CHAPTER II: WAIMATE NATIVES. 1844
[Image of page 28]
CHAPTER II.
IN September, 1844, the Chief Justice had to go on circuit to Kororarika, a small English town in the north, and I accompanied him to visit the Bishop and Mrs. Selwyn, at the Waimate, thirty miles inland, where they were living. We stopped by the way at a little Mission station, where an English catechist, Mr. Kemp, and his wife had been settled for many years. A bend in the stream brought us suddenly in sight of it. Very pretty and peaceful it looked. The wild peach-trees were all in blossom, and there were huge patches of golden gorse. Just beside the house a little stream fell some eight feet over masses of rock, and kept up a continual murmur. There were eight little Maori girls living in the house. They came in to bring us tea, and looked very shy and demure at first, but soon brightened when we spoke to them in their own language, and sang hymns very prettily. Mrs. Kemp was a motherly, old-fashioned, Norfolk woman, who by her wise, loving ways contrived to win the hearts of all the women and girls around her.
[Image of page 29]
We were told, many years after, that the nicest and most respectable native women in the neighbourhood were always found to be "Mother's" old scholars.
The next morning we started over the hills to the Waimate. Half a dozen strong bearers had been sent thence to carry me in an armchair slung on poles. As we travelled on, an old Maori man on horseback was seen approaching. The bearers put me down, and said, in a low voice, "It is Maketu's father." Poor old man; his son had been tried and executed for murder of an Englishwoman and her children, at the first sitting of the Supreme Court in 1842. He had been living as servant, and had some quarrel with his employer, a widow, about money. His father was a man of some position, and member of a very powerful tribe, who, had they chosen, could have sheltered him from justice. But they had no thought of doing so, and his own father gave Maketu up to be dealt with in accordance with our law. Crowds of natives attended the trial, and, as the man's guilt was evident from the first, they were the more impressed by the careful, patient investigation, and by the fact that the Crown assigned a counsel to conduct the prisoner's defence.
Months after Maketu's execution, when the Judge was travelling through the country, he heard the people telling the story outside his tent-door. They
[Image of page 30]
sang about him, in a monotonous chant, as "the man who had put Maketu to death," but showed no sign of disapproval. The Majesty of the Law, unsupported by any military power, awed and impressed the native mind.
And now, for the first time, we were to meet the poor, old father. He got off his horse, held out his hand to the Judge, and then passed quietly on in silence.
The first part of the road was bare and dreary, but as we drew near to the Waimate, we passed through an old forest of stately Kauri pines. We crossed one or two clear streams, and, near to one of these, I saw, for the first time, a grand, old pine dying in the vigorous, cruel embrace of the Rata. 1 A year or two before, this Rata had been only a vine, as thick as one's little finger, clinging round the trunk of the pine for support, and now the strong branches had wound themselves round and round their benefactor, and were crushing him to death, and would soon become a huge forest-tree covered with crimson blossoms. As we approached the Mission station, we rejoiced to see fenced fields with cattle grazing, white houses embowered in trees, and beyond a church.
At the gate the Bishop met us with twelve of
[Image of page 31]
his clergy and the students, in caps and gowns, and a goodly array of English and Maori boys, girls, and infants assembled with their masters, who greeted us with "God save the Queen" and many hurrahs. The infants struck up "Try, try, try again."
The Waimate was the old headquarters of the Church Missionary Society's Mission, and had quite a civilised appearance. A broad path led past the houses to the church; at a little distance was a mill-pond, with the miller's house and wheel, and a clump of pines at the back. This little wood had been "tapu" (sacred) in old days. The Maoris used to put their dead upon a wooden frame, which was hung on to the trees, and the body lay there till only the skeleton remained, and then came a solemn burying and mourning.
We often visited the native girls' school, which was under the charge of a clergyman's wife. She had taught them to spin flax, and they were very merry over their work, and sang many of our school songs amid the whirr of the wheels. The infant school was delightful,--plump, jolly Maori children, who clapped their hands and sang the multiplication-table with great glee. New Zealand children are pleasant to teach, they are so wide-awake and full of fun. I heard the Bishop catechise a large class of boys one day on a sermon which had been preached in Maori
[Image of page 32]
on the previous Sunday. It was on the trials of Job, and the Bishop, who was a first-rate catechiser, drew the story from them. There was immense excitement about Job's possessions. One boy said he had a great number of horses, another cows, sheep, asses. One eager little fellow shouted out, "Thousands of nanny-nannys" (goats). Then the Bishop asked them what they would do if they were in a canoe in a rough sea, if it were heavily laden with gold and treasure, and there was fear of being upset. "Throw all the treasure overboard," was the general outcry; and so he went through the story, the boys' eyes kindling as they listened.
