1885 - White, John. Maori Customs and Superstitions [Lectures from 1861] - PART II. Priesthood, Witchcraft and War, p 132-183

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PART II.

In the first part of this paper, on the superstitions of the Maori race, we gave the principal details of their belief in the creation and the flood; then slightly noticed the different migrations to this country; and concluded by noticing certain of their ancient ceremonies, to one of which we would particularly recall attention, namely, the initiatory rites of priesthood, as being immediately connected with the subject which is to engage our attention this evening, viz., "Maori Priesthood, Witchcraft, and War." Much that we shall relate of their ceremonies is unavoidably absurd, and especially the incantations, the language of which to a cultivated mind is extremely nonsensical. Yet even these absurdities will no doubt cause a Christian heart to feel regret that a people endowed with such minds as the New Zealanders should have been held for so many generations in a labyrinth of superstitions so servile in practice and so degrading in their tendency. It may be said that the New Zealander of the present day--he who walks our streets with the produce of his own industry on his back, complying as far as possible with the

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usages and language of the Europeans--does not resemble in manner or appearance the people whose superstitions and customs we shall give this evening. The savage who will pass in review before us would not on any account go near our cook shops, nor would he come near a baker's the air passing such would bear pollution with it, and such a feeling of horror as in many cases to cause death. That the New Zealanders were bound by a superstitious dread to observe omens we shall have ample proof. It was not the chiefs and priests alone who were superstitious: the whole Maori race, from the child of seven years of age to the hoary head, were guided in all their actions by omens; nor was it the chiefs and priests alone who had a knowledge of the incantations: the people in general were well acquainted with some of them, which they used for certain purposes, repeating them without the assistance of the priest. Of these we shall proceed at once to give a few examples. For instance, if, while men are on a voyage from settlement to settlement, one of the party, in changing the paddle from side to side, accidentally lets the outer end of it come into the canoe, it is an omen of an abundance of food to be given to them on their arriving at their destination. Again, in travelling, if the feet get filled between the toes with fern this is also an omen of food in abundance; but on their arrival, to ensure this omen's fulfilment, this incantation is repeated: "Omen of sweet food, hold: go thou to the hangi (oven), that I may arrive ere it be opened." But there are counter-omens to this. If anyone feels hungry when food is cooking it is an omen that strangers are on the road. Hence the proverbial warning repeated by such, that the people of the settlement may partake at once of the food by themselves: "Though partly raw, it is wholly our own; if fully cooked, we shall get but a part." Again, if a person's chin itches, this implies that they are shortly to partake of something oily, such as fat, eels, dog, rat, or whales' blubber. Also, if a party travelling should hear the bird called "tiraueke" cry to their right hand, this tells something of feasting; or if to the left, of war or murder. Let it not be supposed that the

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neglected, decrepit old female slaves were deficient of omens in their unsophisticated art of cooking; for if one of them wishes to know to a minute when the hangi (oven) is done, at the same time she covers it up she will tie a "taro" to a piece of flax and bury the "taro" on the top of the oven; she then sticks a twig in the ground, and bending it towards the bit of flax, she fastens it to the bent stick. When the food is cooked, the stick will pull the "taro" up.

These may suffice as specimens of the general and ordinary belief of the common people in omens. If any more remarkable event took place, it was the business of the priest to expound its import. He was the guide of the people in almost all their concerns; in his hands was the direction of the policy of the tribe; nothing, in fact, save the ordinary actions, could be done without him. His office was five-fold: he was seer, physician, and general, also sorcerer, as well as priest. As priests, they had to conduct all ceremonies; as seers, by dreams and divinations they foretold the issue of events, and held conversation with the spiritual world, in songs taught them by spirits, shadowing forth the future. Songs thus taught were called "mata kite" (second sight). As wizards, by their incantations they bewitched those who might have given them or others offence; as physicians, they cured the sick by incantations; as generals, they led and determined the movements of war. The priests as such are sacred, and everything they use or touch--in fact, the merest trifles in all their movements--are sacred. Also the priest drinks out of the palm of his hand, and the water is poured into it from a calabash, for the calabash is not allowed to come near his lips, lest it may have been in a cook-house, or near cooked food, to touch which would be an insult to his gods, who would therefore cause his death. The place where he thus drinks is sacred because a portion of the water falls necessarily on the ground; but this must be prevented as much as possible, often to the great personal inconvenience of the priest, for on the amount of water spilled depends the duration of the sacredness on the ground. A slave may thus often revenge himself

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upon a tyrannical or cruel master, for the latter cannot speak to bid his slave desist from pouring out the water, but make signs to him by elevating his eyebrows; as soon, therefore, as the slave expects the sign he is all at once attracted to look another way, while his priestly master, for fear of allowing too much water to run from his sacred hand upon the ground, is forced to continue drinking until his slave shall condescend to attend to his signal, and cease from pouring out from the calabash. The place where he sits is sacred, so also is his house and his fire. He will not eat food cooked in a large oven, nor will he light his own fire from a large one, as anything large is supposed to be common; nor will he take anything from the hand of another person, for fear of his hand coming in contact with a hand which has taken food out of an oven, which would enrage the gods, and cause his death. Anything given must be laid before him. In travelling, the spot and shed where a priest stops is holy, yet travellers passing that way may use the sticks which compose the shed for fuel, if they first take one of them from the top and burn it in a fire, which must be made from the firebrands left there by the priest. This fire, being sacred, will take the tapu from the wood composing the shed, and the power it might have to bewitch is thus removed. A priest must not carry cooked food when on a journey, except in a certain way; he must only eat in a certain attitude. When travelling on a war party, he will carry cooked food for himself in a basket in his hand; but when he eats he must unloose his belt, lest if his "mere" be in the belt or in his breast, as he lifts up the food to his mouth, and it go over his belt or "mere," it would be called an "aitua" (an evil omen), and cause the person and weapon to be powerless when in conflict. Again, a priest will not allow another person (layman or priest) to eat of what he has carried. This is the origin of the proverb, "Haere ana Rangipo, haere ana Raeroa" (Rangipo went, and also Raeroa). These were priests of Waikato who were on a journey together. Rangipo took food, and Raeroa did not, but asked his more thoughtful companion to give him to eat, which being refused,

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Raeroa died. The cooked food carried by a chief will not, in like manner, be given to a priest. And the women observe the same rule; for a chieftainess and a priestess were journeying from Hokianga to Takahue (now called Victoria Valley), having been betrothed respectively to two young chiefs of that district. The chieftainess had taken cooked food, of which the priestess desired to partake, for it was a two-days' journey; yet she was not allowed to eat of it, for fear, as her companion said, that she might repeat her incantations over it, and she (the chieftainess) thereby lose the affection of her intended husband. The secret incantations of the priest were endued with deadly efficacy; therefore priests were not allowed, as priest to priest, to curse or even insult each other. They are supposed to be protected by the gods, and at the same time they have gods at their command, who execute their will; yet, if the priests insult each other, these very gods are said to visit them with punishment. We will relate two anecdotes to illustrate these assertions. There lived in the Tamaki district two priests whose names were Koroti (which means to chirrup), and Nuku (distance), who were on a journey from Tamaki to Waikato, accompanied by a dog, on a road by which they had not before travelled. They did not know the distance to Waikato, and while going through the forest in the Wairoa, on a place called Te Hunua, Distance asked Chirrup how far it might be yet, both being equally ignorant of the road. The folly of this question made Chirrup pun on the name of his companion by saying, "It is such a distance, it will be night ere we get there." But so to use the name of any man was a curse of the kind called "tapatapa." This roused his indignation, and they went on in silence, till Chirrup, feeling fatigued, and having forgotten his joke, as thoughtlessly asked Distance when they should get to their destination. Distance pleased with an opportunity of retaliation, answered, "When the birds chirrup in the morning, then we shall arrive." Chirrup was so enraged that they openly cursed each other. Being priests, they ought to have had recourse to their gods for revenge, and not to have taken the law into their own hands; but

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their intemperate anger caused the gods to transform them into trees, the one into a "rimu," and the other into a "matai;" and their dog, having lain down where the quarrel took place, was turned into a large mound of earth, which to this day keeps the appearance of a dog lying down. There is one peculiarity about this mound: I found a peculiar species of fern growing on it, which I have not seen in any other part of New Zealand. To show the extent of the insult implied in thus using the name of a person as a word in any sentence in conversation, I would remark, that it is a custom with the Maoris, if a chief take for his name any word, or name of animal, weapon, or other object, his tribe at once must substitute some other word or name for that so taken by their chief; hence the origin of many of the provincialisms we meet with among the different tribes. For instance, a chief called himself "Tai" (the tide); at once the tide was called "ngaehe" (ripple). Another called himself "Mangumangu" (black); at once they called black "parauri" (dark). Again, another called himself "Poaka" (pig); a pig was thenceforward called "kuhukuhu" (grunter). Another called himself "Ahi" (fire); fire was then called "ngiha" (burning or blaze). One more example may suffice. Throughout New Zealand generally the Maori may fish for "hapuku" (cod fish), but not so at Hawke's Bay; there he must call his fish a "kauwaeroa" (long jaw), or else incur the penalties of "tapatapa," for profaning the name of the great chief who bears the former appellation. Should any one apply to the original object a name which has been thus taken by a chief, in his presence, it is considered an insult to him, and, as such, payment is demanded. This absurdity is carried so far, that if a rat gnaws unseen a fishing net or a garment, the person whose property is thus eaten will not say. "My net or mat has been eaten by a 'kiore,'" for fear the rat should hear his name used, and thereby be provoked to commit further depredations; but he would say, "My net has been eaten by the 'keroke'" (the fellow), a word used in this instance with no signification of reproach. Maori legends will furnish us here with an example of the danger that lay in

