CHAPTER X.
It is very remarkable that the New Zealanders attribute the creation of man to their three principal deities acting together; thus exhibiting in their barbarous theology something like a shadow of the Christian Trinity. What is still more extraordinary is their tradition respecting the formation of the first woman, who, they say, was made of one of the man's ribs; and their general term for bone is hevee, or, as Professor Lee gives it, iwi[[BL]] a sound bearing a singular resemblance to the Hebrew name of our first mother.
Carved boxes
Particular individuals and places would also seem to have their own gods. When the "Active" was in the river Thames, a gale of wind, by which the ship was attacked, was attributed by the natives on board to the anger of the god of Shoupah,[[BM]] the Areekee who resided in the neighbourhood. Kórro-korro, who was among them said that as soon as he got on shore he would endeavour to prevail upon the Areekee to propitiate the offended deity. When Marsden asked the people of Kiperro[[BN]] if they
knew anything of their god, or ever had any communication with him, they replied that they often heard him whistle. The chiefs, too, are often called atuas, or gods, even while they are alive. The aged chief, Tarra,[[BO]] maintained to one of the missionaries that the god of thunder resided in his forehead; and Shungie and Okeda[[BP]] asserted that they were possessed by gods of the sea.
The part of the heavens in which the gods reside is represented as beautiful in the extreme. "When the clouds are beautifully chequered," writes Kendal, "the atua above, it is supposed, is planting sweet potatoes. At the season when these are planted in the ground, the planters dress themselves in their best raiment, and say that, as atuas on earth, they are imitating the atua in heaven."
The New Zealanders believe that the souls of the higher orders among them are immortal; but they hold that when the "cookees" die they perish for ever. The spirit, they think, leaves the body the third day after death, till which time it hovers round the corpse, and hears very well whatever is said to it. But they hold also, it would seem, that there is a separate immortality for each of the eyes of the dead person; the left, as before-mentioned, ascending to heaven and becoming a star, and the other, in the shape of a spirit, taking flight for the Reinga. Reinga signifies, properly, the place of flight; and is said, in some of the accounts, to be a rock or a mountain at the North Cape from which, according to others, the spirits descend into the next world through the sea. The notion which the New Zealanders really entertain as to this matter appears to be that the spirits first leap from the North Cape into the sea, and thence emerge into an Elysium situated in the islands of the Three Kings. The submarine path to the blissful region of the New Zealanders is less intricate than that of the Huron of America:—
"To the country of the Dead,
Long and painful is thy way!
O'er rivers wide and deep
Lies the road that must be past,
By bridges narrow-wall'd,
When scarce the soul can force its way,
While the loose fabric totters under it."
In the heaven of the New Zealanders, as in that of the ancient Goths, the chief employment of the blessed is war, their old delight while on earth. The idea of any more tranquil happiness has no charms for them. Speaking of an assembly of them which he had been endeavouring to instruct in the doctrines of Christianity, one of the Wesleyan missionaries says: "On telling them about the two eternal states, as described in the Scriptures, an old chief began to protest against these things with all the vehemence imaginable, and said that he would not go to heaven, nor would he go to hell to have nothing but fire to eat; but he would go to the Reinga or Po, to eat coomeras, (sweet potatoes) with his friends who had gone before."
The slaves that are sacrificed upon the death of a chief, by his friends, are generally intended to prevent him from coming again to destroy them; but we find that on the occasion of a child having been drowned, the mother insisted upon a female slave being killed, to be a companion for it on its way to the Reinga.
Though the New Zealanders do not assemble together at stated times to worship their gods, they are in the habit of praying to them in all their emergencies. Thus, when Korro-korro met his aunt, as before related, his brother Tooi informed Nicholas that the ejaculations the old woman uttered as she approached were prayers to the divinity. When Korro-korro urged Marsden to take his son with him to Port Jackson, and was told by that gentleman that he was afraid to do so lest the boy should die, as so many of his countrymen had done when removed from their native island, the chief replied, that he would pray for his son during his absence, as he had done for his brother Tooi when he was in England, and then he would not die.
Tupee,[[BQ]] too, another of the Bay of Islands chiefs, Marsden tells us, used to pray frequently. When that gentleman lay sick in his cot, on the voyage home from his first visit to New Zealand, Tupee, who was with him, used to sit by his side, and, laying his hands on different parts of his body, addressed himself all the while with great devotion to his god, in intercession for his friend's recovery.
