ihuwareware looked upon her with pleasure, and took her as a wife between them both; they then asked her to tell them who she was, and what was her name; this she did not disclose to them, but she changed her name, and called herself Ihungaru-paea, or the Stranded-log-of-timber.

After she had lived with these two brothers for a long time, Ihuwareware went to pay a visit to his superior chief, Tinirau, and to relate the adventures which had happened; and when Tinirau heard all that had taken place, he went to bring

away the young stranger as a wife for himself, and she was given up to him; but before she was so given to him, she had conceived a child by Ihuatamai, and when she went to live with Tinirau it was near the time when the child should be born.

Tinirau took her home with him to his residence on an island called Motu-tapu: he had two other wives living there--they were the daughters of Mangamanga-i-atua, and their names were Harataunga and Horotata. Now, when these two women saw the young stranger coming along in their husband's company, as if she was his wife, they could not endure it, and they abused Hinauri on account of her conduct with their husband; at last they proceeded so far as to attempt to strike her, and to kill her, and they cursed her bitterly. When they treated her in this manner the heart of Hinauri became gloomy with grief and mortification, so she began to utter incantations against them, and repeated one so powerful that hardly had she finished it when the two women fell flat on the ground with the soles of their feet projecting upwards, and lay quite dead upon the earth, and her husband was thus left free for her alone.

All this time Hinauri was lost to her friends and home, and her young brother Mauimua, afterwards called Rupe, could do nothing but think of her; and excessive love for his sister, and sorrow at her departure, so harassed him, that he said he could no longer remain at rest, but that he must go and seek for his sister.

So he departed upon this undertaking, and visited every place he could think of without missing one of them, yet could he nowhere find his sister; at last, Rupe thought that be would ascend to the heavens to consult his great ancestor Rehua, who dwelt there at a place named Te Putahi-nui-o-Rehua, and in fulfilment of this design he began his ascent to the heavenly regions.

Rupe continued his ascent, seeking everywhere hastily for Rehua; at last, he reached a place where people were dwelling, and when he saw them, he spoke to them, saying: 'Are the heavens above this inhabited?'--and the people dwelling there answered him: 'They are inhabited.' And he again asked them: 'Can I reach those heavens? and they replied: 'You cannot reach them, the heavens above these are those the boundaries of which were fixed by Tane.'

But Rupe forced a way up through those heavens, and got above them, and found an inhabited place; and he asked the inhabitants of it, saying: 'Are the heavens above these inhabited?'--and the people answered him: 'They are inhabited.' And he again asked: 'Do you think I can reach them?'--and they replied: 'No, you will not be able to reach them, those heavens were fixed there by Tane.'

Rupe, however, forced a way through those heavens too, and thus he continued to do until he reached the tenth heaven, and there he found the abode of Rehua. When Rehua saw a stranger approaching, he went forward and gave him the usual welcome, lamenting over him; Rehua made his lamentation without knowing who the stranger was, but Rupe in his lament made use of prayers by which he enabled Rehua to guess who he was.

When they had each ended their lamentation, Rehua called to his servants: 'Light a fire, and get everything ready for cooking food.' The slaves soon made the fire burn up brightly, and brought hollow calabashes, all ready to have food placed in them, and laid them down before Rehua. All this time Rupe was wondering whence the food was to come from with which the calabashes, which the slaves had brought, were to be filled; but presently he observed that Rehua was slowly loosening the thick bands which enveloped his locks around and upon the top of his head; and when his long locks all floated loosely, he shook the dense masses of his hair, and forth from them came flying flocks of the Tui birds, which had been nestling there, feeding upon lice; and as they flew forth, the slaves caught and killed them, and filled the calabashes with them, and took them to the fire, and put them on to cook, and when they were done, they carried them and laid them before Rupe as a present, and then placed them beside him that he might eat, and Rehua requested him to eat food, but Rupe answered him: 'Nay, but I cannot eat this food; I saw these birds loosened and take wing from thy locks; who would dare to eat birds that had fed upon lice in thy sacred head? For the reasons he thus stated, Rupe feared that man of ancient days, and the calabashes still stood near him untouched.

At last, Rupe ventured to ask Rehua, saying: 'O Rehua, has a confused murmur of voices from the world below reached you upon any subject regarding which I am interested? And Rehua answered him: 'Yes, such a murmuring of distant voices has reached me from the island of Motu-tapu in the world below these.'

When Rupe heard this, he immediately by his enchantments changed himself into a pigeon, and took flight downwards towards the island of Motu-tapu; on, on he flew, until he reached the island, and the dwelling of Tinirau, and then he alighted right upon the window-sill of his house. Some of Tinirau's people saw him, and exclaimed: 'Ha! ha!--there's a bird, there's a bird'; whilst some called out: 'Make haste, spear him, spear him'; and one threw a spear at him, but he turned it aside with his bill, and it passed on one side of him, and struck the piece of wood on which he was sitting, and the spear was broken; then they saw that it was no use to try to spear the bird, so they made a noose, and endeavoured to slip it gently over his head, but he turned his head on one side, and they found that they could not snare him.

His young sister now suspected something, so she said to the people who were trying to kill or snare the bird: 'Leave the bird quiet for a minute until I look at it'; and when she had looked well at it, she knew that it was her brother, so she asked him, saying: 'What is the cause which has made you thus come here?'-and the pigeon immediately began to open and shut its little bill, as if it was trying to speak. His young sister now called out to Tinirau: 'Oh, husband, here is your brother-in-law'; and her husband said in reply: 'What is his name?'--and she answered: 'It is my brother Rupe.' It happened that upon this very day, Hinauri's little child was born, then Rupe repeated this form of greeting to his sister, the name of which is Toetoetu:

'Hinauri,

Hinauri is the sister,

And Rupe is her brother,

But how came he here?

