And, again, the tribal bards, lamenting over their dead, chant this centuries-old poem:
“Now like an angry gale,
The cold death-wind pierceth me through.
O chiefs of old,
Ye have vanished from us like the moa-bird,
That ne’er is seen of man.
O lordly totara-tree!
Thou’rt fallen to the earth,
And naught but worthless shrubs remain.
I hear the waves’ loud tangi