XVII
THE COMING OF THE MAORI.
A long double sailing-canoe, with a connecting platform and a thatched deck-house amidships, put off one day long ago into the Great Ocean of Kiwa from the palm-clad shores of Tahiti the Golden, in the far South Seas. A multitude of brown people stood on the shining beach, with loud cries bidding farewell to the brave band of kinsmen who were adventuring into the vast unknown places in search of a new and wider land. In their midst, leaning on his staff, was the patriarchal chief Hou-mai-tawhiti. Bent by the weight of years was the ancient man, and his long white beard swept his breast. And as the canoe-paddles took the water and she gathered way, a voice of Hou’ was heard crying his poroporoaki, his farewell to the crew. “Go! Go! Depart to your new land. Leave war and strife behind you. Follow not after the God of War; hold to the deeds of Rongo the Peaceful. Haere! Haere! Haere atu ra!”
And then the sails of the great canoe were hoisted, the foresail, the main and the mizzen, for she had three masts—lofty triangular mat-sails with the apex downwards. Like a huge sea-bird she swept across the blue lagoon to the reef-opening; then she bravely mounted up on the great ocean-rollers, te-whare-hukahuka-a-Tangaroa (“the sea-god’s foamy dwelling”). The brisk trade-wind filled her sails, and away she bounded into the south-west, growing smaller and smaller—a mere speck upon the great waters, until she faded from the vision of the keenest watcher on the shore.
This was the Arawa, most famous of all the historic fleet of canoes that voyaged thousands of miles across the Pacific to this new land Ao-tea-roa, the Great White World. Her commander was Tama-te-Kapua (Son of the Clouds), the son of the venerable Hou-mai-Tawhiti. And of Tama’s doings and the perils that befell the Maori Mayflower I shall briefly tell.
Tama-te-Kapua was a bold and cunning man. He invited the high-priest Ngatoro-i-Rangi on board the Arawa to perform the sacred rites appropriate on the occasion of putting to sea, and then refused to allow him on shore again. He carried him off across the ocean to be the Arawa’s priest, knowing that Ngatoro’ was under the protection of the atuas and ancestral spirits of the race, and that he was indeed almost a god in himself.
While crossing the ocean in search of the new land Ao-tea-roa, Tama-te-Kapua clandestinely gained the affections of the lady Kearoa, the wife of Ngatoro-i-Rangi, who had accompanied her husband. When Ngatoro’ discovered this, he resolved to destroy the canoe and all that were on board. So to this end he directed the bow of the Arawa straight towards the Waha-o-te-Parata, the Mouth of the Sea-monster, a terrible whirlpool, or maelstrom, in mid-ocean, which had sucked down many a vessel to destruction. The sea-battered craft entered the outer circle of the maelstrom, swiftly approached the fatal spot where the Ocean God drew down the waters with an awful, roaring noise. The people in their terror cried to Ngatoro-i-Rangi to save them, but he heeded not. Then stood up Ika, one of the chiefs on board, and recited a karakia to Rangi, the Sky God, praying him to save the canoe, te-kaokao-o-Tane, the ribs of Tane the Tree God, and beat down the angry waves of Tangaroa.
But the ears of the gods were closed, and downwards surged the Arawa. The roaring of the Waha-o-Parata grew more terrifying, and the men and women and children on board cried again to Ngatoro-i-Rangi to save them. And the high-priest rose, and in a wild chant he invoked Tangaroa the Ocean God, and called upon many a deified ancestral spirit. Loud pealed his awa-moana, his rhythmic storm-assuaging incantation (beginning “Unuhia, unuhia te pou tapu, ko te pou mua, ko te pou roto”). He besought the gods to draw out the canoe from the dread tumult of water, the sacred canoe that once grew as a tree (pou-tapu) in the enchanted Forests of Tane—to save from the throat of the Ogre of the Depths the ship of Ngatoro’. He called upon the spirits of Ruarangi, of Maui-tiki-tiki-o-Taranga, to descend by the path of Tawhaki the God-man from the heavens, and “clear from perils all the ocean track of Ngatoro’.”
“O Ngahue!
Here am I in Parata’s Mouth.