There was a sort of primitive school-feast one afternoon, and we all went to a wood about a mile off. It was a very hot afternoon, and we rejoiced to get under the shade of the large branches of the tree ferns. The girls gathered the long fronds and made a fairy bower, where they had their tea, and then the whole party ran shouting and leaping through the tangled bush.
In some ways a New Zealand wood is less beautiful than in the old country. One misses the ridings, and open spaces, and long vistas, and the old proverb becomes literally true, "You can't see the wood for the trees." But the luxuriant vegetation, the parasitical plants which fringe the huge trunks up to the topmost branches, the tangled
[Image of page 33]
ropes of supple-jack, the giant skeletons of trees that have fallen and lie where they fall, still green with the mosses and ferns that grow on them, the tree ferns, with their chocolate-coloured, hairy stems,--all have a wondrous charm of their own. As we turned homewards the wood was lighted up by the glory of the setting sun. Soon the quiet Mission settlement came in view. The cows were being driven up for milking; the bell was ringing for even-song. These scenes of peaceful industry and Christian work made one realise the change wrought in this fierce, wild people. Only twenty-five years before, every man's hand had been against his neighbour.
There was a Translation Committee meeting day by day in the Bishop's study to revise the Maori Prayer-book. We often were admitted to listen to the animated discussion. The three revisers were the Rev. W. Williams, an Oxford man, who had joined his brother, the head of the New Zealand Mission, seventeen years before; an Irish clergyman, the Rev. R. Maunsell, an able man and a scholar, who spoke Maori like a native; and a layman, who had been brought up in the country from childhood.
There was a large confirmation of natives held while we were at the Waimate, and on the next day (Sunday) five English deacons were ordained, three of whom had long been catechists of the Church Missionary Society. Mr. Williams preached in
[Image of page 34]
Maori. The church was crammed. It was grand to hear the people repeat the responses all together in perfect time. It was like the roar of waves on the beach. I had some pleasant peeps at the country around. We went one day to a wood less tangled than the last, and carpeted with moss. There were wild raspberry bushes and peach-trees growing there. Another time I rode to a "pah," or fortified village, surrounded on all sides by a high fence. At the corners of the fence were grotesquely-carved figures, with goggling eyes and tongues thrust out. There were neat little houses within, each with its patch of Indian corn and pumpkins. As we passed one of these, we heard a tangi going on for a dead child, and the mother's exceeding bitter cry, "Oh, my child, my child!" It was very touching, amid the beauty and brightness all around, to hear that desolate wail. We learned a good deal about the old habits of thought among the Maoris from a grey-haired man in deacon's orders, who had been many years in the country. He had been prepared by Mr. Whytehead, the Bishop's chaplain, before his death. The latter was a Fellow of St. John's, and a scholar and poet. The older man, though trained in a very different school of theology, sat like a disciple at the young man's feet, and always retained a most loving remembrance of his teaching, the two drawing together as good, earnest-minded men will.
[Image of page 35]
He (Mr. Davis) told us that an Atua Maori,--that is to say, a man who professes to be possessed by a spirit,--had been disturbing the neighbourhood. The people, while accepting Christianity, and believing in God as the one true God, maker of heaven and earth, could not at once, any more than the early Christians converted from Paganism, give up their belief in the evil power that had so long been feared. William Thompson,--a very intelligent man,--told a friend of ours of what happened to him after his baptism. An old priest reviled him for turning away from the ancestral faith, and challenged him to hold a conference with the Maori god. William, half valiantly, half fearfully, agreed. He went into a house where the old priest was lying wrapped up in a blanket. Suddenly, as he sat by him, a shrill whistling cry came from the roof of the house. William, darted out to see if any one were outside, but no one was near. On his return, he plucked up courage to cry out: "You are a false or lying spirit, perhaps," and a low voice answered from the roof: "No, no! I am a true god!" Poor William was greatly scared, especially when the old priest warned him that this Atua Maori would destroy him. But after a while, finding he did not die, he took heart again. He, however, still thought it was Satan's voice. Our old friend, Mr. Davis, was not quite willing to receive our suggestion that the priest was a ventriloquist.
[Image of page 36]
He had heard such strange things told him by grave, thoughtful men, after their conversion, of apparent Satanic agency, especially of spells and incantations uttered by the priests against enemies, and how the victim of them had withered away and died.