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even the hasty and inconsiderate insult of a priest. In ancient times there lived in the district of Whangarei a priest of the name of Manaia, whose wife, Maungakiekie, was also of priestly rank. Their family consisted of two daughters, with a slave, called Paeko. The whole account of them is voluminous; therefore, passing over the major part of the doings and sayings of this family, I would only notice their final fate. It should be said, by the way, that the elder daughter, having a taste for architecture, occupied a considerable portion of her time in constructing a wharf from which she could fish with a rod and line; but after she had laboured at it all the day, in the night the gods of her father replaced the stones in their original position, till, finding her work thwarted in this way every night, she gave it up in despair. Afterwards the whole family took a journey from Whangarei to the Bay of Islands, namely, Manaia, his wife, their two daughters, and the slave Paeko, who was carrying a calabash in each hand, and was accompanied by their dog. Before they started on this journey, Manaia and his wife had disagreed on some little matter of domestic life, and were in a very bad temper. They had crossed the river of Whangarei, and ascended a rugged mountain on the north side, where they all sat down fatigued with the ascent. Here the dispute between Manaia and his wife was renewed, till, very unlike a chief, he kicked her. The slave interceded for her; Manaia kicked him also down the hill, calabashes in hand. The dog shared the same treatment, till the gods, who had amused themselves by destroying the young woman's wharf, and by witnessing this scene, to end all family discord, and to be certain of punishing the offender, turned them all (the dog included) into huge blocks of stone. In sailing down the coast, four projecting rocks are to be seen to this day near the North Head of the Whangarei river, on the summit of a hill. These are Manaia, his wife, and his two daughters. On the southern declivity of this mountain is also seen a rock lying up and down the slope of the hill, near which there are two round boulders, and another of an oblong shape. These are the slave Paeko, the two calabashes, and his clog. A legend which

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will carry a moral for all heads of families who are litigiously inclined.

The eldest son is heir to the knowledge of priesthood and sorcery, yet there are exceptions to this custom. Priests in general will not teach those of another tribe their own incantations; yet this knowledge is sometimes imparted, provided the family whose eldest son is taught (and he alone) enter into a contract that in all succeeding generations the descendants of the disciple shall pay a yearly tribute to those of the preceptor; this tribute consists of all sacred food, which, when thus set apart, is called "kai popoa." So also at baptisms, at funerals, and at exhuming, at the cutting of the hair, at the planting of the kumara, and at others of the more solemn ceremonies, a portion is set apart for the gods, as the supreme rulers; this is also "kai popoa" (the food of propitiation), and when rendered to a chief, is given as an acknowledgment of such supremacy, and is by him received as the representative of the indwelling gods. A further tribute also of all first fruits is exacted, the first of the kumara crop, the first fish caught in a new net, the first birds speared, the first rats caught, and the first of all sharks caught in the season, --in fact, the first and the choice of all the produce of the district where a family so adopted into the priesthood reside. Such districts have, not unfrequently, in time been claimed as the joint property of two tribes and the novice, from which arise many of the conflicting claims between the native tribes at the present day. Another may be adopted into the knowledge of the priestly office, so the eldest son may sometimes be excluded, although he has the prior right to its inheritance. I will relate two or three anecdotes to illustrate on what trifling ground he may be excluded from this portion of his birthright. A priest, on leaving his own for another settlement, showed to his wife two bundles of fern root, which he hung separately up in a certain part of the enclosure of the village, requesting that she would give one to his brothers (who were expected to arrive in his absence), and the other to their dog. On his return he learnt that his wife, by forgetting, had

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given to the dog the bundle intended for his brothers; and for this trifling mistake he left his wife, who shortly afterwards had a son, whom his mother called "Uenuku," but, having no one to teach him the mysteries, he was the son of a priest without the knowledge to which he was by birth entitled. To this clay, any chief who is deficient in the knowledge of the priesthood is called "Uenuku kuware" (Uenuku the untaught). When a priest teaches the ceremonies and incantations, he fasts all the day, and at night he teaches, repeating each "karakia" once only. The same person is not taught a second time, as it is asserted by the priests that if he forgets any of the incantations taught him, he has only to request the gods, and they will reveal them in a vision. The gods will not divulge anything but to those who have been a disciple of a priest; but should the priest himself forget a word in the incantations which he is teaching, it is a fatal omen, and tells of his own death: this is called the "pepa." The ceremonies observed before and after these lessons are in my former lecture, and therefore need not be repeated here; but I may observe that the priests, while teaching, stand in great awe lest the revealing of the sacred mysteries should cause their gods or their ancestors to kill them. One of the principal tutors was so terrified at the idea of having divulged so much to me (though the man was professedly a Christian), that he dreamt the spirits of his ancestors met him, each with an adze in his hand, and, passing him, each struck his adze into the ground; at each stroke, rats issued forth from the holes. This he interpreted, that for his divulging Maori secrets he was to be eaten alive by rats. After this dream, I could not get the old priest, for any consideration, to proceed with his teaching. Governor Sir George Grey, after much persuasion, got from Te Taniwha, one of the few natives in this province who recollected having seen Captain Cook, and was commonly known by the name of "Hooknose," two or three of his incantations. Shortly after, Government House was burnt. "Hooknose" firmly believed that the fire was caused by his gods, in vengeance for Sir George Grey having made him divulge his incantations.

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We proceed now to speak of the prophetic office of the priests. As seers, future events are within their knowledge; for it is supposed that one of the principal gods resides within a seer, and that there are many others who attend him in all his movements. Any insect that may light upon the garments of a seer is supposed to be one of his gods; and once myself, in company with a priest, I noticed a spider crawling up his arm on to his head, and when I called his attention to it, the man replied that it was one of his gods. The chief Kiwi, whose tribe occupied Mount Eden, was slain in a pitched battle at the Whau by the Ngatiwhatua, and on his own head being cut off, it is reported that a small lizard was found on the back of his neck, which was said to have been the god "Rehua," who resided there as the protector of the tribe Tainui, of which Kiwi was chief. Other priests and seers have a god in their breasts in the form of a pebble (called "whatu"), which at their death is taken by the next of kin, and is so handed down through generations. They have not any set rules by which to interpret dreams; but according to the expedition on which they are engaged, the object of it will give a clue to divine the meaning. An evil dream is called a "kotiri;" to dream of death or wounds, of weeping, or eating disagreeable food, means death. For example, a short time before the Heke war broke out, Tamati Waka dreamt that he was walking near the seaside, when a lobster leapt out on to his hand; he bit off one of its claws, and let it go. This was ominous of war. Again, a Ngapuhi seer named Hemi Mete (James Smith), immediately before the same war, dreamt that he was fishing on a hill called Te Ahuahu, near to the pa which was afterwards attacked by the troops: he fished not in the water, but on shore, and the fish he caught was a European female. This he spoke of as an omen of strife between the Natives and Europeans. The seers not only foretell coming events, but have visions of incidents transpiring in distant places at the time of the vision. One anecdote will suffice for this. An old man (seer), of the name of Nakahi, residing in Hokianga, dreamt that he saw on the West Coast two canoes and the god Te-ata-o-te-rangi,

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and that he saw the wreck of them. In one was Mohi Tawhai, the well-known chief of Waima, in Hokianga, in imminent danger of drowning; and but for the intervention of Nahaki and of his god, Tawhai himself would have shared the fate of the others on board, and would have perished. It appeared afterwards in reality, that on the night of this dream a gentleman in company with Mohi Tawhai was coming from Auckland to the Bay of Islands, and was caught in a heavy gale, which that gentleman said he did not expect the vessel would have been able to outlive. About dawn the gale subsided, and they arrived in the Bay. Is it any wonder that the natives are so superstitious when an old man accidentally dreams of things so strikingly corresponding to what is then actually taking place; and not only of the circumstances, but also the name of the person so positively stated? A subject closely allied to the foregoing is that of the "Matakite" (a second sight), analogous in some respects to the Scotch Highlanders', but differing in this important point, that the Maori priest voluntarily courts the prophetic trance. We will give but two instances. A priest named Kaiteke was leading a war party in their canoes from the Bay of Islands to attack the Kaipara natives, unaware that the natives of that district were awaiting him with the intention of fighting at Mangawhai. Encamping for the night on shore, he invoked the gods to reveal to him his success by "matakite," using the same ceremonies to himself which were described in our former Lecture as being observed when the priest watches over the sleep of his disciple to see if he will become adept in the mysteries he is about to learn. In the trance Kaiteke saw a company of spirits dancing before him and singing--

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This he explained to his men on rising from his trance. The line, "Trees are seen in the blood-red clouds," were the enemy waiting for the battle; the "small summer birds" were the enemy in their flight after the defeat. The two parties met as thusforetold, a battle was fought at Mangawhai, where many of bothsides fell; the Kaipara tribes were forced to fly into the Waikato district, the invaders being conquerors. Our second specimen is the one which prophesied the capture of the famous Waikato pa, Matakitaki, by the Ngapuhi under the great Hongi Hika:--

In the last two lines the local allusion to the cave of Reinga marks at once the interpretation of the otherwise ambiguous oracle, and prophesies the victory of the Ngapuhi (the Northern tribe).