Came he by travelling on the earth,

Or came he through the air?

Let your path be through the air.'

As soon as Rupe had ceased his lamentation of welcome to his sister, she commenced hers, and answered him, saying:

'Rupe is the brother,

And Hina is his young sister,

But how came he here?

Came he by travelling on the earth,

Or came he through the air?

Let your path be now upwards through the air

To Rehua.'

Hardly had his young sister finished repeating this poem, before Rupe had caught her up with her new-born baby: in a moment they were gone. Thus the brother and sister departed together, with the infant, carrying with them the placenta to bury it with the usual rites; and they ascended up to Rehua, and as they passed through the air, the placenta was accidentally dropped, and falling into the sea, was devoured by a shark, and this circumstance was what caused the multitude of large eggs which are now found in the inside of the shark.

At length the brother and sister arrived at the dwelling-place of Rehua, which was called Te Putahi-nui-o-Rehua. The old man was unable to keep his court-yard clean for himself, and his people neglected to do so from idleness; thus it was left in a very filthy state. Rupe, who was displeased at seeing this, one day said to Rehua: 'Oh, Rehua, they leave this court-yard of yours in a very filthy state'; and then he added: 'Your people are such a set of lazy rogues, that if every mess of dirt was a lizard, I doubt if they could even take the trouble to touch its tail to make it run away'; and this saying passed into a proverb.

At last, Rupe thought that he could clean and beautify, in some respects, Rehua's dwelling for him, so he made two wooden shovels for his work, one of which he called Tahitahia, and the other Rake-rakea, and with them he quite cleansed and purified Rehua's court-yard. He then added a building to Rehua's dwelling, but fixing one of the beams of it badly, Rehua's son Kaitangata, was one day killed from hanging on to this beam, which giving way and springing back, he was thrown down and died, and his blood running about over part of the heavens stained them, and formed what we now call a ruddiness in the sky; when, therefore, a red and ruddy tinge is seen in the heavens, men say: 'Ah! Kaitangata stained the heavens with his blood.'

Rupe's first name was Maui-mua; it was after he was transformed into a bird that he took the name of Rupe. 1

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Kae's Theft of the Whale

SOON after Tuhuruhuru was born, Tinirau endeavoured to find a skilful magician, who might perform the necessary enchantments and incantations to render the child a fortunate and successful warrior, and Kae was the name of the old magician, whom some of his friends brought to him for this purpose. In due time Kae arrived at the village where Tinirau lived, and he performed the proper enchantments with fitting ceremonies over the infant.

When all these things had been rightly concluded, Tinirau gave a signal to a pet whale that he had tamed, to come on shore; this whale's name was Tutunui. When it knew that its master wanted it, it left the ocean in which it was sporting about, and came to the shore, and its master laid hold of it, and cut a slice of its flesh off to make a feast for the old magician, and he cooked it, and gave a portion of it to Kae, who found it very savoury, and praised the dish very much.

Shortly afterwards, Kae said it was necessary for him to return to his own village, which was named Te Tihi-o-Manono; so Tinirau ordered a canoe to be got ready for him to take him back, but Kae made excuses, and said he did not like to go back in the canoe, and remained where he was. This, however, was a mere trick upon his part, his real object being to get Tinirau to permit him to go back upon the whale, upon Tutunui, for he now knew how savoury the flesh of that fish was.

At last Tinirau lent Tutunui to the old magician to carry him home, but he gave him very particular directions, telling him: 'When you get so near the shore, that the fish touches the bottom, it will shake itself to let you know, and you must then, without any delay, jump off it upon the right side.'

He then wished Kae farewell, and the old magician started, and away went the whale through the water with him.

When they came close to the shore at Kae's village, and the whale felt the bottom, it shook itself as a sign to Kae to jump off and wade ashore, but it was of no use; the old magician stuck fast to the whale, and pressed it down against the bottom as hard as he could; in vain the fish continued to shake itself; Kae held on to it, and would not jump off, and in its struggles the blow-holes of Tutunui got stopped up with sand, and it died.

Kae and his people then managed to drag up the body of Tutunui on shore, intending to feast upon it; and this circumstance became afterwards the cause of a war against that tribe, who were called 'The descendants of Popohorokewa'. When they had dragged Tutunui on shore, they cut its body up and cooked it in ovens, covering the flesh up with the fragrant leaves of the Koromiko before they heaped earth upon the ovens, and the fat of Tutunui adhered to the leaves of the Koromiko, and they continue greasy to this day, so that if Koromiko boughs are put upon the fire and become greasy, the proverb says: 'There's some of the savouriness of Tutunui'.

Tinirau continued anxiously to look for the return of Tutunui and when a long time had elapsed without its coming back again, he began to say to himself: 'Well, I wonder where my whale can be stopping!' But when Kae and his people had cooked the flesh of the whale, and the ovens were opened, a savoury scent was wafted across the sea to Tinirau, and both he and his wife smelt it quite plainly, and then they knew very well that Kae had killed the pet which they had tamed for their little darling Tuhuruhuru, and that he had eaten it.

Without any delay, Tinirau's people dragged down to the sea a large canoe which belonged to one of his wives, and forty women forthwith embarked in it; none but women went, as this would be less likely to excite any suspicion in Kae that they had come with a hostile object; amongst them were Hine-i-te-iwaiwa, Raukatauri, Raukatamea, Itiiti, Rekareka, and Rua-hau-a-Tangaroa, and other females of note, whose names have not been preserved; just before the canoe started Tinirau's youngest sister asked him: 'What are the marks by which we shall know Kae?'--and he answered her: 'Oh, you cannot mistake him, his teeth are uneven and all overlap one another.'