William Jowett had told us before of this old belief. He had a real fear of this Atua Maori, which had no shape, but dwelt within the priests, and might be heard from the roof of the house before a war expedition by its shrill, whistling cry.
We had a great gathering at the Waimate on Monday, September 22. The Maoris always came on that day to bring their wares for sale, and it was called market-day! But, unlike an English market, school and catechising were held in the chapel after morning prayers, before the traffic began. This day the people had heard a rumour of the Bishop's intention to remove to Auckland, and there was a great deal of speech-making on the subject. The speakers gathered in front of the drawing-room windows. A "powerful speaker" opened the debate. The audience seated themselves on either side of the path. The orator, a man of some standing, was dressed in a handsome native mat, and had a spear in his hand. He began by trotting slowly up and down a given space, always beginning and ending each sentence with his run to and fro. After a while he got warmed up and excited, and then he rushed
[Image of page 37]
backwards and forwards, he leaped up off the ground, he slapped his thigh, shouted, waved his spear. Any one who had not understood the language, would have thought he was breathing out death and destruction, instead of urging the Bishop to stay among his people. It was very amusing to see the two brothers Williams stand up to answer him. They had lived so long in the land that they used Maori action, though they did not leap or rush about. Archdeacon Henry Williams, a stout, old-fashioned-looking clergyman, with broad-brimmed hat and spectacles, marched up and down with a spear in his hand, and elicited shouts of applause. Then his brother drew a large space on the gravel, and divided it into three parts, and asked whether it was not fair that the Bishop should live in the middle of the diocese instead of at either end. There was a loud murmur of voices, "It is just"; but all the same they did not like to lose him and his large party from among them. The relations on the whole between them had been most satisfactory. Only a few months, however, before our visit to the Waimate, a "taua," i. e., a fighting-party, had come to the Bishop's house to demand "utu" (payment) for a trespass. One of his young students had shot some wild ducks on a native preserve. An account has been given in the Bishop's life by one present, who probably did not speak the language,
[Image of page 38]
and who tells it, therefore, au grand serieux. It was just at the time when John Heke, afterwards the leader of the first native war, was, with a party of turbulent young fellows, making himself troublesome. They had no intention probably to do more than "bounce," but the Bishop was equal to the occasion. He came out to the door as they were beginning to rush up and down, and make speeches, and work themselves up to a due pitch of excitement, and politely invited the few leaders into the house, saying that of course he must talk with them, not with the boys. By the time the leaders were seated on chairs in the dining-room, the power to get up steam had ceased. He then asked Heke if he was a baptised man. "Yes." "Then do you wish to go according to the old Maori law or the new Christian one?" After a little talk aside, the leaders of the fray all said, "By the Christian law." "Then," said the Bishop, "I will go by Zaccheus's rule. If I have taken anything wrongfully, I restore it fourfold. So I will pay four times the value of each duck." This was received with immense applause. A large supply of stirabout was then brought out for the comfort of John Heke and his tail, and they went off in great good-humour. 2
[Image of page 39]
One more story, different in a way, though the peace-bringing result was the same, may be told here. A year or two after our visit to the Waimate there was fighting at the East Cape between hostile tribes. When both sides were exhausted, the Archdeacon in charge, the Rev. G. Kissling, a German missionary, induced them to meet at his place as neutral ground, to settle terms of peace. They appeared on the day fixed, with guns in their hands and plenty of ammunition. After a while the old hostile spirit began to manifest itself among the younger men, and the Archdeacon, fearing a fray, proposed to open the meeting with prayer. This was agreed to, and he wisely began the Litany, reading with much deliberation. As the last Amen was said, the two parties leaped to their feet, and
[Image of page 40]
rushed towards each other. For a moment the good man's heart sank within him. But he soon saw that the guns were all laid aside, and the late enemies were embracing each other.