The gods even inspire animals with the power of knowing future events. Before the battle at Rotoiti, between the tribes of Heke and Waka, a chief called Te Kahakaha was sitting with Heke in a hut, when a dog came and barked at him. This was thought to be a warning of his death: he fell the next day, and it was said the god Te Nganahau (the god of death and evil) inspired the dog, thus telling Te Kahakaha of his doom. When going into battle, if men feel a creeping of the flesh in any part of the body, they are to be wounded in those parts; if they feel a warm air pass over them, which causes them to perspire, they are to die. Such omens to men are called "aitua," and to ani-

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mals "pawera." Lest animals intended to be hunted should feel the "pawera," the natives in olden times never determined to hunt before the day on which they started for the chase. Three young chiefs, whose mother was a priestess, in defiance of this rule, determined in the night to go to a certain place to hunt. The old lady overheard them agreeing to start the next day, and told them that as they had determined beforehand, the pigs would certainly be "pawera," and so go from the place. They, however, went, and failed to catch one. A few days afterwards the priestess told them to go to the same place and they would catch a pig. They went, and did so. Now in this case the mother was so feeble by age, that she could not have gone to the place where the pigs were; therefore it was believed her gods had enabled her to give such positive information. A European, who was in the camp at the time the troops were mustering to march against Heke's pa at Okaihau, states that when the native allies saw the litters brought, and that too to accompany a body of living men to battle, that one and all said "great would be the mischief which would follow on such an evil 'aitua.'" That evening he (the European) again passed through the camp where the dying and wounded were. The natives observed what a number of men were wounded, but added, "These men have brought this upon themselves; they consigned their bodies to death while they were alive by taking those litters with them."

All that a seer has is sacred, and partakes of the influence of his gods, and any violation of his property is therefore visited with their vengeance. For example, there lived in Waikato a seer, whose wife also was a prophetess; these, after having been married for many years, at last quarrelled, and the wife took her dog with her, and left Waikato, and went down near Kawhia, and along the West Coast, passing through Taranaki, till she arrived at a settlement of the Ngatiruanui, and there she became the wife of a chief, whose name was Porou. For some reason (now forgotten) the Ngatiruanui killed and ate her dog; but for this sin (for it was a prophetess' dog) the gods laid upon the

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tongues of all the people this curse: "That, whenever they spoke they should bark like the dog they had killed." To this day this branch of the Ngatiruanui retain the curious provincialism of commencing every address, every question, and every answer, with the syllable "ou, ou," and they are hence, in allusion to the legend, distinguished by the name of "Ngatikuri," "Sons of the dog."

We will conclude this portion of our subject with a few anecdotes from the history of the Northern war. While our troops and those of our allies were lying before the pa of Ohaeawai, an old seer within the pa, who could not speak one word of English, announced that he was attended by the European gods, so that he could foretell the fate of the English forces, as well as of his own people. His prophecy was, of course, delivered in a kind of gibberish, which was interpreted by Pene Taui, the chief of Ohaeawai, who understood English, as follows: "The gods spoke by the seer, and said, 'No one must smoke a pipe while standing, and two shillings and sixpence will be killed.'" Now it did so happen that, on the same day when this prophecy was delivered, a cannon shot entered the pa, killed a woman and her child, and, continuing its course, took off the leg of a man, who died in the course of the day. These two adults and child were the two shillings and sixpence in the oracle. How far either the priest or his interpreter (Pene Taui) believed themselves is very questionable, but they required the people to believe implicitly; and if they reposed any faith in their own prophecy, it is only one of many instances where the extent to which a man practised in deceiving others may end in imposing upon himself. Again, on the morning when the troops were preparing for the attack upon Ohaeawai, this same Pene Taui took a leaf of an English Bible, and loading his gun with it, fired it up to heaven at the moment of the assault; "For," said he, "the God in heaven was the author of the Bible, and was the defender of the Europeans," and the best way to obtain His protection for themselves instead was to send a leaf of His own book to implore His aid. One morning at daybreak Mohi Tawhai (one of the bravest of our allies) went out of the camp, and in-

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advertently got within fifty yards of an ambush party of ten men sent out of the pa to reconnoitre. Mohi was next in rank and command to Tomati Waka, and his death would have given no small credit to the man who might kill him; but not one of the ten could pull the trigger of his gun at him; they all lay on the ground, looking at one another, wondering what spell restrained them, and Mohi returned unmolested to the camp. The men themselves told me this afterwards, and accounted for it on the ground that as Mohi was a firm believer in the Christian God, and every Sabbath taught his people out of the Word of God, the God in whom he so believed had held their hands from pulling the triggers at him, His worshipper.

Residing within the pa at this time was a priest from Hawaii, who assumed to himself the power of charming the life of any person from cannon shot and musket balls by chewing a piece of stick and rubbing it over the man. Absurd as this may appear to a European, many of the natives in the pa believed in him, and through faith in his charms exposed themselves fearlessly to the firing of our troops; nor was it until they had fallen that the rest awoke to the murderous imposition practised on them. Another impostor, named Papahurihia, promised by the aid of his gods and the power of his incantations to protect from the power of cannon shot a house built by his command in the pa of Ohaeawai, as a council chamber for the chiefs. The house was built, and eight chiefs were sitting in it when a cannon ball passed directly through it, shattering the muskets which were piled within. The seer said that some one had smoked a pipe inside, and his gods were angry. Another house was built with the same promise of protection; this was struck by a shell, and unroofed, and Papahurihia now attributed his failure to cooked food having been taken in the house, not perhaps in the hand but in the mouth, which would have the same effect in polluting the place. This second failure, however, was a death-blow to his pretensions, and the council house was not re-built.

We will now speak of the sorcerer and his witchcraft. The power possessed by the sorcerer of inflicting death upon such as

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had either insulted him or others, no doubt gave him great influence with the people, and few or no insults were offered to him; still it must be admitted that his life was only held on a precarious tenure; for it has frequently occurred that his nearest relation, even his own son or grandson (to say nothing of members of another tribe), would murder a man accused of bewitching one of their relations. We will give one or two anecdotes on this head, and then give one incantation from one of each of the different modes of divination; for the ceremonies differ according to the circumstances of the case.

In November last, while engaged in the Kaipara district, we came to a native settlement where, three days previous to our arrival, a young chief had died of consumption, of which disease his brother and sister were also dying. The natives of this district had for more than fifteen years observed all the outward forms of Christianity, yet on retiring to our tent we overheard them relating to the chiefs who accompanied us the cause of the young man's death, which of course was the result of witchcraft; the proof of this was, that about three months previous to his death the young man and an elderly chief were jointly cultivating a piece of ground, when they had some trifling dispute respecting it. The younger asserted that the crop of wheat would not grow for want of drainage, and that it would be washed away; to which the elder replied, "You will never see it." Shortly afterwards the young man, on an excursion with his brother and sister, got very wet with rain, and being of consumptive tendency, all three took colds, the cause of death to him, and most likely to prove fatal to the other two. When the young chief died, the words uttered by the old man were remembered, and were considered an indisputable proof that he had bewitched the whole family on account of the words the one had uttered to him in conversation in the plantation. Formerly the sorcerer might not have escaped so well; for in the year 1844 a slave and his wife were killed in Hokianga for the supposed crime of witchcraft. These two poor beings had been taken from the Rotorua tribes, in the wars of the noted cannibal Hongi Hika,

