“Who is paddling my canoe along the river?
It is Hine, who takes my heart away from me!
O Rangi, send down thy dark clouds of rain,
That my dear love may not depart from me!—
O, I wish the water were heaped into waves
So my dear one will not go in haste from me.”
Honewaka is leader; standing in the middle of the canoe, in his hand the greenstone-mere, he is chanting mighty songs of encouragement to the oarsmen, and these are repeated by them whilst paddling to the music, and the canoe glides joyfully under chanting and merrymaking, between the cliffs with the overhanging tree-ferns and ratas.
Honewaka is a leader of great mana; he knows every ripple in the river, and he knows men. He knows where the canoe glides onward whilst the spirits of his men are not in the paddles, and he knows how to incite their spirits by powerful songs so that, when the rapids are fighting their strongest, the spirits of men uniting to their greatest strength in the paddles will be victorious.
There rushes a rapid.
The eyes of the leader commence to roll; his weapon shakes; his breath is short, as he sings: