So sudden and startling was the sound in that lonely place, that I half sprang to my feet. Though reason told me that what I had taken for a cry of distress was but the jugglery of air and water in the rock-crevices, I remained half erect, ready, at a repetition, to launch the boat to aid. It came again, more sorrow-laden, more piercing than before.
Puketawa must have divined my thoughts, for he laid his hand upon my arm.
"It is Heruini who cries for her lover," he said.
"Who is she?"
"Listen. This is her story as it has come down through the years from mouth to mouth of the 'Tohunga,'[2] even unto this day." And then he told me the following narrative:—
[2] Priests, who preserve the oral traditions of the tribes.
Ere the first of the Pakeha (white men) set foot in Aoa-te-Aroha (New Zealand), and before the tribes of the north were welded into one nation, Kokako was chief of Ngatitoa. Here, at Manaia, was the stronghold of the tribe. Their lands lay broad and fertile from Waikara in the west, through Parna, even to Tukaka in the north. Flanked on three sides by the sea and the precipice, the place was a strong one.
By the slope alone could the enemy approach, and that was guarded by the "pah," whereof, as you see, the wall and ditch remain to this day. Look also how the back of the "pah" is set against the rock face. Through the rock behind runs a steep path leading to the shelf below the crags. Narrow, walled by high rocks on either side, this path was also guarded by a stockade. Beneath the topmost crags is a cave. From the cave's mouth to the cliff edge the space is narrow—scarce a spear's length in width. Up this path, should the "pah" fall, the Ngatitoa could retreat, when all was lost, to the cave, where, in the floor, there was a pool of water.
Before that time of which I speak the Ngatitoa was a tribe numerous and warlike. Now, half the fighting men had fallen in long wars, and the tribe was much weakened. Yet was Kokako still a great chief, and five hundred warriors followed him to battle.