Well, away they paddled, and in due time they arrived at the village of the old magician Kae, and his tribe all collected to see the strangers; towards night, when it grew dark, a fire was lighted in the house of Kae, and a crowd collected inside it, until it was filled; one side was quite occupied with the crowd of visitors, and the other side of the house with the people of Kae's tribe. The old magician himself sat at the foot of the main pillar which supported the roof of the house, and mats were laid down there for him to sleep on (but the strangers did not yet know which was Kae, for it did not accord with the Maori's rules of politeness to ask the names of the chiefs, it being supposed from their fame and greatness that they are known by everybody).

In order to find out which was Kae, Tinirau's people had arranged, that they would try by wit and fun to make everybody laugh, and when the people opened their mouths, to watch which of them had uneven teeth that lapped across one another, and thus discover which was Kae.

In order, therefore, to make them laugh, Raukatauri exhibited all her amusing tricks and games; she made them sing and play upon the flute, and upon the putorino, and beat time with castanets of bone and wood whilst they sang; and they played at mora, and the kind of ti in which many motions are made with the fingers and hands, and the kind of ti in which, whilst the players sing, they rapidly throw short sticks to one another, keeping time to the tune which they are singing; and she played upon an instrument like a jew's-harp for them, and made puppets dance, and made them all sing whilst they played with large whizgigs; and after they had done all these things, the man they thought was Kae had never even once laughed.

Then the party who had come from Tinirau's, all began to consult together, and to say what can we do to make that fellow laugh, and for a long time they thought of some plan by which they might take Kae in, and make him laugh; at last they thought of one, which was, that they should all sing a droll comic song; so suddenly they all began to sing together, at the same time making curious faces, and shaking their hands and arms in time to the tune.

When they had ended their song, the old magician could not help laughing out quite heartily, and those who were watching him closely at once recognized him, for there they saw pieces of the flesh of Tutunui still sticking between his teeth, and his teeth were uneven and all overlapped one another. From this circumstance a proverb has been preserved among the Maoris to the present day--for if any one on listening to a story told by another is amused at it and laughs, one of the bystanders says: 'Ah, there's Kae laughing.'

No sooner did the women who had come from Tinirau's see the flesh of Tutunui sticking in Kae's teeth than they made an excuse for letting the fire burn dimly in the house, saying, that they wanted to go to sleep--their real object, however, being to be able to perform their enchantments without being seen; but the old magician who suspected something, took two round pieces of mother-of-pearl shell, and stuck one in the socket of each eye, so that the strangers, observing the faint rays of light reflected from the surface of the mother-of-pearl, might think they saw the white of his eyes, and that he was still awake.

The women from Tinirau's went on, however, with their enchantments, and by their magical arts threw every one in the house into an enchanted sleep, with the intention, when they had done this, of carrying off Kae by stealth. So soon as Kae and the people in the house were all deep in this enchanted sleep, the women ranged themselves in a long row, the whole way from the place where Kae was sleeping down to their canoe; they all stood in a straight line, with a little interval between each of them; and then two of them went to fetch Kae, and lifted the old magician gently up, rolled up in his cloaks, just as be had laid himself down to sleep, and placed him gently in the arms of those who stood near the door, who passed him on to two others, and thus they handed him on from one to another, until he at last reached the arms of the two women who were standing in the canoe ready to receive him; and they laid him down very gently in the canoe, fast asleep as he was; and thus the old magician Kae was carried off by Hine-i-te-iwaiwa and Raukatauri.

When the women reached the village of Tinirau in their canoe, they again took up Kae, and carried him very gently up to the house of Tinirau, and laid him down fast asleep close to the central pillar, which supported the ridge-pole of the house, so that the place where he slept in the house of Tinirau was exactly like his sleeping-place in his own house. The house of Kae was, however, a large circular house, without a ridge-pole, but with rafters springing from the central pillar, running down like rays to low side posts in the circular wall; whilst the house of Tinirau was a long house, with a ridge-pole running the entire length of the roof, and resting upon the pillar in its centre.

When Tinirau heard that the old magician had been brought to his village, he caused orders to be given to his tribe that when be made his appearance in the morning, going to the house where Kae was, they should all call out loud: 'Here comes Tinirau, here comes Tinirau', as if he was coming as a visitor into the village of Kae, so that the old magician on hearing them might think that he was still at home.

At broad daylight next morning, when Tinirau's people saw him passing along through the village towards his house, they all shouted aloud: 'Here come Tinirau, here comes Tinirau'; and Kae, who heard the cries, started up from his enchanted sleep quite drowsy and confused, whilst Tinirau passed straight on, and sat down just outside the door of his house, so that he could look into it, and, looking in, he saw Kae, and saluted him, saying: 'Salutations to you, O Kae!'--and then he asked him, saying: 'How came you here?'--and the old magician replied: 'Nay, but rather how came you here?'

Tinirau replied: 'Just look, then, at the house, and see if you recognize it?'

But Kae, who was still stupefied by his sleep, looking round, saw he was lying in his own place at the foot of the pillar, and said: 'This is my house.'

Tinirau asked him: 'Where was the window placed in your house?'

Kae started and looked; the whole appearance of his house appeared to be changed; he at once

guessed the truth, that the house he was in belonged to Tinirau; and the old magician, who saw that his hour had come, bowed down his head in silence to the earth, and they seized him, and dragged him out, and slew him: thus perished Kae.