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and as the Rotorua people are noted for their knowledge of sorcery, these two slaves of course must share such knowledge. Most of the principal chiefs of the Hokianga district having died in the space of five years, these slaves were charged with having bewitched them, and on the mere supposition they were put to death. Even in these days of comparative civilization of the Maori, the lives of the nearest relatives are sometimes sacrificed to the still strong belief in these Satanic rites, and for the supposed crime of witchcraft murder is still perpetrated. Since November last there have been no less than four such murders, one of which took place within a few days' journey from this city. In that month a man named Hakaraha was killed at Rotorua by a person of the name of Hura, who supposed the other had bewitched his wife Roka. It appears that Hakaraha and Roka had not been on friendly terms, and that he had said, "May earth be laid on Roka;" shortly after which the woman died. Hakaraha's wish was sufficient evidence to warrant his seizure and execution, which took place accordingly. At Whaingaroa, in September last, an old man and his wife were strangled for the imputed death of a chief's son, one of the executioners having been baptized, as also the victims. The old man and his wife had been taken slaves by the Ngatihourua tribes from the Ngatikahungunu in Hawke's Bay; and chiefs having died in the tribe of their masters, these two were accused of sorcery, and sold to the Ngatimahanga for a gun. Whilst among them, a son of the chief William Naylor having quarrelled with his own wife, had thoughtlessly kicked her arm, which the two slaves bathed with warm water: while doing so it is supposed they uttered the incantations of witchcraft against the husband. Shortly afterwards he died, when the slaves were summoned to appear before a superstitious semi-cannibal assembly of men, women, and children, who constituted themselves judges, jury, and witnesses--judges without the knowledge of the rights of man, jury reckless and utterly incapable of estimating the value of human life, and witnesses devoid of any evidence but the mere presumptions of superstition. The prejudged vic-

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tims, being by these questioned as to their knowledge of witchcraft, repeated the incantations for a curse. This was sufficient. They were ordered to forget such knowledge, which they could not promise. They were then told "they were given up to the evil world, the dark world, and to wickedness." This was understood by the young men; and accordingly, a few days afterwards, while the poor old man and his wife were cooking their evening meal, unconscious of their fate, two men, named Wapu and Hakopa, entered the hut and strangled them. Shortly after this, and even nearer to Auckland, an old man named Ruharuha was murdered at Waiuku by his own grandson, Pita Te Whareraukura. Pita's wife had died, and a short time previous to her death he (Pita) had quarrelled with the old man about the land, and therefore he threw the blame of her death upon his grandfather's incantations, and on this supposition he shot him.

All these cases were spoken of by the majority of the Maori people as just, and as such the murderers were not thought the less of by their own tribes. I will make but little comment upon these facts. They speak for themselves, and call upon us, by those feelings of pity and national benevolence for which England's sons in every land have been so noted, to assist in enlightening the ignorance and alleviating the consequent misery of so many of our fellow-mortals. Surely, being sons of such ancestors as ours were, we love to worship that God whom they served, and to reverence His name. Can we not devise some plan to assist the ministers, and help them on in the work of our Lord, so that these Satanic customs and superstitions may cease for ever, and such acts may not again be perpetrated in the very precincts of our city, endangering the whole community? Even if we take the lowest ground (the eternal danger of the actors in such scenes being left out), many men, who look upon the present moral condition of the Maori race, and see how strong a hold their heathenish and barbarous customs yet retain upon them, are tempted to conclude that the efforts of our missionaries for forty years have been of little avail in christianizing the people.

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But the Maori is an observant race, and they will compare practice with precept. When the European inhabitants of New Zealand were only scattered individuals, then missionary teaching, supported by example, had its full effect. The sin or the profanity of an individual produced but little impression on the Maori mind, for they knew that amongst themselves also there were evil men as well as good; but it is to the wickedness of our community that we must attribute the revival of heathenism. They have been taught to keep the Sabbath day holy, and they come into our streets and see it constantly profaned by drunkenness and other evils, and they turn and say to us, "England sent first her missionaries; they showed us the wickedness of our old evil ways; we believed them, and we put away the evil from us. But now England sends her people, and we see more sin amongst them than was ever in the midst of us. We had no marriage rite, yet were more faithful and moral than you who are bound with a vow in God's presence. It is your example, as a nation, that has taught us to revert to our old customs." Christian nations have amongst themselves a standard by which they are judged and weighed; a Christian people in the presence of a heathen race are watched more closely still, and their example is of still greater influence. It is by our example as a people that we can the most surely help forward the work of the Almighty; and certainly He will not fail to visit us accordingly; for "righteousness exalteth a nation, but sin is the destruction of many people."

We will now give the ceremonies and incantations of witchcraft. As we have before stated, there are many degrees of a Maori curse, and this being mostly the cause of a person being bewitched, a few specimens of them will not be out of place. There are three principal degrees; viz., the "kanga," the superlative curse, as "Upoko kohua (skull to cook in) or "Upoko taona" (cooked head); the "apiti," as "To upoko ko taku ipu wai" (your head is the calabash from which I drink); "Ko taku tirou kai o wheua" (my fork is your bones). The distinction between these two degrees may not be at first glance visible to

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many present. The "kanga" is an actual wish that the devoted man may be eaten; the "apiti" (or literal comparison) is only likening of the bones to a fork, and the skull to a calabash. There is also the lower degree, "tapatapa," which is by calling the name of any animal or thing after a person; for instance, prompted by feelings of loyalty, we call our ships after our beloved Queen, which is to a Maori a "tapatapa," which blood alone could atone for; and what to him is still worse is that the very sixpence which we give for a loaf of bread bears on it the likeness of our Queen. This is utterly unintelligible to his superstitious mind, that we who are so wise should sell the likeness of our Queen for cooked food, a curse upon her sufficient to require the lives of a nation to atone. The curse of tapatapa is very frequently taken advantage of by a covetous chief to seize on anything belonging to a slave, such as a canoe, a spear, or mat, a fine dog, or a fat pig. All that was required to deprive the slave of his property was, any chief should call it after himself or any of his limbs, when the owner must surrender it.

We have said before that it was not sufficient to avenge the insult of a curse; its effects also must be expiated. The ceremonies used for this purpose by the natives differed according to the several degrees we have defined above, of kanga, apiti, and tapatapa. If the malediction were by kanga, then the priest would go with the man who had been thus cursed (each unclad) to a running stream, and making mounds of earth beside it, the priest sticks a twig of tangeo into the bank; then they immerse themselves in the water, the priest repeating this incantation, while the gods are supposed to come and rest upon the mounds, and dance upon the twig thus set up:--

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This done in the water, they return now to the settlement, and some little distance from it they sweep a place clear of grass or weeds, as an arena upon which the gods and spirits may alight. While sweeping, this incantation, which is called the "Tahinga," is used:--

Within the open space the priest digs a hole about two feet long, which is intended for a grave for the spirits of those who cursed, and while digging it this incantation is repeated:--

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This done, and the grave finished, they put a twig of karamu on each side, and seat themselves on its brink, and take a shell of a freshwater mussel with which to scrape into the pit the spirits of those who uttered the curse, which have been already brought to the pit's edge. While doing this, again the priest begins:--

A narrow mound is then made all along the side of the pit, upon which the priest places stones named after those who used the curse, one for each, and says:--

This is repeated over every stone, and each time he comes to the name "Nuku" he strikes into the pit each stone to which it is addressed. The twigs are now thrown likewise into the grave; then he covers it in, and pats down the hillock with his hands. The next day they come there again, and weaving a basket which is of very small size, which is called "Paro taniwha" (god's basket), the priest again repeats:--

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The bodies of their enemies were buried in the twigs; the stones represented their hearts, cold and dead as they. Now their spirits are imprisoned in the basket, and being hung up on a stick above the grave, and squeezed by the hands of the priest, are thus offered to the gods, and chiefly to the goddess Raukataura, who is especially addressed to enlist the spirits of the female line of priesthood on their own side while weaving; also one of the party waves a mussel shell above her work to effect the same. On the third day, at a little distance from this pit, they build a hut, and make a mat, and lay it on the pit. They then make an effigy of Raupo, putting within it a stone to represent the heart, and laying it on the mat. This is called Whiro, They then address the figure:--

The mat and the effigy are lastly taken up and deposited in the hut, and the priest, standing at a little distance, asks, "Are you asleep, Whiro? Awake! awake! Are you awake, Whiro? The priest, answering for Whiro, says, "Oh yes, I am awake." He again asks, "Are you in your own house?" Again answering, he says, "Yes." "No, you are not. O Whiro, you are in the world. It is not your place of abode. Arise! arise! go thou to the gods in the depth of Nuku, to the worm, to the depths, to the dark world, to the evil, to the gods of power, to the end of evil." This concluding ceremony is called "Whakaoho," and the curse is finally removed from them, and transferred to him

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or them who uttered it. Yet all this is not enough if the original imprecation have derived additional power from having been uttered by a priest. In such a case the ceremonies above related are followed till the "marae," or consecrated area, has been swept; but then the priest makes a little mat, and while working it he says:--

This, resembling in all but size a common sleeping mat, is laid upon the ground, and upon it is placed a piece of stick with leaves tied round it for head, arms, and clothing. This stick stands for the representative of Raukataura. Then again he says:--

Then he builds over it, as it thus lies, a small house, and adds:--

The priest answers for the goddess, as though she were speaking:--

Here he listens, as though expecting an answer. There being no answer, he says:--

He then mentions the name of each one whom he intends should die by his witchcraft. Then taking in his hands a stick,

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he sets another against the end of the house to represent the door, and touching it with the one he holds in his hand, he proceeds:--

Then striking it a second time, he says:--

Again addressing the goddess Raukataura--

And here he repeats by name the principal relations of those whom he is bewitching:--

Repeating here the names of the men themselves against whom his sorceries are directed. This done, he turns the little effigy on its face, and says:--

All this is done to transfer the curse not only to the priest who uttered it, but also to his tribe; then all is left as it lies until there is a rumour of approaching war, and in the meantime, for the space of a whole year, the tribe will not cultivate the ground, but are supplied by their kindred tribes.