The priests, or tohungas, as they are called, are persons of great importance and authority in New Zealand, being esteemed almost the keepers and rulers of the gods themselves.
Many of the greatest of the chiefs and Areekees are also priests, as was, for example, Tupee, whom we have just mentioned. It is the priest who attends at the bedside of the dying chief, and regulates every part of the treatment of the patient. When the body of a chief who has been killed in battle is to be eaten, it is the priest who first gives the command for its being roasted. The first mouthfuls of the flesh, also, being regarded as the dues of the gods, are always eaten by the priest. In the case of any public calamity, it is the priest whose aid is invoked to obtain relief from heaven.
Marsden states that on occasion of the caterpillars one year making great ravages among the crops of sweet potatoes at Rangheehoo,[[BR]] the people of that place sent to Cowa-Cowa[[BS]] for a great priest to avert the heavy judgment; and that he came and remained with them for several months, during which he employed himself busily in the performance of prayers and ceremonies. The New Zealanders also
consider all their priests as a species of sorcerers, and believe they have the power to take the lives of whomsoever they choose by incantation. Themorangha,[[BT]] one of the most enlightened of the chiefs, came one day to Marsden, in great agitation, to inform him that a brother chief had threatened to employ a priest to destroy him in this manner, for not having sold to sufficient advantage an article which he had given him to dispose of. "I endeavoured," says Marsden, "to convince him of the absurdity of such a threat; but to no purpose; he still persisted that he should die, and that the priest possessed that power; and began to draw the lines of incantation on the ship's deck, in order to convince me how the operation was performed. He said that the messenger was waiting alongside, in a canoe, for his answer. Finding it of no use to argue with him, I gave him an axe, which he joyfully received, and delivered to the messenger, with a request that the chief would be satisfied, and not proceed against him."
Themorangha seems to have been particularly selected by these priests as a subject for their roguish practices, perhaps by way of revenge for the freedom with which he occasionally expressed himself in regard to their pretensions, when his fears were not excited. A short time before this, one of them had terrified him not a little by telling him that he had seen his ghost during the night, and had been informed, by the atua, that if he went to a certain place to which he was then about to proceed, he would die in a few days. He soon, however, got so far the better of his fears as, notwithstanding this alarming intimation, to venture to accompany Marsden to the forbidden district; and he expressed his feelings of contempt for the sacred order in no measured terms, when he found that at the expiration of the predicted period he was still alive.
He said that there were too many priests at New Zealand, and that they "tabooed" and prayed the people to death. Others, as well as the priests, however, are supposed sometimes to have the power of witchcraft.
Two of the missionaries, when one day about to land at a place a short distance from the settlement, were alarmed by nearly running the boat's head on three human bodies, which lay close together by the water's edge among some rushes; and upon inquiry they were informed that they were the bodies of three slaves who had been killed that morning for makootooing a chief, i.e. betwitching or praying evil prayers against him, which had caused his death.[[BU]]
A common method which the priests use of bewitching those whom they mean to destroy, is to curse them, which is universally believed to have a fatal effect. The curse seems usually to be uttered in the shape of a yell or song, so that the process is literally a species of incantation. Bishop Newton, in his commentary on the scriptural account of Balaam being sent for to curse the Israelites, says, "It was a superstitious ceremony in use among the heathens, to devote their enemies to destruction at the beginning of their wars; as if the gods would enter into their passions, and were as unjust and partial as themselves."
The demeanour of most of the New Zealand priests is something so entirely different from that observed by the ministers of religion in civilized countries that it is not surprising Rutherford should have failed to recognise them as belonging to that order.
Thus, we read of a priest who speaks of having killed, not by enchantment, but in the usual way, with his own hands, both a woman who had gone on board a ship contrary to his orders, and a man who had stolen some potatoes.
Another is mentioned as having one day introduced himself into the house of Mr. Williams, one of the missionaries, by springing over the fence, and then, when his rude conduct was reproved, stripping himself to fight with that gentleman. The same personage, who bore the venerable name of Towee Taboo,[[BV]] or Holy Towee, a short time after attempted to break Mr. Williams's door to pieces with a long pole; and when he could not accomplish that object, effected his entrance by leaping over the fence as before. What he now wanted, he said, was hootoo,[[BW]] or payment, for a hurt which he had given his foot in performing this exploit on the former occasion. When this strange demand was refused, he attempted to set the house on fire; and having collected a mob of his friends, would certainly have done so, had not another party of the natives come to the assistance of Mr. Williams and his family.
