To set forth the various uses of the verbal noun here would carry us beyond our limits. We shall therefore only give a few examples;—sufficient, however, we trust to lead the critical student into more extensive inquiry;
- Ko tona moenga tena, that is where he slept.
- Te pumautanga o te Whakaaro, the full assurance of hope; te whakangarungarunga o te wai, the troubling of the water.
- Te peheatenga i meatia ai, the manner in which it was done.
- Te patunga poaka, the place where the pigs are killed.
- Kahore aku kete kumara hei whakahokinga atu mo to puka, I have no basket of kumara with which to send back, (i. e., to pay for the loan of) your spade.
- I te hanganga o te ao, when the world was made.
- I ana inoinga, in his prayers, (i. e., when he prayed.)
- Ko tona kiteatanga tenei, this is the opportunity for looking for, or seeing, it.
- To tatou nuinga, the rest of our party.
- I taku oranga, while I live.
Note.—Instances will sometimes occur in which the simple root, or the verbal form, may be indifferently used in the sentence. The critical student, however, will generally be able to see the reason; e. g., te here o tona hu, the thong of his shoe; te herenga o tona hu, the holes, &c., by which the thong is fastened.
Proper Names should, perhaps, have been classed under the head of derivative nouns.
They are epithets arbitrarily assumed, as among the Hebrews, from some circumstance, quality, act, or thing. Sometimes they are simple; e. g., ko te Tawa, Tawa (a tree). Sometimes compound; e. g., Tangikai, cry for food. They are generally known by a prefixed; when a is not prefixed, by the context.
Note.—Sometimes we meet with English appellatives employed as appellatives in Maori, but with the form peculiar to proper names; e. g., a mata, the mistress; a pepi, the baby; a tekawana, the governor. These, however, must be regarded as solecisms, and as in no way supported by Maori analogy.[9]
We sometimes also meet with a Maori proper name employed as an appellative; i. e., If an individual of a particular district has been remarkable for any quality, his name will often be predicated of any other in whom the same feature of character is discernible: thus, Ropeti, of Waikato, was remarkable for making a great show of hospitality:—hence, to any person else who has been detected acting in a similar way, it will be said, Ko Ropeti, There is Ropeti.
As all these terms are necessarily limited in their use to a particular district, we need not notice them further.
OF GENDER, NUMBER, AND CASE.
Maori, we may premise, admits of no such thing as declension by inflection, i. e., by a variation of the ground form. All the relations, it is capable of expressing, are denoted by words, or particles, prefixed or post-fixed to the noun.