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The curse of the second degree, or "apiti," does not necessarily require the death of the offender for its extirpation; a less punishment may often satisfy the offended party. In any case the person aggrieved goes to the priest and repeats the curse; the priest then takes as many sticks as there are words contained in it, and makes an effigy of raupo; into this he puts these sticks, and for the heart he puts into it a sacred stone, called "okaka" (parrot food). This stone is said to be found by the "kaka" in the heavens, and when possessed by a flock of them, is carried by one bird for the rest to whet their beaks. This effigy is placed on one side of a running stream, and beside it the priest takes up his station; on the other side stands the sufferer, with a branch of koromiko stuck in the ground beside him. When all is ready, the priest bids the man spit into the stream, and catch the spittle in his right hand; he strikes it upon his own right cheek; upon this the spirit of the enemy is seen standing at the priest's left hand. He then bids the man assume a certain posture, varying according to circumstances. If cursed by a relative, and if death is exacted as the penalty, he reclines on his right side, and draws up both legs; if he will be satisfied with the infliction of pain, the right leg only is thus drawn up. If his enemy be no relation, yet one whom he does not wish to kill, he lies outstretched upon his back, and folds his hands across his breast; but for the doom of death he assumes the posture of a corpse, with his arms laid straight beside him. Then the priest repeats this incantation (while the spirit leaves his side, and takes its station on a stick pitched in the middle of the stream):--

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The priest now strikes the spirit down the stick with his hand into the water, and continues:--

Then the man leaves the stream, and roasting a fern root in a fire kindled by the priest, he touches the priest on the head and shoulders, and then gives it to him to eat. The tapu is thus broken, and both are polluted and unfit for further rites of sorcery. This is done lest any others should be bewitched by their encounter, and lest the secrets of the craft should be divulged. Another karakia accompanies the resumption of their garments; for had they touched cooked food without this precaution, the incantations of the priest would return upon his own head. So ends the ceremony, which must be concluded before day dawns or closes upon it. For three days afterwards they must both eat only the pohue (the root of the wild convolvulus) to ensure its complete success. Nor is this success in the least doubtful if they be left to their uninterrupted operations; yet if the offended man relent, and would avert the death thus menaced, it is still in the power of the priest to undo his work, and to effect a cure on the bewitched man by this karakia repeated over him:--

So saying, he spits on the sick man's forehead, and laying his hand upon him, says:--

These words complete the cure. To understand them we must refer to the legend mentioned in a former lecture of the sin of

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Maui in catching and beating the sun, and in his insult offered to Hinenuitepo, which occasioned his own death. If a curse were uttered against a priest, he would not speak at the time, but silently repeat the following incantation:--

Then returning home, he fasts three days, in order to ensure that the offender shall have eaten food, which will enhance the effect of his incantation. When he is certain of this, he has food cooked for himself, and taking part of it, he wraps it in a nikau leaf (New Zealand palm), with some hairs from his own forehead, and taking it to a running stream, he throws it in, saying:--

Then he returns, and while eating, lest he who cursed him should have bewitched his food, he repeats silently:--

This completes the charm against the offender. He is now doomed to certain death; and that the cause of it may be known, the spirit of the sorcerer will appear bodily at his funeral. The relatives then seeing and recognising it will go to a running stream, and, sitting on its brink, repeat this incantation:--

This charm precludes any future sorcery being exercised against the remainder of the family. Occasionally, however, instead of

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all these ceremonies, the priest, when cursed, will lay his left hand on the right side of his breast, and with the right hand catch the curse, saying aloud, "Aue taku upoko!" (Oh, my head!) for on the head dwell the principal gods, and they are thus called to punish the offender with death.

Before we give any specimens of the native doctor's craft we may be allowed to remark that he has more to encounter than falls to the share of any European physician. He not only requires a larger amount of faith in the efficacy of his own incantations, but he has to contend in every instance with that which a European doctor would pronounce not only the cause of sickness, but sure to result in death. A New Zealand patient will not remain in a house in the settlement; he will reside in a shed by himself in the scrub, a shed that cannot shelter him from the evening breeze, much less keep out the dew of night or the rain. He will also (if he eats at all, which is not often the case) have whatever he may wish; in fact, he is led by his appetite alone. If he has a fever, he will go and bathe; if he is consumptive, he will do the same. In many cases the Maori doctor had recourse to certain leaves and the bark of trees to assist his incantations. For a burn he used the inner bark of the rimu bruised into a pulp, or the ashes of the tussac grass sprinkled on the burn; for dysentery the kawakawa root was chewed. About six years ago, when the influenza was very rife in the North, one of the Maori doctors gave out that he had found a cure for the head-splitting disease, as it was called. It was a compound of roots, bark, and leaves of trees, with certain shrubs burnt together, the ashes of which were kneaded into a paste with hogs' lard. This he sold to his countrymen in balls the size of a common marble, charging £1 10s. for each. They were bought with avidity by timid persons, who, when they felt the least pain, in whatever part of the body it might be, made an incision in that part, and rubbed a portion of the compound into it. It was astonishing to see how many cures were effected by it amongst those in whose imagination alone the disease had existed. After a Maori doctor has made himself acquainted with the complaint of his patient,

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he decides as to the remedy. If he is suffering from the effects of witchcraft, he takes him to a stream, and sprinkles his naked body with water, repeating the following incantation over him:--

They then return to the settlement. The patient, now being more sacred than ever, is not to eat for three days, at the expiration of which he is supposed to be cured.

The following is to give sight to the blind. The priestly physician ties around his own waist the twigs of the kawakawa and karamu as an apron, and standing in front of his patient, who is sitting up, he waves a branch of one or other of the same shrubs before the man's face, saying:--

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The following is to cure any casual disease. If the priest has satisfied himself, after looking at the patient, that his sickness is not attributable to the influence of Makutu, he merely repeats this incantation, with certain contortions of his body, clawing the air with his hands over the patient, sometimes standing, sometimes sitting; but no certain rules can be given, for the ceremonies in this case are quite arbitrary on the part of the priest. Some of them never come near the patient, merely repeating the incantation while they are standing on the top of their own house, which is as follows:--

While repeating this he sticks a twig of karamu in the ground before the sick man, which he had previously held in his hand, and continues: --

The following is to cure a burn or scald. When the priest is putting on the pulp made as before mentioned he says:--

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When a limb is broken, as in war, the priestly doctor makes splints, and, while binding them on the broken limb, he says:--

Maori doctors do not exactly profess to be able to raise the dead, but they do profess to restore to life those who may be in the last agony; but then many concurrent omens and propitious circumstances must occur all at the same time ere such a miracle can be wrought. It must take place near dawn; the dying man must have a shivering fit; also, Matariki (the Pleiades) must be high in the heavens, a power from which stars is supposed to cause the fit; also, the Toutouwai (the New Zealand robin) must sing for the first time, at one and the same time that Tawera (the Morning Star) is seen; then the priestly doctor will engage to revive him who is in his last moments by saying:--

I will not weary you by detailing the incantations used by the priests for the cure of headache, stomach-ache, for the relief

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of choking, and a hundred other evils, for the detection of a thief, and for the blinding of a pursuer after battle; for there were forms appropriate to every accident of life, and the power of the Tohunga was based upon his ready and extensive knowledge of them. I will conclude this portion of my subject with two anecdotes of the self-desecration and voluntary surrender of their powers by two Maori priests. A Maori priest (yet living) had made up his mind to abandon his heathen ceremonies, and to embrace the religion of the Europeans. He summoned therefore three others to his settlement, and having had a quantity of kumaras cooked, and put into three baskets, he bade them place these upon the most hallowed part of his person--the shoulders and the head--while the three ate from them. My readers will remember that the hair of the head beyond all things is the chosen seat of the gods of a Maori priest, and that cooked food is the abominable thing that defiles and pollutes beyond all others. This, to the Maori, was the utmost and most daring profanation. This, therefore, he did, not only to defy the gods, and drive them from him, but to testify to all others that he had done so, and that they had no power to avenge upon him the insult he had offered. Soon afterwards he was baptized by the Christian name of Zaccheus. We doubt not that many here present have often heard of the great Ngapuhi Chief Mohi Tawhai, the friend and ally of our forces in the North, and whom we have already more than once mentioned. A similar act of self-desecration may be recorded of him. Doubting the power of his gods, he resolved to test it; and knowing that it was not lawful for cooked food to be near his head, and that he must not sit within a cooking-house, or even enter into it, he notwithstanding bade one of his slaves take a pot and cook food in it, and eat from it; then filling the pot with water he washed his head with it, and sitting down he waited the result. He has said since that he actually perspired with deadly fear, watching the sun go down, for if the sun set upon him, and he living, that was the appointed sign, viz,, that the gods of the Maori were but false ones, and that their power over him was gone, while

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the God of the Christian was the true God, and thenceforward he would be His disciple.

