No. 1 (Vol. 4 No. 1)

Must Follow Tribal Customs

The people who are responsible for planning the new system have to think of a number of things. First, naturally, they must think of some form of title which will enable the land to be worked in the best possible way and produce the most. But they must also, as far as possible, plan the new system so that it will fit in, to some extent with the customs of the people and their social organisation. If the change is too great the tribal organisation of the people will break down and the new system simply will not work—or at any rate not for several generations. The way in which a people lives cannot be completely changed overnight.

The systems adopted are not necessarily the same in all countries. Because of the different circumstances of land use, different tribal circumstances and customs, relationships between different races, and so on, there is no general and ideal system possible. What may work in, say, Uganda, may by no means suit Papua. Each case has to be worked out by itself for there is no world-wide rule about what is the best form of tenure.

The history of Maori land titles is a subject of particular interest to the Maori people on which little has been published in a generally available form. The opinions and conclusions, contained in this article are not to be taken as representing any official viewpoint.

Maori Ancestral Rights

To get back to our question in New Zealand: before any criticism can be made of the course taken here, it is necessary to know what did happen and, broadly, why it happened. Some brief historical survey is therefore necessary.

In the days before Europeans arrived the Maori customary system of land holding centred on the tribe or hapu. Founded on ancestral right, conquest or occasionally gift, confirmed always by occupation or use, a tribe would hold an area of land consisting of a number of blocks. Within the tribe, the hapus or family groups would have rights located in blocks or parts of blocks, but rarely was there anything approaching individual ownership. Generally speaking rights would tend to be more finely divided out in closely settled areas, as in places of fixed residence and areas of intensive cultivation. There are however examples of something approaching individual rights of use, if not of the ownership order, in bird-sharing trees, rat-catching runs, fishing channels and the like.

But there was no real certainty of rights since they could be overturned by force. Within the tribe there was a reasonable chance of preserving rights but they could hold good only within the tribe. No assertion of ancestral title or gift or occupation could avail against a superior force of arms by an outside tribe. There could be no certainty as a lawyer would put it of “quiet enjoyment”.

It is clear, therefore, that title, even where it might approach the individual title, stood or fell with the tribe or hapu whose corporate strength would defend it. The individual could not exist apart from his membership of the group and the rights of the group dominated the rights of the individual, as witness for example the “muru” custom. The chiefs and elders were the governing organs of the community, and, to a greater or lesser extent according to their degree of autocracy, could claim to speak for the tribe.

Buying the Land

When a European prior to the Treaty of Waitangi and for many years thereafter wanted to purchase land, he was faced with the initial hurdle of ascertaining the tribe or chief with whom he should negotiate—i.e., those who would have the right to sell the land. Sometimes this was comparatively easy—it was obvious from the circumstances. But many and many a would-be purchaser found that after he had, as he thought, completed a bargain with the proper people, others came forward alleging their rights. As he had no sure means of determining who had the better title, he must either satisfy all or give up the land. Many claims were disallowed by the early Land Purchase Commissioners because negotiations had not been with the right people.

It was more than twenty years after the Treaty of Waitangi that something effective was done to meet this situation.

The danger of trouble arising from purchasing from one tribe land claimed by another became more and more prominent. The outstanding and classic example is Waitara which was the occasion, if not necessarily the direct cause of the Taranaki Wars. In addition the old Maori social order was

already seriously shaken, and the authority of the chiefs weakening—particularly in regions of close settlement. Thousands of Maoris had already left their village communities to work for or with settlers. They had discovered the attractions of a cash economy and had developed more sophisticated tastes in clothing, food, furniture, and, of course, stimulants and sports. Boys who had been given a sound education in missionary schools had become men and the Christian teachings were on the whole not calculated to maintain the communal relationships previously existing.

Land Court Established

The obvious course was therefore taken of setting up a special tribunal to determine ownership, very much for the purpose of ensuring that when purchases or leases were made they would be made from the right people and there would be made from the right people and there would be no argument. There was no question but that from the European point of view purchasing was necessary, with thousands of square miles in the North Island held by the Maoris and surplus to their actual needs. Settlers were still arriving, and routine systems of farming were being evolved. Communications still needed much development.

In addition, although this probably had less importance attached to it, such a tribunal would enable effect to be given to the undertakings of the Treaty of Waitangi to confirm the rights of the Maoris to their land. Before those rights could be confirmed they must be ascertained. Disputes between tribes and hapus must be settled, the point of reference being the position at the time of the Treaty itself. The Maoris who had had interests in land were entitled to look to the Government or the Crown for protection against encroachment by Europeans or other Maoris. In the old days, as a last resort the strong arm was an effective title deed, but now some other means had to be found.