The news of his death at last reached his tribe--the descendants of Popohorokewa; and they eventually attacked the fortress of Tinirau with a large army, and avenged the death of Kae by slaying Tinirau's son.

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Te Patunga o Tuwhakararo

NOW about this time Tuhuruhuru, the son of Rupe's sister, grew up to man's estate, and he married Apakura, and she gave birth to a son whom they named Tuwhakararo, and afterwards to a daughter named Mairatea; she had then several other children; then she gave birth to Whakatau-potiki; afterwards her last child was born, and its name was Reimatua.

When Mairatea grew up, she was married to the son of a chief named Popohorokewa, the chief of the Ati-Hapai tribe, and she accompanied her husband to his home; but Tuwhakararo remained at his own village, and after a time he longed to see his sister, and thought he would go and pay her a visit; so he went, and arrived at a very large house belonging to the tribe Popohorokewa, the name of which was Te Uru-o-Manono; all the family and dependants of Popohorokewa lived in that house, and Tuwhakararo remained there with them. It happened that a young sister of his brother-in-law, whose name was Maurea, took a great fancy to him, and showed that she liked him, although, at the very time, she was carrying on a courtship with another young man of the Ati-Hapai tribe.

Whilst Tuwhakararo was on this visit to his brother-in-law, some of the young men of the Ati-Hapai tribe asked him one day to wrestle with them, and he, agreeing to this, stood up to wrestle, and the one who came forward as his competitor was the sweetheart of his brother-in-law's young sister. Tuwhakararo laid hold of the young man, and soon gave him a severe fall. That match being over they both stood up again, and Tuwhakararo, lifting him in his arms, gave him another severe fall; and all the young people of the Ati-Hapai tribe burst out laughing at the youth, for having had two such heavy falls from Tuwhakararo, and he sat down upon the ground, looking very foolish, and feeling exceedingly sulky and provoked at being laughed at by everybody.

Tuwhakararo, having also finished wrestling, sat down too, and began to put on his clothes again, and whilst he was in the act of putting his head through his cloak, the young man he had thrown in wrestling ran up, and just as his head appeared through the cloak threw a handful of sand in his eyes. Tuwhakararo, wild with pain, could see nothing, and began to rub his eyes, to get the dust out and to ease the anguish; the young man then struck him on the head, and killed him. The people of the Ati-Hapai tribe then ran in upon him and cut his body up, and afterwards devoured it; and they took his bones, and hung them up in the roof, under the ridge-pole of their house, Te Uru-o-Manono.

Whilst they were hung up there the bones rattled together, and his sister heard them, and it seemed to her as if they made a sound like 'Tauparoro, Tauparoro'; and she listened again to the rattling of the bones, and again she heard the words 'Tauparoro, Tauparoro'. And the sister of Tuwhakararo looking up to the bones, said: 'You rattle in vain, O bones of him who was devoured by the Ati-Hapai tribe, for who is there to lament over him or to avenge his death?'

At last the news of the sad event which had taken place reached the ears of his brother, Whakatau-potiki, and of his other brothers, and when they beard it they were grieved and pained at the fate of their brother, and at last Whakatau-potiki adopted a firm resolution to go and avenge Tuwhakararo's death, and as the rest of his tribe agreed in this purpose, they began without delay to build canoes for its execution.

They named some of their canoes the Whiritoa, the Tapatapahukarere, the Toroa-i-taipakihi, the Hakirere, and the Mahunu-awatea, and to all the other canoes which they prepared for this purpose they also gave names; and when they had finished lashing on the top-boards of their canoes, their mother Apakura, with all her female attendants, began to beat and prepare fern root for the warriors to carry with them as provisions for their voyage, and whilst the females were thus engaged in beating and preparing fern root for the war party who were about to start to revenge the death of Tuwhakararo, they kept on repeating a lament for the young man which might rouse the feelings of the warriors.

Lo, the army of Whakatau-potiki now embarked; they started in a thousand canoes, and floated out into the open sea, and proceeding upon their course, they landed at a certain place which lay in their route, and there the army of Whakatau had a review, to show how well they could go through their manoeuvres. They were formed into columns, and one column, with fierce shouts and yells, after a war dance, sprang upon the supposed enemy, and whilst they were thus engaged with their imaginary foe, a second column, with wild cries, advanced to their support; then the first column of warriors retired to re-form and thus column after column feigned to charge their foes.

Then one body of the warriors rushed to an adjoining creek and tried to jump across it, but they could not. A band of men under Whakatau's immediate command were sitting upon the ground watching the others, and when the first body gave up in despair all thoughts of overleaping the creek, this chosen band of Whakatau rose from the ground, started forward, reached in good order the edge of the creek, and sprang easily across it the whole body of them to the other side.

When the review was ended, Whakatau made a speech to the warriors, saying: 'Warriors, all of you listen to me. We will not finish our voyage until the dark night, lest we should be seen by the people we are about to attack, and thus fail in surprising them.'

Just as it was dark, Whakatau ordered his own chosen band of warriors to go and pull the plugs out of all the canoes but their own, and they, in obedience to his orders, went round and pulled all the plugs out of the canoes, and thus they did to the whole of them without missing a single canoe of the whole thousand.

This having been done, Whakatau called aloud to the whole force: 'Now my men, let us embark at once this very night.' Then the warriors hurriedly arose in the darkness, and all was confusion and noise, and one canoe was launched, and then another, and another, until all were afloat on the sea. Then they all embarked, and the several crews sprang cheerfully into their own canoes; but lo, presently the canoes all began to sink, one after the other, and the crews were compelled again to seek the shore, and to busy themselves there in repairing them.