But one of the most remarkable among this order of men seems to be Tamanhena[[BX]], the priest of the head of the Shukehanga, who is believed to have absolute command over the winds and waves. Marsden met with this dignitary on his second visit to New Zealand; and found that, in addition to being a priest, he was in the habit of acting as a pilot, a profession with which the other suited very well, as by virtue of his sacred character he had the power of keeping the winds and waves quiet whenever he chose to put to sea.
Accordingly, Marsden went out with him in a canoe to examine the entrance of the river; Tamanhena assuring him, though it blew very fresh, that he would soon make both the wind and the waves fall.
"We were no sooner in the canoe," continues Marsden, "than the priest began to exert all his powers to still the gods, the winds, and the waves. He spake in an angry and commanding tone. However, I did not perceive either the winds or waves yield to his authority; and when we reached the head, I requested to go on shore."
Tamanhena wished very much to learn to pray like the Europeans, and said he should willingly give a farm to any missionary who would come to reside near him. He also promised that he would let Marsden hear his god speak to him; but when they got to the place where the conference was to be held, he discovered that the god was not there. Marsden, however, found him remarkably well informed on all subjects relating to his country and religion, and thought him, upon the whole, a very sensible man, making allowance for his theological opinions.
Cruise has, however, detailed some particulars of this venerable personage, whom he also met with a few months after Marsden had seen him, which grievously detract from his character for sanctity. He made the voyage with them in the "Dromedary" from the Bay of Islands to the mouth of the Shukehanga, but announced his intention of leaving them the day after their arrival.
"During his stay in the ship," says Cruise, "there certainly was nothing of a very sacred character about him; he was by far the wildest of his companions; and, unfortunately, on the morning fixed for his departure, a soldier having missed his jacket, there was so great a suspicion of the pilot's honesty, that the sentinel at the gangway took the liberty of lifting up his mat, as he prepared to go down the side, and discovered the stolen property under it.
"The jacket was of course taken from him; and as the only excuse he had to offer for his misconduct was that he had lost a shirt that had been given to him, and that he considered himself authorised to get remuneration in any way he could, he was dismissed without those presents which were given to the others. We were glad to see that his countrymen seemed to notice his conduct in the strongest terms of disapprobation; and the next day, when they were about to leave us, they seemed so determined to put him to death that they were requested not to do so, but to consider his having lost his presents, and his being forbidden ever to come near the ship, a sufficient punishment for his offence."
It is very remarkable, that, whenever a child is born in New Zealand, it is the invariable practice to take it to the tohunga, or priest, who sprinkles it on the face with water, from a leaf which he holds in his hand. It is believed that the neglect of this ceremony would be attended with the most baneful consequences to the child.
Much reverence is felt among the New Zealanders for dreams; and it is believed that the favoured of heaven often receive in this way the communications of the gods. We need hardly remark how universal this superstition has been. The reader of Homer will recollect the
[Greek: kai gar t onar ek Dios estin]
of that poet, and the [Greek: oulos oneiros], or evil dream, which, in the second book of the Iliad, Jupiter sends down to Agamemnon, to lure him to give battle to the Trojans in the absence of Achilles.
We must refer to Lafitau's learned work on the savages of America for an account of the notions which prevail among them as to divination by dreams. Dillon tells us that he found no way so effectual of repressing the importunities of his New Zealand friends, in any case in which it was inconvenient to gratify them, as assuring them he had dreamed that the favour they requested would turn out a misfortune to them. When some of them, for example, entreated that he would take them with him to India, he told them that he had dreamed that if they went to that country they would die there; and this at once put an end to their solicitations.
FOOTNOTES:
The Maoris and Hawaiians use the word "iwi" for a bone; the Samoans, Tahitians, and other islanders say "ivi."
Probably Tupa.
Probably Kaipara.
Tara.
Okita.
Tupi.
Rangihoua, in the Bay of Islands.
Kawa-kawa, in the same district.
Te Morenga, a chief of the Bay of Islands.
The maketu, which is correctly described here, was one of the most firmly established institutions in New Zealand in old times.
Tui Tapu.
Utu. This is another great institution amongst the ancient Maoris. It represents the principle of payment, an equivalent, a return, compensation, or satisfaction for injuries.
Tamihana.