In sailing they are not expert, having no art of going otherwise than before the wind: the sail is of netting or matt, which is set up between two poles that are fixed upright upon each gunwale, and serve both for masts and yards: two ropes answered the purpose of sheets, and were consequently fastened above to the top of each pole. But clumsy and inconvenient as this apparatus is, they make good way before the wind, and are steered by two men who sit in the stern, with each a paddle in his hand for that purpose.
Having said thus much of their workmanship, I shall now give some account of their tools: they have adzes, axes, and chisels, which serve them also as augers for the boring of holes: as they have no metal, their adzes and axes are made of a hard black stone, or of a green talc, which is not only hard but tough; and their chisels of human bone, or small fragments of jasper, which they chip off from a block in sharp angular pieces like a gun-flint. Their axes they value above all that they possess, and never would part with one of them for any thing that we could give: I once offered one of the best axes I had in the ship, besides a number of other things, for one of them, but the owner would not sell it; from which I conclude that good ones are scarce among them. Their small tools of jasper, which are used in finishing their nicest work, they use till they are blunt, and then, as they have no means of sharpening them, throw them away. We had given the people at Tolaga a piece of glass, and in a short time they found means to drill a hole through it, in order to hang it round the neck as an ornament by a thread; and we imagine the tool must have been a piece of this jasper. How they bring their large tools first to an edge, and sharpen the weapon which they call Patoo-Patoo, we could not certainly learn; but probably it is by bruising the same substance to powder, and, with this, grinding two pieces against each other.
Their nets, particularly their seine, which is of an enormous size, have been mentioned already: one of these seems to be the joint work of a whole town, and I suppose it to be the joint property also: the other net, which is circular, and extended by two or three hoops, has been particularly described, as well as the manner of baiting and using it. Their hooks are of bone or shell, and in general are ill made. To receive the fish when it is caught, and to hold their other provisions, they have baskets of various kinds and dimensions, very neatly made of wickerwork.
They excel in tillage, as might naturally be expected where the person that sows is to eat the produce, and where there is so little besides that can be eaten: when we first came to Tegadoo, a district between Poverty Bay and East Cape, their crops were just covered, and had not yet begun to sprout; the mould was as smooth as in a garden, and every root had its small hillock, ranged in a regular quincunx by lines, which with the pegs were still remaining in the field. We had not an opportunity to see any of these husbandmen work, but we saw what serves them at once for spade and plough: this instrument is nothing more than a long narrow stake sharpened to an edge at one end, with a short piece fastened transversely at a little distance above it, for the convenience of pressing it down with the foot. With this they turn up pieces of ground six or seven acres in extent, though it is not more than three inches broad; but as the soil is light and sandy, it makes little resistance.
Tillage, weaving, and the other arts of peace, seem to be best known and most practised in the northern part of this country; for there is little appearance of any of them in the south: but the arts of war flourish equally through the whole coast.
Of weapons they have no great variety, but such as they have are well fitted for destruction; they have spears, darts, battle-axes, and the Patoo-Patoo. The spear is fourteen or fifteen feet long, pointed at both ends, and sometimes headed with bone: these are grasped by the middle, so that the part behind balancing that before, makes a push more difficult to be parried, than that of a weapon which is held by the end. The dart and other weapons have been sufficiently described already; and it has also been remarked, that these people have neither sling nor bow. They throw the dart by hand, and so they do stones; but darts and stones are seldom used, except in defending their forts. Their battles, whether in boats or on shore, are generally hand to hand, and the slaughter must consequently be great, as a second blow with any of their weapons is unnecessary, if the first takes place: their trust, however, seems to be principally placed in the Patoo-Patoo, which is fastened to their wrists by a strong strap, lest it should be wrenched from them, and which the principal people generally wear sticking in their girdles, considering it as a military ornament, and part of their dress, like the poniard of the Asiatic, and the sword of the European. They have no defensive armour; but, besides their weapons, the chiefs carry a staff of distinction, in the same manner as our officers do the spontoon: this was generally the rib of a whale, as white as snow, with many ornaments of carved work, dog’s hair, and feathers; but sometimes it was a stick, about six feet long, adorned in the same manner, and inlaid with a shell like mother-of-pearl. Those who bore this mark of distinction were generally old, at least past the middle age, and were also more marked with the Amoco than the rest.
One or more persons, thus distinguished, always appeared in each canoe, when they came to attack us, according to the size of it. When they came within about a cable’s length of the ship, they used to stop; and the chiefs rising from their seat, put on a dress which seemed appropriated to the occasion, generally of dog’s skin, and holding out their decorated staff, or weapon, directed the rest of the people what they should do. When they were at too great a distance to reach us with a lance or a stone, they presumed that we had no weapon with which we could reach them; here then the defiance was given, and the words were almost universally the same,—Haromai, haromai, harre uta a patoo-patoo oge: “Come to us, come on shore, and we will kill you all with our patoo-patoos.” While they were uttering these menaces, they came gradually nearer and nearer, till they were close alongside; talking at intervals in a peaceable strain, and answering any questions that we asked them; and at intervals renewing their defiance and threats, till being encouraged by our apparent timidity, they began their war-song and dance, as a prelude to an attack, which always followed, and was sometimes continued till it became absolutely necessary to repress them by firing some small shot; and sometimes ended after throwing a few stones on board, as if content with having offered us an insult, which we did not dare to revenge.
The war-dance consists of a great variety of violent motions, and hideous contortions of the limbs, during which the countenance also performs its part: the tongue is frequently thrust out to an incredible length, and the eye-lids so forcibly drawn up, that the white appears both above and below, as well as on each side of the iris, so as to form a circle round it; nor is any thing neglected that can render the human shape frightful and deformed: at the same time they brandish their spears, shake their darts, and cleave the air with their patoo-patoos. This horrid dance is always accompanied by a song; it is wild, indeed, but not disagreeable, and every strain ends in aloud and deep sigh, which they utter in concert. In the motions of the dance, however horrid, there is a strength, firmness, and agility, which we could not but behold with admiration; and in their song they keep time with such exactness, that I have often heard above an hundred paddles struck against the sides of their boats at once, so as to produce but a single sound, at the divisions of their music.
A song not altogether unlike this, they sometimes sing without the dance, and as a peaceable amusement: they have also other songs which are sung by the women, whose voices are remarkably mellow and soft, and have a pleasing and tender effect; the time is slow, and the cadence mournful; but it is conducted with more taste than could be expected among the poor ignorant savages of this half-desolate country; especially as it appeared to us, who were none of us much acquainted with music as a science, to be sung in parts; it was at least sung by many voices at the same time.
They have sonorous instruments, but they can scarcely be called instruments of music; one is the shell, called the Triton’s trumpet, with which they make a noise not unlike that which our boys sometimes make with a cow’s horn: the other is a small wooden pipe, resembling a child’s nine-pin, only much smaller, and in this there is no more music than in a pea-whistle. They seem sensible indeed that these instruments are not musical; for we never heard an attempt to sing to them, or to produce with them any measured tones that bore the least resemblance to a tune.