To a certain extent we may even consider the priest as holding the position and discharging the duties of a General. The Maori Tohunga not only predicted the events of battle, but he directed the movements of the tribe and often led them to the attack; and this leads us to the third main division of our lecture--the ceremonies and incantations used in war, and the omens and superstitions therewith connected. But before we proceed further, we must request you to bear in mind one great difference between Maori wars and those of civilized nations. To commence, therefore, with such omens as portend the likelihood of war. It is customary with the New Zealanders to fulfil to the utmost extent any request made by a dying chief. Such a request is called "Poroaki," and its meaning is confined solely to this custom. Any offence given or murder committed, for which satisfaction has not been obtained, the dying chief will remind his relatives of the fact, and nominate some particular person of a future generation, the whole aim of whose life shall be to take vengeance. Although it is not necessary that the family of the party who committed the injury should be the victims to propitiate the wrong committed, for vengeance may be obtained from any other tribe, yet the family or tribe of the injuring party are looked upon by the family of the murdered man as their "uto," or object of vengeance. No tribe, therefore, in New Zealand, however apparently at peace with all its neighbours, could at any moment tell whether the storm of war was not just ready to burst upon it. I know of two such cases or Poroakis, in one of which the nominated person is the grandson, in the other the great-grandson of the dying chief. Happily, however, Christianity will prevent these and other Satanic injunctions of a similar kind from ever being carried into effect.

Birds, of course, as they have done in every country, afford a fertile source of omens. If the cry of the Pie is heard from the landward of a traveller, it is counted a sign of a war party

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coming from the same direction; if a settlement is to be attacked, a god comes in the night time in the likeness of a bird, and warns them with the cry of "Ka toto, ka toto" (there will be blood, there will be blood); there is also a night bird called Hokio, which on the eve of war is heard continually to repeat "Kakao, kakao," which cry is caused by the choking of the bird with the hair of the heads of those warriors who are doomed to fall in the battle.

There are signs also in the sky which the priest can read. Those fragments of the rainbow known as weather-galls, and the broad summer lightning unaccompanied with thunder, both these speak to him of war, and hostile tribes hovering in the same quarter as that where they appear. A solitary star seen near the moon is also a sign that the conflict is at hand, but on the night before the enemy arrive, the chill and piercing Tokihi Kiwi, the starting of the cold wind of battle, is felt throughout the menaced settlement. Other signs are:-- the noise of a species of rat called Hamua; the singing of the ear, the tossing of the arms, and the gurgling in the throat in sleep. The cry of the Hamua is "Kato, kato," and this must be distinguished from the rat which is eaten by the natives, the Kiore, whose cry is "Tititi." When the ear of a person sings it asks, "Is it war? is it murder? is it good news? is it evil tidings?" and such like questions; and the ceasing of noise is held as an answer to the last question asked. When both arms are thrown by the sleeper across his breast, or when he makes a gurgling sound in his throat, this is a certain sign, not so much of war as of private murder.

Amongst the Maories, dreams have held invariably a prominent position. We may adduce one or two facts to illustrate this position in addition to what we have already related. A night or two before the news was received of the murder of the Europeans at Wairau near Cook's Straits, Tamati Waka Nene dreamed that a fowl came to the door of a hut where he was lying, and sung to him a war song; this, Waka said, when he awoke, was a sign that there had been some Europeans mur-

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dered. Again, just before the breaking out of the Northern war, the same chief dreamed that the bed on which he was sleeping changed into a canoe, and the floor of the hut into the sea, and that he was fishing there for sharks, the ends also of the firewood turned into sharks, and he caught many of them. This he spoke of in the morning as an omen of a coming war. Again, a short distance from where I lived in Hokianga, there resided a chief with his wife Ramari, and a family of five children; one night Ramari in her sleep made the gurgling noise in her throat to which we have before alluded; this was so loud as to wake up the whole family, and being accounted a certain sign of murder, they all left the hut in terror, and each hid himself separately in the scrub, and so passed the remainder of the night. Next day about 300 yards from their hut, a man and his child were found to have been murdered. Old Ramari certainly believed that had they not taken timely warning, and obeyed the omen given to them, they would all have been murdered also. Such are the scenes that foretell the breaking out of war; the principal causes that produce it are quarrels about land, women, murders committed, and curses uttered by men of one tribe against those belonging to another. A woman may often cause a war by abandoning her own tribe to follow that of her beloved; for her friends will not unfrequently consider themselves bound in honour to reclaim her by force of arms, if no other way remains. On the subject of cursing we have already spoken at some length; but although the ceremonies we have related are all that are requisite for the expiation of the curse, still satisfaction has yet to be exacted from the offenders if of a different tribe. In the case of a murder, the perpetrator of which is unknown, the tribe will declare war, and send out a party to avenge it upon the first they meet. They go no further than will allow of their return before the sunset of the same day, and slay the first who may fall in their way, without regard to tribe, age, or sex. If these should be too strong for them, or they should in any way escape, they return at once; or if they meet no one in that day's march, they will not go out again for

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this object; but while returning to their village they catch a few of the small swamp birds, called matata, and tearing them to pieces, each ties a limb upon the two fern stalks which he holds in his hands, and when they come in sight of the settlement they seat themselves in a line, and holding up their sticks they sing in chorus:--

In other instances, where a priest has accompanied the party, he runs along a line, exclaiming, "Hiki, Hiki, Hikitia, Tangaroa ha, hapainga ha, kia iri ha." Each time that he utters the syllable "ha," they all lift up their fern sticks at once: should any one fail to be exactly even with the rest, as the priest glances along the rank, that man will certainly fall in the first war in which he is engaged. Having returned thus unsuccessfully, they do not eat until midnight. This ceremony is called "Pihe hiku toto" (the avenger of blood), a dirge for the dead.

Supposing the tribe to have now resolved on war, a day is set apart for the cutting of the hair of the warriors. As the cutting is a religious rite, it is of course performed by the priests, who go with the assembled warriors to a little distance from the pa; here the latter seat themselves in a line, the priest senior in rank casting the lots by the ceremony Niu, which in this case bears the distinctive name of "Tuaumu," there being a stick for each hapu or family of their own tribe, and one for each hapu of the tribe to be attacked. This done, the officiating priests each chew a stalk of grass, called "Toetoe whatu manu," and then cut the hair of the warriors, which is accomplished with the tuhua (obsidian). They then repeat over each man these words:--

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The senior priest, while repeating these words, rests on each man's head a twig of karamu, which he had previously slung at his girdle; then he proceeds:--

Repeating here the names of all the gods of the elements, of their ancestry, reciting their genealogies from the earliest names recollected in Hawaiki, each tribe following their own line of ancestry. Food is then cooked in two ovens, one small, from which the priests alone eat, one large, intended for all the people. When all the people have finished eating, the priest lays his hand on the head of each man, saying:--

Adding here again a list of names of places in Hawaiki, and once more repeating the genealogy of their own migration, following the eldest son of the direct line, the ceremony is ended, and they return to the settlement, all this occupying a considerable time, commencing early in the morning, and if the tribe be strong, lasting the whole day.

When war has been at last for any cause resolved, the business of the priest is to divine of its success. His first plan is by his motions in his sleep; if he tosses his right arm towards his breast, it is a favourable omen, but unfortunate if the arm be thrown from him. Next he tries the niu (divination) by the fern stalks; this is to determine who shall fall and who survive. Of this ceremony, already mentioned, we shall give a full description. Before dawn--the usual time for all the most solemn rites --the priest issues a strict order that no food be cooked throughout the pa until he gives his permission; then spreading a mat on the ground before him, he takes fern stalks, one for each chief who is to go upon the war party, and one for each who is known upon the opposite side; he then holds each piece, one by one, giving it some chief's name; as he does so, tying around it

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in a particular knot a strip of flax. Thus named and tied, the fern stalks are called "kaupapa." He then prepares a second set, named like the first, but without the tie, and lays each couple that bears the same name together on the mat before him; then taking in his hand the piece around which the flax is wound, he sticks the others upright in the mat, and makes first a feigned throw with the one he holds, but before the second or real cast he holds it up in the air, exclaiming--

Then saying--

He flings it at the upright stick, first naming the hostile chieftains, and then those of his own tribe. If it drop upon the left of the upright stick, he whose name it bears will fall; if upon the right, he will survive; if the knot turn downwards, it is a presage of defeat. The lot being thus cast for each of the chiefs who are to be engaged, the priest takes once more the fern stalks, and calling the standing ones now by the names of the women and children who are to remain at home, he flings at them the other sticks, as enemies who may attack the settlement in the absence of its warriors. This second divination is called "Tuaumu wahine." Then raising each stick, he says, as if addressing the assailant in it, "This omen is for thee, O thou unknown. Look to thine home, and to those behind thee, and ask of the speaking omens." Then adding, "What art thou, O woman? what canst thou do in the evil day?" he flings the fern stalks as before; if it fall upon the right, the party named is doomed to die; but if to the left, she will escape; the rule observed in the former instance being in this reversed. This divination being now complete, the priest draws a line upon the ground between himself and the mat, then spits upon the mat, and so removes the tapu from the settlement. By this time the day has broken, and the people may venture to cook their food. After they have eaten they gather round the priest, who now explains openly to them the omens we have described; for all

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the previous divination has been in secret. An additional omen is drawn from the cooking of the breakfast on this day; for if the food in any one of the hangis or ovens be imperfectly baked, this is also a sign of defeat, called "mangungu" (broken or bruised).