In the meantime the chosen band of warriors of Whakatau urged on their canoes, leaving the others behind, and when they drew near the place where the house called Te Uru-o-Manono was situated, they landed. Then the warriors silently surrounded the house in ranks throughout its whole circumference, and each of the eight doors of the house they guarded by a band of men, and Whakatau laid hold of a man named Hioi, whom they caught outside of the house, and he questioned him, saying: 'Where is my sister now?' And Hioi answered him: 'She is in the house.' And he asked him again: 'In what part of the house does Popohorokewa sleep? Hioi replied: 'At the foot of the large pillar which supports the ridge-pole of the house.' Whakatau next asked: 'Has he any distinguishing mark by which we may know him? Hioi answered: 'You may know him by one of his teeth being broken.' Whakatau asked him one question more, saying: 'In what part of the house does my sister sleep?' And Hioi answered him: 'She sleeps close to that door.'

Whakatau-potiki asked him no further question, but took the fellow and cut out his tongue, and when he had done so he made him talk, and he still spoke quite distinctly, although a great part of his tongue was cut out. Whakatau then took him again, and cut his tongue off quite close to the root, and he made him try to talk again, and nothing but an indistinct mumbling could be heard, so he then ordered the man into the house to send his sister out to him.

Hioi went as he was told to send Whakatau's sister to him, for she was then in Te Uru-o-Manono, the house of her father-in-law, Popohorokewa. When he got inside, the whole mass of the Ati-Hapai tribe who were sitting saw him come in, and some of them asked him where he had been to, and what he had gone for; but what was the use of their talking to him, since be could do nothing but mumble out indistinct words in reply, and those who were sitting near him wondered what could be the matter.

But the sister of Whakatau guessed in a moment that this was some device of her brother's, and at once went out of the house, and found Whakatau, and she and her brother wept together, partly from joy at their meeting, partly from sorrow in thinking of the melancholy death of their brother since they had last met.

When they had done weeping, Whakatau asked her: 'In what part of the house does Popohorokewa sleep? And she answered him: 'He sleeps at the foot of the large pillar which supports the ridge-pole of the house.' And then she added: 'But oh, my brother, a great part of the Ati-Hapai tribe have seen you before, and they will know you.' Her brother then asked her: 'What then do you think I had better do? His sister answered: 'You had better cut your hair quite short to disguise yourself.'

He consented to this being done, so his sister cut his hair quite close for him, and when she had done this she rubbed his face all over with charcoal, and then he and his sister went together into the house. The fire in the house had got quite low some time before, and when they entered, the people near where they went in, cried out: 'Make up the fire, make up the fire; here's a stranger, here's a stranger.' So they blew up the fire and made it bum brightly, and many of them came to see Whakatau-potiki, and when they had looked well at him, they broke out laughing, and said: 'What a black-looking fellow he is!' Even Popohorokewa burst out laughing at his appearance, and Whakatau, when he saw him laugh, at once recognized him by his broken tooth.

Whakatau-potiki had taken a stout rope with him when he went into the house, and he held this ready coiled in his hand, with a noose at one end of it; and as soon as he recognized Popohorokewa, he slily dropped the noose over his head, and suddenly hauling it tight, it got fast round his neck: then, still holding the rope in his hand, and lengthening it by degrees as he went, Whakatau and his sister rushed out of the house; and he still hauling with all his strength on the rope, climbed up on the roof, repeating a powerful incantation.

Then each warrior sprang up into his place from the ground, on which they had been lying down to conceal themselves, and they set fire to the house in several places at once, and slaughtered all those who tried to escape. Thus they burnt Te Uru-o-Manono, and all those who were in it, and then the warriors returned, and carried with them joyful news to Apakura, the mother of Tuwhakararo.

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The Legend of Rata

His Adventures with the Enchanted Tree

Revenge of his Father's Murder

BEFORE Tawhaki ascended up into the heavens, a son named Wahieroa had been born to him by his first wife. As soon as Wahieroa grew to man's estate, he took Kura for a wife, and she bore him a son whom they called Rata. Wahieroa was slain treacherously by a chief named Matukutakotako, but his son Rata was born some time before his death. It therefore became his duty to revenge the death of his father Wahieroa, and Rata having grown up, at last devised a plan for doing this: he therefore gave the necessary orders to his dependants, at the same time saying to them: 'I am about to go in search of the man who slew my father.'

He then started upon a journey for this purpose, and at length arrived at the entrance to the place of Matukutakotako; be found there a man who was left in charge of it, sitting at the entrance to the court-yard, and he asked him, saying: 'Where is the man who killed my father? The man who was left in charge of the place answered him: 'He lives beneath in the earth there, and I am left here by him, to call to him and warn him when the new moon appears; at that season he rises and comes forth upon the earth, and devours men as his food.'

Rata then said to him: 'All that you say is true, but how can he know when the proper time comes for him to rise up from the earth? The man replied: 'I call aloud to him.'

Then said Rata: 'When will there be a new moon? And the man who was left to take care of the place answered him: 'In two nights hence. Do you now return to your own village, but on the morning of the second day from this time come here again to me.'

Rata, in compliance with these directions, returned to his own dwelling, and waited there until the time that had been appointed him, and on the morning of that day he again journeyed along the road he had previously travelled, and found the man sitting in the same place, and he asked him, saying: 'Do you know any spot where I can conceal myself, and he hid from the enemy with whom I am about to fight, from Matukutakotako?' The man replied: 'Come with me until I show you the two fountains of clear water.'

