CHAPTER IV. EARLY EXPERIENCE.
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CHAPTER IV.
EARLY EXPERIENCE.
WE were for three years on the Hokianga. My first work was to learn the language of the people. This was no easy task: neither lexicon nor grammar was at hand. It had been reduced to writing; and some portions of the Scriptures, with a few manuals, had been translated and printed. Not having a good ear, I found it difficult to lay hold of a barbarous tongue. With the aid of translations, and by daily intercourse with the natives, I managed to prepare a grammar and a vocabulary for my own use. Ere long I was able to take some part in school instruction.
At the end of a year, I made my first attempt at preaching in Maori. My sermon was prepared with great care. The congregation listened gravely:--they politely told me that I succeeded well. But I afterwards found that I had made some ludicrous mistakes.
My reminiscences of those early days recall many incidents. The Sunday was a high day. The whole aspect of the station seemed to give voice to the words of the Psalmist: "This is the day which the Lord hath made: we will rejoice and be glad in it."
The villages of the natives were more or less distant. During the week we made visits to them. But on the Saturday, they came in fleets of their well-filled canoes,
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--not, as formerly, to kill and eat one another, but to hear the glad tidings of "peace on earth, goodwill toward men." From the tributary rivers, they converged to the Mission ground, bringing their provisions with them, as also their pet dogs and pigs. I have counted, on the beach, as many as seventy of those canoes at one time, holding respectively from five to fifty people. Their encampment, at Otararau, was a lively scene on Saturday evenings. Lit up with their many fires, resonant with their earnest talk, and steaming with their savoury ovens, the little settlement was all astir. Most scrupulously they peeled their potatoes, and made other preparations for the Sunday. In every hut, the voice of praise and prayer was heard.
Early on the Sabbath morn, they would wend their way to the prayer-meeting. Sermons were preached to them in the forenoon and evening. A school was held in the afternoon. And here the old chief, of sixty, would sit beside the child of six, spelling out their lessons in the class, and desiring "the sincere milk of the word." Many a famed cannibal warrior had come to "sit at the feet of Jesus." The crowded church was a thrilling sight. To the fastidious it had little charm. They were poorly clad: soap was scarce; olfactory nerves were offended. But to the Christian mind, the scene could not fail to give joy. Here was a people just lifted out of the "horrible pit and miry clay," and earnestly seeking to "know the way of the Lord more perfectly."
For the sake of the Mission families, the settlers on the river, and the crews of ships, an English service was held in the school-room on Sunday afternoons. There is reason to hope that, in those exercises, more than one
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prodigal was brought to say, "I will arise and go to my Father." At times, a large number of catechumens was baptized. Many of their heathen friends, as well as their Christian relations, would be present. The church was crowded, within and without. I find, in my journal, an entry which records that a hundred and sixteen, after due probation, were baptized in the presence of a large congregation, and twenty-eight couples joined in holy matrimony.
Some of them had been polygamists. Mohi Tawhai, a very influential chief of Waima, had many wives. He was now greatly perplexed in making his choice of "one wife." His difficulty was in deciding which of two should be his spouse. To one he was very strongly attached, but the other was mother of most of his children. After a long struggle with himself, he elected the latter. If the ordinance of baptism was solemn, that of matrimony was not always without a touch of the ludicrous: this was often the case in the clumsy attempt to place the wedding-ring on the proper finger.
The natives would generally stay over the Monday, for the purpose of getting counsel and instruction on many things, affecting their every-day life, or to learn the meaning of certain texts of Scripture, or to get medicine for themselves or their sick friends. And others would stay that they might barter their pigs and potatoes for such articles of trade as they most needed. To such a people, missionaries have to become "all things to all men."
It sometimes happened that a gathering of the Pakeha (white man) would meet on the station. That would be a funeral occasion. It was no rare thing for one or more of them to be drowned in their drinking bouts.
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The corpse, when found, was conveyed, in a boat, to Mangungu, and was followed by all its old comrades. This gave the missionaries their best opportunity for a solemn appeal to the consciences of those misguided men, that they should "turn from their wickedness and live." But the funeral was not always that of the poor drunkard. Among other cases of a similar kind, my diary contains the account of the burial of a respectable trader, Mr. Mitchell. He lived at the Horohoro, in the Mangamuka branch of the Hokianga, and had a well-trained family, who had been accustomed to come, with their parents, to our Mission services. I saw him die in hope. The cortege consisted of eleven boats, the British ensign waving over that which bore the coffin. About sixty Europeans attended. The service was impressively read, and an address given on Isaiah xxxviii. i, by the Rev. N. Turner. The last mournful offices were performed amid many tears.
There is a sameness about life on a Mission Station. The coming of a friend--or even a stranger--now and then, was a pleasant relief; still more the receipt of a packet of newspapers and letters from the outside world, and from distant loved ones. In those days we deemed ourselves happy to receive news from England, not more than six months old. Visitors came from Tokerau (Bay of Islands) on the other coast. That was the chief resort of the whale ships, and the seat of the Episcopalian Mission. The journey took two days. The first stage, of fifteen miles, was over an open and sterile country, to the Waimate--a beautiful spot, an oasis in the desert-- where our Episcopalian brethren had an agricultural station. Seven miles westward, the traveller entered a gloomy forest, through which he had to thread his way
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along an old war-path, to the top of the Hokianga, whence he came to Mangungu by water.
It was a gladsome thing to greet the face of a friend, and to hear his voice. But for brotherly intercourse, the Annual District Meeting was our chief joy. It was the only season in the whole year when men bound together by common sympathies, and labouring--far apart from each other--with a common object, held personal communion. Then they felt that "as iron sharpeneth iron, so doth the countenance of a man his friend." To attend that meeting, some would travel hundreds of miles, through forests, across rivers and swamps, and over hills and valleys. There was neither bridge, nor hotel, nor road, other than the narrow trackways beaten by the natives in their old war expeditions. If any of the missionaries brought their wives with them--an occasional thing--they would be carried in a "kauhoa," a rude sort of hammock, resting on the shoulders of the carriers. This was made of a flax mat, fastened to two long poles, and protected by a canopy. It was borne along at a jog-trot pace, after the style of the old sedan chair in England, and at regular intervals the bearers would be relieved by relays.
Our travelling, rough and toilsome as it was, had its peculiar charms in fine weather, and when the natives were in good humour. I retain very pleasant recollections of many of those journeys. Times have changed since then. That experience cannot be repeated now. The natives have become comparatively rich: they ride on horseback, having roads. If a guide be wanted for the interior, he must be hired, together with his steed, and that at no small expense. But at the date of which I write, the services of natives could be obtained on
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easy terms. And when the missionary brethren met each other at Mangungu, it was the great annual event. None but those who have shared the joy, can tell how precious were those seasons! Then "they rehearsed all that God had done with them, and how he had opened the door of faith unto the Gentiles." A few of those brethren are now in other lands; some have gone to their rest; and others, in a ripe old age, "remain to this day."
