Tiki is a god who in the dim long ago helped to build the world, and whose carved image is now supporting the middle pillar of the house. His eyes of pawa-shell, which once commanded in the ten Heavens and were full of fire and wisdom, glisten out of the silent twilight; they stare far, far into the darkness, which Hine-nui-te-po is slowly spreading over the world, Hine-nui-te-po, the Great Mother of Night, who at one time was young and beautiful, and gave life to Nature.
“Haere-mai, e te manuhire, Haere-mai” (“Welcome, stranger, welcome”), so speaks the old Tohunga; then, drawing his flax mat around him, he mutters: “Haere-mai”, and, after a long silence again, as if murmuring to himself, “Haere-mai”—but soon his eyes follow those of his ancestor again, gazing into the silence of the slowly descending night, the ancient goddess Hine-nui-te-po, the Great Mother of Rest. Wisdom dwells with the aged, and their muttering is the sign that their wisdom is ripe. Flying from the mouth of the old it becomes mother now and wife to the listening ear.
“Listen, my guest:
When man dies, he returns no more to the place which once knew him. Unlike the Daughter of Heaven, Te marama, the moon, which ever ascends to new life from the Spring of Living Water, man must die: he is devoured by Hine-nui-te-po, the Great Mother of Nature, the first among the gods; and man is her food.
Ha, hear now the story of Tiki, our Father, the Father of man!
When Rangi-nui, the great Heaven, and Papa-tu-a-nuku, the far-stretching earth, were separated from each other, then, my listener, the light shone over Papa-tu-a-nuku, the mother of Tiki, and he was the first man.
Ah, great was his longing for the power to spread himself out over Papa: father of mankind he wanted to be! Far, and far, and far he wandered over Hawaiki, searching and asking, and again and again he wandered forth over all Hawaiki, his heart full of longing.
Ah, my listener, full of longing was his heart.
At last he came to the river at Hawaiki known by the name of Wai-matu-hirangi, and from the depth of his desire he cried aloud: ‘Oh, daughter of Hawaiki, child of the murmuring water, tell me how I may become the father of mankind. Tell me where may I obtain the power and from whom?’