They then went together until they came to the two fountains.

The man then said to Rata: 'The spot that we stand on is the place where Matuku rises up from the earth, and yonder fountain is the one in which he combs and washes his dishevelled hair, but this fountain is the one he uses to reflect his face in whilst he dresses it; you cannot kill him whilst he is at the fountain he uses to reflect his face in, because your shadow would be also reflected in it, and he would see it; but at the fountain in which he washes his hair, you may smite and slay him.'

Rata then asked the man: 'Will be make his appearance from the earth this evening?' And the man answered: 'Yes.'

They had not waited long there, when evening arrived, and the moon became visible, and the man said to Rata: 'Do you now go and hide yourself near the brink of the fountain in which he washes his hair'; and Rata went and hid himself near the edge of the fountain, and the man who had been left to watch for the purpose shouted aloud: 'Ho, Ho, the new moon is visible--a moon two days old.' And Matukutakotako heard him, and seizing his two-handed wooden sword, he rose up from the earth there, and went straight to his two fountains; then he laid down his two-handed wooden sword on the ground, at the edge of the fountain where he dressed his hair, and kneeling down on both knees beside it, he loosened the strings which bound up his long locks, and shook out his dishevelled hair, and plunged down his head into the cool clear waters of the fountain. So Rata creeping out from where he lay hid, rapidly moved up, and stood behind him, and as Matukutakotako raised his head from the water, Rata, with one hand seized him by the hair, while with the other he smote and slew him; thus he avenged the death of his father Wahieroa.

Rata then asked the man whom he had found in charge of the place: 'Where shall I find the bones of Wahieroa my father? And the keeper of the place answered him: 'They are not here; a strange people who live at a distance came and carried them off.'

Upon bearing this Rata returned to his own village, and there reflected over many designs by which be might recover the bones of his father.

At length he thought of an excellent plan for this purpose, so he went into the forest and having found a very tall tree, quite straight throughout its entire length, he felled it, and cut off its noble branching top, intending to fashion the trunk into a canoe; and all the insects which inhabit trees, and the spirits of the forests, were very angry at this, and as soon as Rata had returned to the village at evening, when his day's work was ended, they all came and took the tree, and raised it up again, and the innumerable multitude of insects, birds, and spirits, who are called 'The offspring of Hakuturi', worked away at replacing each little chip and shaving in its proper place, and sang aloud their incantations as they worked; this was what they sang with a confused noise of various voices:

Fly together, chips and shavings,

Stick ye fast together,

Hold ye fast together;

Stand upright again, O tree!

Early the next morning back came Rata, intending to work at hewing the trunk of his tree into a canoe. When he got to the place where he had left the trunk lying on the ground, at first he could not find it, and if that fine tall straight tree, which he saw standing whole and sound in the forest, was the same he thought he had cut down, there it was now erect again; however he stepped up to it, and manfully hewing away at it again, he felled it to the ground once more, and off he cut its fine branching top again, and began to hollow out the hold of the canoe, and to slope off its prow and the stem into their proper gracefully curved forms; and in the evening, when it became too dark to work, he returned to his village.

As soon as he was gone, back came the innumerable multitudes of insects, birds, and spirits, who are called the offspring of Hakuturi, and they raised up the tree upon its stump once more, and with a confused noise of various voices, they sang incantations as they worked, and when they had ended these, the tree again stood sound as ever in its former place in the forest.

The morning dawned, and Rata returned once more to work at his canoe. When he reached the place, was not he amazed to see the tree standing up in the forest, untouched, just as he had at first found it? But he, nothing daunted, hews away at it again, and down it topples crashing to the earth; as soon as he saw the tree upon the ground, Rata went off as if going home, and then turned back and hid himself in the underwood, in a spot whence he could peep out and see what took place; he had not been hidden long, when he heard the innumerable multitude of the children of Tane approaching die spot, singing their incantations as they came along; at last they arrived close to the place where the tree was lying upon the ground. Lo, a rush upon them is made by Rata. Ha, he has seized some of them; he shouts out to them, saying: 'Ha, ha, it is you, is it, then, who have been exercising your magical arts upon my tree?' Then the children of Tane all cried aloud in reply: 'Who gave you authority to fell the forest god to the ground? You had no right to do so.'

When Rata heard them say this, he was quite overcome with shame at what be had done.

The offspring of Tane again all called out aloud to him: 'Return, O Rata, to thy village, we will make a canoe for you.'

Rata, without delay, obeyed their orders, and as soon as he had gone they all fell to work; they were so numerous, and understood each what to do so well, that they no sooner began to adze out a canoe than it was completed. When they had done this, Rata and his tribe lost no time in hauling it from the forest to the water, and the name they gave to that canoe was Riwaru.

When the canoe was afloat upon the sea, 140 warriors embarked on board it, and without delay they paddled off to seek their foes; one night, just at nightfall, they reached the fortress of their enemies who were named Ponaturi. When they arrived there, Rata alone landed, leaving the canoe afloat and all his warriors on board; as be stole along the shore, he saw that a fire was burning on the sacred place, where the Ponaturi consulted their gods and offered sacrifices to them. Rata, without stopping, crept directly towards the fire, and bid himself behind some thick bushes of the Harakeke; 1 he then saw that there were some priests upon the other side of the same bushes, serving at the sacred place, and, to assist themselves in their magical arts, they were making use of the bones of Wahieroa, knocking them together to beat time while they were repeating a powerful incantation, known only to themselves, the name of which was Titikura. Rata listened attentively to this incantation, until he learnt it by heart, and when he was quite sure that he knew it, he rushed suddenly upon the priests; they, surprised and ignorant of the numbers of their enemy, or whence they came, made little resistance, and were in a moment smitten and slain. The bones of his father Wahieroa were then eagerly snatched up by him; he hastened with them back to the canoe, embarked on board it, and his warriors at once paddled away, striving to reach his fortified village.