We must digress a little here. Some of the canoes in which the Maories came from Hawaiki brought with them one or more gods; the famous ones were five, brought by Kuiwai and Hangaroa, two of which, called Ihungaru and Itupaoa, remained to very modern times. The Ihungaru, formed of a lock of human hair twisted with a rope of "aute" (paper mulberry bark), was kept in a house made of wood from Hawaiki, and thatched with mangemange. This fell into the hands of Hongi and the Ngapuhi tribes at the storming of the Mokoia pa in Rotorua, in the year 1823, where it was preserved, and being carried from the little islet where the fortress stood to the mainland, was brought to an eminence overlooking the lake, and there cut to pieces with the tomahawks of the victors. Of the Itupaoa we have no description; it was kept with the former, but was secreted by the priests, and hidden in the fastnesses of the Horohore range, where its place of concealment is now forgotten. To revert: when news of war reaches a settlement, if it were still in possession of one of these gods, the priest went to its house, and taking out the god, he laid it on a mat upon the ground, asking:--

The god then would move a certain space: if it were about two inches, it was a good omen; if four, it told of a great victory; but if six, on reaching that distance it would immediately contract--a sign of a defeat and of a devastated settlement. Ihungura was the god thus consulted on the occasion of Hongi's invasion, as above referred to, which gave this evil omen. In settlements which could not thus boast the possession of a god,

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the incantations alone were repeated. When war is at last declared, and the enemy known to be on the march, the priests again consult the gods Whiro and Rakataura, by going with a stick to the place where the ceremonies and incantations were performed, which we gave in the former part of this lecture, in the witchcraft for a kanga, or curse and then again, making a little effigy, and a house to contain it, they shut the door as formerly, and one of them strikes upon the door with a stick, and says, "Rakataura, come out;" then answering himself, "No, but you come in." Then follows a considerable altercation, which ends at last in Rakataura agreeing to come out. The priest then seats himself towards the west, and with clasped hands, and pressed upon the ground, and eyes bent down, he says:--

He then, representing the god, turns his head first on one side, and then on the other, as though listening, still repeating the incantation:--

Then rising with a bound, and facing eastward, with extended arms, he says:--

He now takes the stick with which he had struck the door, and sometimes the effigy also in his left hand, and his spear in his right, and leads his tribe to battle.

Mention has been made of Rakataura. She is in New Zealand a goddess of "the powers of the air," and to her all sudden

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and unintelligible noises are attributed. She is also the goddess of music, and used formerly as her flute the tough leathery cocoon of a kind of caterpillar, which may not unfrequently be found upon the manuka and other trees; but subsequently she took up her abode in this cocoon, and having thus lost her flute, she confines herself to these aerial noises.

We may now suppose the warriors ready to start upon this expedition; but before they march each recites a "reo" over his weapon. One of these, as a specimen, may suffice. The warrior holds his weapon in his right hand, and standing in an attitude of defence, he addresses an imaginary enemy:--

The allusion to the single star seen close beside the moon we have already explained as a presage of certain victory. For young men entering battle for the first time, a slightly different reo is used. When all are ready they go to a running stream, and, while they sit in a line side by side, the priest takes a branch of Karamu. and dipping it in the water, sprinkles their naked bodies, repeating over each "Their mocking is at a distance, but the ominous wind of Uenuku is blowing. Thou art baptised, my son, to conflict and to war; thou, my son, then wield the weapon of Tu in the tide of war; fight in the tide of Tu, ward off the blow in the tide of Tu, my son." Should a part of the branch break off over any man, it is a presage of his death. This ceremony is called "Tohi Tauwa" (the baptism of war), and is held particularly sacred; no woman or boy is therefore allowed to be present at it.

We now pass on to the ceremonies of asking and concluding an alliance. They who ask for the assistance of another

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tribe make no formal statement of the cause of the quarrel, or even the names of their enemies, but send a messenger with a token, which is called a "Ngakau" (heart), varying according to the object in view. If it is a secret expedition of murder that is meant, this token is the kumara, either raw or rotten, or, if cooked, cold and uneatable. If it is to be open war the messenger wears a mat with holes burnt in it. He gives no explanation of his mission, save that he sings some old songs suitable for the occasion. They ask no questions, but accept the token and invitation together, or else, first dismissing the envoy, return his present by one of their own men upon the same day. In either case, the cause and nature of the quarrel are never asked. But the tribe assailed will also have their allies, and, if they know of the invasion, they light up their beacon fires upon certain well-known mountains, as a summons to their friends to hasten to the rescue. In the wars of the noted Hongi, the mountains of Waikato were lighted up this way night after night to mark to the natives inland the route of their dreaded foe. Should the allies not answer the summons, and there be yet time left, the chief will go himself to try and enlist their sympathies. On his arrival, he sits some time in silence, then asks for water. A chief always drinks from the palm of his joined hands, into which the water is poured from the calabash by a slave. On this occasion, the calabash used is a very large one, held sacred, and reserved in time of war for this special purpose, being covered with the dried skin of a tattooed chief killed in some former war. This calabash he must drain to the bottom, for upon this his success may depend. Next, he says he is hungry. A young chief now rises, and takes a basket of taro (a small round yam)--no other fruit would suit, for the kumara is sacred to the gods of peace--and washing part of the earth from them, he lights a native oven, which must never have been used before, and the stones of which must also be new; the whole basket, half baked, is then set before the guest, and if he proves his prowess by devouring all thus offered to him, those whose help he asks will join him in the war. When

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he has done, all required of him is to present a lizard, brought with him for the purpose, to the chief whose aid he seeks. The lizard is held in great dread by the Maoris; but now, to show that they will aid each other in spite of any previously dreaded thing, he who receives the lizard eats it raw. The resolution for war, or the approach of an enemy, is communicated to the people at large by a trumpet called a putara, or by a kind of gong formed out of a piece of matai wood, hung by one end and struck with a stone at the other. When the resolution for war proceeds from the chief alone, he will make an effigy, and calling over it, in the sight of all the people, the name of him whom he intends to attack, he cleaves the head with his axe. Thus, before the Northern war, Heke gave a great feast at his village, Kaikohe; poles were as usual set up round which the food was piled in pyramids; but on the top of one of them was made the figure of a man, and as the pole was lifted up into its place by the people Heke split the head of it with an adze, saying, "I split thy head, O Governor": thus both his own people and his visitors knew that he had resolved to fight the Europeans, and that they were invited to join him in the war. The incidents of the march afford fresh omens. A blow-fly crossing the road is a sign of defeat; if the party arrive unobserved within a short distance of the pa, the priest makes a kite of toetoe whatu manu, and flies it into the air; if the kite proves one-sided it is an evil omen, but if it should fly right, the priest holds the line in his right hand (for if he should by accident hold it in the left it would be a fatal omen), and letting it out he says: --

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Still holding the kite he sends up a messenger upon the string: when it is half-way up he let goes the line, taking care to have such advantage of the wind as that the kite will fly across the pa; if the kite catch on the palisade, it is thought that the incantation (repeated by the priest while flying the kite) will produce such an overwhelming dread in the inhabitants that they will be easily conquered. This ceremony, like that of Niu, described before, must be commenced before daybreak, and before any food is allowed to be cooked or eaten. A cloudy misty day is favourable to an assault, for the mist is the brains of the slaughtered enemies. Such was the day on which the troops attacked Heke's pa at Mawhe, a circumstance which highly encouraged Tamati Waka's natives, as giving them a presage of victory. Before they attack a pa, and while yet on the march, the priestly leader performs another rite called "Tuahu" (the hill-making). He makes a number of long narrow mounds, one for each of the tribes engaged, and at the end of each he plants a stick and names it by the name of its tribe; this stick is called "mauri" (the life or seat of life), and upon each hillock is laid another stick which is called "tahuhu" (ridge-pole), bearing also the name of its own tribe; he then repeats this incantation, turning his back to the mounds and his face to the east:--

While the priest is repeating this incantation the gods come and scratch the mounds to pieces, and move the stick that lies upon the mound up to the Mauri. The omens thus yielded do not, as in the Niu, tell of the fate of the battle and point out the conquerors and the vanquished, but they decide the tribe which is

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to win the prize of valour. The actual assault must be deferred until the inhabitants of the pa discover their assailants, who on their side use divination. For example, a chief at Hokianga, whose pa was thus beset, took his son (an only child) killed him and burnt his heart in a fire kindled outside the pa; if the smoke came across the pa it would be captured, if not it would resist the assault.