We started back at the end of October. It was an intensely hot day. The Bishop, Mrs. Selwyn, and the children were off by seven. Mrs. Selwyn and her little boy of five rode; the Bishop on foot with his infant son (the present Bishop of Melanesia) securely swathed in a plaid, which was thrown over his shoulder and wound round his waist. I followed, an hour later, in a little native litter with eight bearers. My husband brought up the rear on foot, with his Maoris carrying his bags and tent, as he meant to return overland to Auckland. Friends waved farewell, and the Maori children came swarming to the top of the lane, singing "Oh! that will be joyful." But there was little time for sentiment, for the men were in haste. They trotted up hill and down dale for two hours and a half, till we came to a little river, overhung by shrubs and trees, where the tent was pitched and the tethered horses grazing, and the Maoris stretched out at their ease. After lunch we crossed the shallow river, and the men scrambled up a steep bank with me, three holding the litter on each side. And so on again until we reached the Wai-tangi river, where a boat was to receive us. We sat under the shadow of a
[Image of page 41]
tree, among some rocks by the side of a waterfall, and, on descending to the boat, soon came in sight of the grand falls. The river is very wide, and these falls are some fifteen or twenty feet deep. They looked most beautiful, and the foam had rainbow tints in the sunlight. We rowed across the harbour; and our kind old friend, Sir Everard Home, wanted us to dine on board H. M. S. North Star, which was lying at anchor there, but we could not stay, and landed before sunset at the little town of Kororarika, a sort of New Zealand Gravesend. It had been the resort of whalers in old days, and a few small wooden houses with verandahs running round them, and some third-rate public-houses were the main signs of English civilisation. But we went up to the little wooden parsonage which stood near the church, on a hill above the town, and found a garden, gay with flowers and shrubs, and some sheltering trees. We visited Paihia, a Mission station which nestles under some hills on the other side of the harbour. We went across in a whale-boat manned by natives, and landed on a shelly beach, along which lay the Mission houses, with the clear, blue water washing up almost to their doors.
The gardens were all ablaze with flowers. Honeysuckle, and passion-flowers, and cluster-roses hung in masses over the verandah, and here and there a tall aloe or native palm-tree rose towering up, and gave
[Image of page 42]
a foreign air to the scene. We could see the vessels lying at anchor from the windows of the rooms, and the surf breaking on the shore. Good Mrs. Williams took me to a cool, shady room, with green hangings, and there I rested, and heard the lazy hum of bees, and smelt the fragrance of the flowers. Everything suggested peace and quiet, but there had been many a year of hard work, and privation, and anxiety, before this happy time could come, and only a few months later the horrors of war came within a few miles of the Mission station. Mrs. Williams told me many stories of her early experiences in New Zealand. She had been very delicate in England, and when her second boy was born had suffered from nervous fever, and had to be guarded from all noise. Her third child was born soon after their arrival. She was in a little hut on the beach, and was surrounded by wild people, who all talked at the top of their voices. She had no better fare than gruel which was sour, and ship-biscuits; but she throve on it, and grew strong in the fine climate. For many months she and her husband could get no vegetables but potatoes. Sometimes the Maoris would bring a basket of wild cabbage, or some large water-melons, and refuse to take any other payment than powder and shot, and with much longing she had to see the coveted food carried off again; but after a while they got some garden stuff of their own. She had a
[Image of page 43]
brave heart always, and now, with her six tall sons and five daughters around her well-furnished table, in large, airy rooms, she told me that the past seemed like a dream. For it must be remembered by gentlemen of England who sit at home at ease, that these early pioneers had many hardships in their day, and witnessed many a terrible scene of heathen bloodshed and fury.
Some one pointed out to me a chimney, the first erected, which was built by William Williams. He had been seen standing on the rounds of a ladder, with a trowel and mortar in his hand, hard at work, and a Latin grammar fixed before him, while his little son went through his lessons. In the very early days the whole Mission party lived in rough native houses, and were dependent on scanty supplies from chance ships from Sydney. Mrs. W. Williams and her little flock moved to the East Coast in 1837, and I have often heard her tell of her early difficulties.
She had but two rooms for bedroom and parlour, and kitchen, and all, and had a young baby in arms, and for days and days after her arrival, people came pouring in all day long to look at her, filling up the little space in the most uncomfortable manner. Yet it did not do to offend the people whom they had come to win and help. A great amount of bodily fatigue and daily worry must fall on the missionary's wife in a wild country. She herself must wash and
[Image of page 44]
cook and bake till she has trained her raw material, and when the native helps have been at last taught to work, they need constant overlooking. If she has children, she must make clothes and mend for them, and teach and nurse them, and yet manage to find time to keep school and mix medicines, and listen to long stories from people to whom time is no object.
I took a class of old Maori women one Sunday afternoon, and tried to get some of the Archdeacon's sermon out of them. But they seldom got beyond the opening, "Oh, my friends," about which they were all clear. Nevertheless, the good bodies had got hold of Christianity, or rather it of them, in a practical way. They might have said, as an old Maori woman long afterwards said to me, "Mother, my heart is like an old kete {i. e., a coarsely-woven basket). The words go in, but they fall through."