In the morning some of the Ponaturi repaired to their sacred place, and found their priests lying dead there, just as they were slain by Rata. So, without delay, they pursued him. A thousand warriors of their tribe followed after Rata. At length this army reached the fortress of Rata, and an engagement at once took place, in which the tribe of Rata was worsted, and sixty of its warriors slam; at this moment Rata bethought him of the spell he had learnt from the priests, and, immediately repeating the potent incantation, Titikura, his slain warriors were by its power once more restored to life; then they rushed again to the combat, and the Ponaturi were slaughtered by Rata and his tribe, a thousand of them--the whole thousand were slam.

Te Rata's task of avenging his father's death being thus ended, his tribe hauled up his large canoe on the shore, and roofed it over with thatch to protect it from the sun and weather. Rata now took Tongarautawhiri as one of his wives, and she bore him a son whom he named Tuwhakararo; when this son came to man's estate, he took Apakura as one of his wives, and from her sprang a son named Whakatau. He was not born in the manner that mortals are, but came into being in this way: one day Apakura went down upon the sea-coast, and took off a little apron which she wore in front as a covering, and threw it into the ocean, and a god named Rongotakawiu took it and shaped it, and gave it form and being, and Whakatau sprang into life, and his ancestor Rongotakawiu taught him magic and the use of enchantments of every kind.

When Whakatau was a little lad, his favourite amusement was flying kites. Mortals then often observed kites flying in the air, and could see nothing else, for Whakatau was running about at the bottom of the waters, still holding the end of the string of the kite in his bands. One day he stole up out of the water by degrees, and at length came upon the shore, when the whole of his body was quite plainly seen by some people who were near, and they ran as fast as they could to catch him. When Whakatau observed them all running to seize him, he slipped back again into the water, and continued flying his kite as before; but the people who had seen him were surprised at this strange sight, and being determined to catch him the next time he came out, they sat down upon the bank to wait for him. At last Whakatau came up out of the water again, and stepped on shore once more; then the people who were watching for him, all ran at full speed to catch him. When Whakatau saw them coming after him again, he cried out: 'You had better go and bring Apakura here, she is the only person who can catch me and hold me fast.'

When they heard this, one of them ran to fetch Apakura, and she came with him at once, and as soon as she saw little Whakatau, she called out to him: 'Here I am, I am Apakura.' Whakatau then stopped running, and Apakura caught hold of him with her hands, and she questioned him, saying: 'Whom do you belong to? And Whakatau. answered her: 'I am your child; you one day threw the little apron which covered you on the sands of the sea, and the god Rongotakawiu, my ancestor, formed me from it, and I grew up a human being, and he named me Whakatau.'

From that time Whakatau left the water and continued to live on shore. His principal amusement, as long as he was a lad, was still flying kites; but he understood magic well, and nothing was concealed from him, and when he grew up to be a man he became a renowned hero.

This second legend of the destruction by Whakatau-potiki of the house called Te Tihi-o-Manono, or Te Uru-o-Manono, is added because it differs consistently from the other, and is often alluded to in ancient poems.

Tinirau determined to attempt to avenge the death of his descendant Tuhuruhuru, and he thought that the best person to do this was Whakatau, whom he knew to be very skilful in war, and in enchantments, so he directed his wife Hine-i-te-iwaiwa to find Whakatau, and she went in search; when she reached a village near where she expected to find him, she asked some people whom she saw, where Whakatau was, and they answered her: 'He is on the top of yonder hill flying a kite.' She at once proceeded on her way until she came to the hill, and seeing a man there, she asked him: 'Can you tell me where I can find Whakatau?'--and he replied: 'You must have passed him as you came here.' Then she returned to the village where she had seen the people, and said to them: 'Why, the man upon the hill says that Whakatau is here'; but they told her that the man who had spoken to her must have been Whakatau himself, and that she had better return to him, and told her marks by which she might know him; she therefore returned, and he, after some time, when she showed him that she knew certain marks about his person, admitted that he was Whakatau; and he then asked her what had made her come to him, and she replied: 'Tinirau sent me to you to ask you to come and assist in revenging the death of my son; the warriors are all collecting at the village of Tinirau, but they fear to go to attack this enemy, for it is the bravest of all the enemies of Tinirau.' Whakatau then asked her: 'Have you yet given a feast to the warriors?'--and she said, 'Not yet.' He then spoke to her, saying: 'Return at once and when you reach your village, give a great feast to the warriors; give them abundance of potted birds from the forest, but let all the oil in which the birds were preserved be kept for me; as for yourself, do not go to the feast, but, decking your head with a mourning dress of feathers, remain seated close in the house of mourning.' Then Hine-i-te-iwaiwa at once returned to Tinirau, to do as she had been directed.

Shortly after his visitor had left him, Whakatau called aloud to his people, saying: 'Let the side-boards be at once fresh lashed on to our canoe, to the canoe of our ancestor of Rata.' His men were so anxious to fulfil their chief's orders, that almost as soon as he had spoken they were at work, and had finished the canoe that very day, and dragged it down to the sea; when night fell, six of his warriors embarked in it, and Whakatau made the seventh; they then paddled off, following a direct course, until they reached the village of Tinirau where they found Hine-i-te-iwaiwa seated in her house of mourning. Whakatau then asked her: 'Have the warriors all left yet?'--and she replied: 'They will not do it, they are afraid.' Whakatau then said to her: 'Farewell, then; do you remain here until you hear further from me.'