The cannibal rites of a Maori battle-field I will pass unnoticed, as any description of them would disgust you. I would, however, notice the name given to the first man killed in battle, "Te Ika a Tiki" (the fish of Tiki), which is the corpse of warriors slain in battle; and Mataika or Matangohi, the first of such trophies, is the name applied to the body of a man carried off by some noted champion who rushes in and slays and bears away his man before the ranks join in fight. The accomplishment of this feat is considered highly honourable, but it is an essential condition to its success that the warrior who performs it should effect his retreat without receiving a wound from any other hand but that of the antagonist whom he slays. If a chief is slain in the melee of the battle, his slayer claims at once his prize by pulling out a lock of hair wherewith to identify the body after victory; should the honour, however, be afterwards disputed, it is referred to the judgment of the priest, who decides it by an ordeal called Whangai hau. The "hau" is any part of a corpse which may be taken by the priest over which to repeat incantations; it is therefore an offering to the gods who reside in the wind ("Hau" meaning wind). The want of time precludes us from giving more than the conclusion of this ceremony. When several incantations have been repeated over the disputants as they sit beside a stream with whose water they have been sprinkled, they return to the army, and there the priest pitches in the ground a forked stick three paces from the disputants, who stand side by side and hold each two fern stalks, to which are tied locks of the dead man's hair. The priest then, pointing with his forefinger to their foreheads, says:--

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He then casts the fern stalks toward the fork of the upright stake, and the gods will cause the sticks of him whose claim is purest to hang upon the fork as he thus flings it. The warrior who thus fell into the enemy's hands was of course eaten, nor was the priest exempt from this doom; the god who resided in him departed with his breath, as the proverb on such occasion means "The god is gone, and Hapopo (the body so called in time of war) may be eaten." If the captive be a chief he must not in honour ask his life, but smile at him who gives him the death-blow. If a chief fall or die in any way on the victorious side, the body is burnt and the head preserved, those in whose charge it remains being for such time tapu. If the avenging of a murder be the origin of the war, and the murderer or any of his descendants be among the prisoners, the fate reserved for them was attended with circumstances of peculiar horror. Every portion of the body was devoted to some particular use. For the skull was reserved the greatest indignity, to carry water for the native ovens; from the arm bones were made pins to eat periwinkles; from the small bones of the legs the heads of bird spears and the barbs of fish hooks; tame parrots were fed from the collar bone; from the thigh bones were cut rings for the decoy birds, and the remainder were fashioned into flutes. It is said that the rank of the deceased could always be known by the colour of the bones; for those of a chief were red; those of one of inferior rank were of a light colour; sometimes even the character of the men could be guessed from signs afforded by the use of these. If the bird, for instance, when struck with a spear, did not die at once, but fluttered and screamed in falling, the man whose bone it was must have been a nonsensical, talkative fellow. The teeth were made into a necklace and given to the relatives of the murdered; so also were the eyes, which were always eaten; the other bones were made into needles, and the dog-skin mat was sewed with them, which was

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always greatly prized on that account. The idea that the eyes were eaten to prevent them from becoming stars is, however, I believe, a mere European fancy: I have never heard it so stated by a Maori, This fate was inflicted by the noted Hongi upon the whole of Paraoarahi's family and their relations, in vengeance for the murder of Koperu, the murder for which he commenced his war on the Waikato, Thames, and East coast tribes. Sometimes the head was preserved entire, that the young men might set it before them, and make their first attempt at eloquence in recounting the cause of the chief's death, and by whom he fell; or the old woman would set it before her upon the "Turuturu," or corner stick, used for holding the web while making a mat, and taunt and revile it.

The women are invariably left behind when blood vengeance is the object of the "taua;" they are not thought sufficiently sacred to cook food in such cases. They have also their signs, for which they watch anxiously, to guess the fate of the warriors. If the clouds are red at sunset, a battle has been fought that day; if an owl cry in the daytime, and especially seven times, if a tame tui talk at night, these are evil omens. The men must, in this case, cook for themselves; but cooked food, being considered polluted, must not come near the weapon. It must not pass before a warrior, it must not be eaten standing, it must not be carried in the right hand or on the back, but either slung on the left side or carried in the left hand.

We will now suppose the victorious war party on the return to their own home, bearing with them the preserved heads of the great chiefs whom they have killed. Just on the border of their own territory they dig a small hole for each; then all the people turn round towards the country from which they come, and the priests, taking each a head, repeat a song, to which all the warriors dance, and every time they leap from the ground the priests lift up the heads. This ceremony is called "Whakatahurihuri" (a turning round, a causing to look backwards), and is, as it were, a farewell from the heads to their own land, and a

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challenge to the defeated tribe to follow them. The words of the song are these:--

These holes are also to perpetuate the memory of the battle, and. of those who fell in it; and the ceremony is repeated at every subsequent halting-place.

On the south side of the Manukau Heads is a spot called Te Kauri, which forms a prominent point as seen in going up the harbour to the Waiuku. Here the first "Whakatahurihuri" was performed with the heads of the Waikato chiefs who fell in Hongi's invasion. To this day the Waikato tribes never use the spot as a resting-place when they travel from Waikato to Auckland; for were they to stay there to sleep or cook, the spirits of their slaughtered friends would be sure to visit their impiety with death.

When the war party arrives at home, the priestesses go forth to meet them, headed by the eldest, and make the most hideous contortions and grimaces that they can, which are called "whakatama." Then with a loud voice they ask them:--

The warriors halt and answer with one voice:--

The priestesses ask again:--

The warriors answer:--

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The priestesses rejoin:--

The whole of the people of the settlement then make their appearance, and wave their garments in the air, while each tries to let his voice be heard above all the others, some calling one thing, some another, women and children all joining in the clamour. The general import of the noise is, "Welcome! return, return!" The warriors are sacred; they therefore go first to the stream of water, with all they have brought with them, and sit in lines facing the water. One of the priests, taking a round pebble, goes to the other side of the stream, and flinging off all his clothing, offers the stone with a piece of fern root and of human flesh (all of which he holds in his right hand) in sacrifice to Tika, the creator of mankind, who must yet be appeased for the slaughter of those whom he has formed. To Tika the kumara is sacred; so also is the right foot, and especially the great toe of it, because with this foot only the Maori digs in setting the kumara. To this therefore, as the god, the stone, the fern root, and the human flesh are now offered, and the following incantation is repeated:--

The fact of shedding blood renders the Maori tapu, and until the tapu is removed by this ceremony the warriors cannot mix with the others. Before, however, they enter the village, one of the elder chiefs takes up the war-song, all the men repeating it and dancing, weapon in hand, with a slow and measured step, till they have sung about half of it; then a kind of fantastic excitement seems to come over them, and they dance furiously, and with almost demoniac attitudes and gestures, still keeping

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perfect time with each other. The words of the song are these:--

We come lastly to the reception of the warriors at home. The dance concluded, they march in silence to the village, where those who remained behind are gathered to receive them, the old warriors standing, the rest sitting, and the younger people only having their heads covered. Some must have fallen; therefore the reception is with a "tangi," or general chorus of wailing, while the elder women at the same time are clawing the air as a welcome to the gods who reside in it; the warriors from battle in the meantime stand leaning upon their spears, and all join the tangi for the space of about an hour; then all rising up, they rub noses, and the slaves begin to cook; yet not a word has been spoken of the success of the expedition, and above all, not a question has been asked; for such inquisitiveness would be punished with certain death by the war god Tu. After the meal is ended, the best orator who has been in the party rises, unasked, and gives an account of the whole proceedings in the war; and as the cause and manner of the death of each of their own friends or relatives is told, the women recommence the low mournful wailing of the tangi, cutting their hair short off, and cutting and gashing themselves with pieces of obsidian. The recital over, each chief who has been in the war takes a piece of human flesh, and gives it to his firstborn son, as an offering to Tu; this is to ensure success in after expeditions. The rewards of honour are now given to those whose bravery has been noticed in the fight. The fattest dogs in the village are killed and cooked with fern-root cakes and taro; for the kumara being sacred to Tiki and the gods of peace alone, these are distributed in small

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baskets, and presented separately to each one of those whose actions have entitled them to such honour, the warrior's name being pronounced over the basket as it is given. To touch this uninvited is the grossest of insults, as it is a mark of the highest favour for him who receives it to ask another to partake of it with him.

Thus we have opened another page from the yet unexhausted volume of Maori superstitions; but as our time is more than gone, we must thus abruptly conclude.