Whakatau and his men having re-embarked in their canoe, made a straight course for the place where was situated the great house called Te Tihi-o-Manono, and they let their anchor drop, and floated there.

When the next morning broke, and some of the people of the village coming out of the house, and beyond their defences, saw the canoe floating at the anchorage, they gave the alarm, crying out: 'A war party! a war party!' Then the warriors came rushing forth to the fray in crowds, and arranged themselves in bands. Then stood forth one of their champions whose name was Mango-huritapena, and he defied Whakatau, who was standing up in his canoe, calling out: 'Were you fool enough, then, to come here of your own accord?'--and Whakatau answered him, by shouting out: 'Which of the arts of war do you consider yourself famous for?'--and Mango-huritapena shouted out in answer: 'I am a most skilful diver.' 'Dive here, then, if you dare', shouted out Whakatau in reply. Then the champion of the enemy gave a plunge into the water, and dived under it. just as he got right under the canoe, one of Whakatau's men poured the oil which Hine-i-te-iwaiwa had given them into the sea, and its waters immediately became quite transparent, so that they saw the warrior come floating up under the canoe, and Whakatau transfixed him with a wooden spade; so that champion perished.

Then forward stepped another champion named Pitakataka, and he defied Whakatau, shouting out: 'Ah! You only killed Mango-huritapena because he chanced to put himself in a wrong position.' Whakatau shouted out in reply: 'Which of the arts of war are you skilled in, then?'--and he answered: 'Oh! I leap so skilfully that I seem to fly in the air.' 'Then leap here, if you dare', answered Whakatau; and the champion of his enemies took a run and made a spring high into the air; but Whakatau laid a noose on the canoe, and as the warrior alighted in it, he drew it tight, and caught him as a bird in a springe, and thus slew that warrior also.

And thus, one after the other, he slew ten of the most famous warriors of his enemies; one whom he had seized, he saved alive, but he cut out his tongue, and then said to him: 'Now, off with you to the shore again, and tell them there bow I have overcome you all'; having done this, Whakatau retired a little distance back from the place, so that his canoe could not be seen by his enemies.

In the afternoon Whakatau landed on the coast, and before eating anything, offered the prescribed sacrifice of the hair and a part of the skin of the head of one of his victims to the gods; and when the religious rites were finished, he ate food; and having done this, he directed the people he had with him to return, saying: 'Return at once, and when you reach the residence of Hine-i-te-iwaiwa, speak to her, saying: "Whakatau told us to come, and tell you, that he could not return with us"';--and he further said: 'If heavy rain falls in large drops, it is a sign that I have been killed; but if a light, misty rain falls, and the whole horizon is lighted up with flames, then you may know that I have conquered, and that I have burnt Te Tihi-o-Manono'; he also said that 'he wished you to sit upon the roof of your house watching until you saw Te Tihi-o-Manono burnt.' Whakatau's people at once returned to Hine-i-te-iwaiwa to deliver the message he had given them.

Just before nightfall, Whakatau drew near the great house, called Te Tihi-o-Manono, and as the people of Whitinakonako, a great chief, were collecting firewood at the edge of a forest, he stealthily dropped in amongst them, pretending to be collecting firewood too; and as they were going home with their loads of firewood upon their backs, he managed to push on in front of them, and got into the house first with a long rope in his hand: one end of this he pushed between one of the side posts which supported the roof, and the plank walls of the house, and did the same with every post of the house, until the rope had gone quite round it, and then he made one end of it fast to the last post, and held the other end in his band.

By this time the people who lived in the house all came crowding in to pass the night in it, and soon filled it up: the house was so large, and there were so many of them, that they had to light ten fires in it.

When their fires had burnt up brightly, some of them called out to Mango-Pare, the man whom Whakatau bad saved alive, and whose tongue he had cut out: 'Well, now, tell us what kind of looking fellow that was who cut your tongue out'; and Mango-Pare answered: 'There is no one I can compare him to, he was not like a man in the proportion of his frame.' One of them then called out: 'Was he at all like me? But Mango-Pare answered: 'There is nobody I can compare him to.' Then another called out: 'Was he at all like me?'-and another: 'Was he like me?'--until, at length, Mango-Pare cried out: 'Have I not already told you, that there is not one of you whom I can compare to him?

Whakatau himself then exclaimed: 'Was he at all like me? And Mango-Pare, who had not before seen him in the crowd, looked attentively at him for a minute, and then cried out: 'I say, look here all of you at this fellow, he is not unlike the man, he looks very like him, perhaps it is he himself.' But Whakatau coolly asked him again: 'Was the man really something like me? And Mango-Pare replied: 'Yes, he was like you; I really think it was you'; and Whakatau shouted aloud: 'You are right, it was I.' As soon as they heard this, all of them in a moment sprang to their feet. But, at the same instant, Whakatau laid hold of the end of the rope which he had passed round the posts of the house, and, rushing out, pulled it with all his strength, and straightway the house fell down, crushing all within it, so that the whole tribe perished, and Whakatau, who had escaped to the outside of the house, set it on fire, and Hine-i-te-iwaiwa, who was sitting upon the roof of her own house watching for the event, saw the whole of one part of the heavens red with its flames, and she knew that her enemies were destroyed. Whakatau, having thus avenged the death of Tuhuruhuru the son of Tinirau, returned to his own village.

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Legends of the Mist 1

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