An attempt to set up such a tribunal was made in 1862 when the first Native Lands Act was passed. For a number of reasons however, this was abortive. It was operated only in the far northern districts and to a very minor extent and it was not until 1865 that the first effective Court was set up by the Native Lands Act, 1865. The process by which the Court dealt with lands brought before it was essentially the same as was followed right down to the early part of this century, when, except for a very few small areas, the last of the blocks of Maori customary land were being dealt with. Claims were lodged, the land was surveyed, a sitting was held where the various claimants stated the nature of their claims and led evidence. The Court then, from the conflicting evidence, determined who were the owners

as at 1840, the date of the Treaty, and issued a certificate of ownership which resulted in the issue of a Crown Grant. But the Court could only put 10 names in any certificate and accordingly inserted the names of ten or less persons selected by the owners—normally the leading chiefs or heads of families—the idea being clearly that they should hold for and on behalf of the hapu or tribe. It was, in fact, possible for the Court instead to issue the certificate in the name of a tribe or hapu. The trouble about this was that no method was provided of dealing with land in this way, that is, of selling or leasing, and the eyes of the Maoris as well as those of Europeans were turned towards alienating. The consequence of the ten owner system was, unhappily in many cases that the persons (usually chiefs) nominated as owners dealth with the land as if it were their absolute property, and in many cases the remaining beneficial owners got nothing.

Indeed, various steps were taken to avoid this, and later the names of all members of the tribe were inserted as beneficial owners, but the grantees still had power to lease. Eventually the law required, as perhaps it should have done from the start, the insertion of all names.

Towards Full Individual Ownership

With this arose fresh problems. Since all were included in the title, a sale of the land required the execution of a deed of conveyance by all, including minors and other persons under disability. No relative shares were at this stage defined. This made the process of alienation well nigh impossible particularly where the members of the owning tribe might reach some hundreds, until at last the time came when the law permitted the sale of undivided interests which might be cut out by partition for the purchaser. Ultimately the Court was required to define interests. This was normally, in fact, arranged by the owners themselves reaching agreement and submitting the result to the Court.

The flow towards the individualisation of interests once commenced was irreversible and it resulted in more and more difficulties, complicated by the constant spate of legislation and it is true to say that it was not until the Act of 1909 that one coherent and clear system of dealing with Maori Land Titles was set forth. Here despite earlier foreshadowings we first have a clear system of dealing by vote of the owners in the assembled owners procedure; the incorporation system enabling the owners to work their land by means of an incorporation; the governing body being an elected committee of management; the relatively clear system for cutting up and leasing lands vested in the Maori Land Boards which, for reasons often quite unforseeable, were to go so astray—also a comprehensive code for the purchase of Maori Land by the Crown. It was well on in the 1920's before any workable system of financing the development of Maori land for Maori settlement was formulated.

Succession and Partition

The position was, then, that much Maori land after passing through the Court was held by a number of owners each individually, with a defined share. Before long it became necessary to provide for some method of succession to a deceased owner to be found. For this purpose the Court was given power to act and it was laid down that succession (to land interests) should as nearly as possible be in accordance with Maori custom. This meant that, generally speaking, succession was in favour of all children equally so that as time went by shares got smaller and smaller as the number of owners became larger.

The Court also, at quite an early stage, was given power to partition land—that is to cut out the interests of different people or groups of people into different parts, each with a separate title. Over the country the Court has made many thousands of partitions, resulting in pieces of land of all shapes and sizes which today are not easily handled for practical use. There are for example, the “fiddle-string” groups of sections, perhaps several miles long and only a chain or two wide. We tend to wonder these days why a piece of land should be cut up into such fantastic shapes. There is usually an explanation. The “Fiddlestring” type of partition was designed to give the owners of each section a part of each sort of land in a block. Thus the section might run from the sea back into the hills, enabling the owners to have access to the sea for sea food, to have some flat land for residence and cultivation, and some hill country for forest foods and timber.

Could Tribal Ownership Have Been Maintained?

So we come to to-day's position. The great part of Maori land has been sold. Of what is left a great deal is broken and poor in quality, and much is difficult to deal with owing to badly shaped sections and a multitude of owners.

Our question is whether some other system of titles could have been used which would have prevented all these difficulties, and which would perhaps have encouraged, at a much earlier stage the farming by the Maoris of their land for their own benefit. Many people think this would have been possible if some system of ownership nearer to the tribal system had been carried on by the laws and the Maori Land Court, rather than the giving to each person of a distinct share which he could deal with himself.

The issue between the communal type of title

and the individualised title is not a new one. It has been argued almost from the beginning by different people interested in the administration of Maori land. In the report of the Native Land Laws Commission of 1891, the question is discussed to some extent but not in a very constructive way. The majority report, by W. L. Rees, M.H.R., and James (later Sir James) Carroll, M.H.R., expressed vague bankering for the days when all sales were carried on in public by the natural leaders of the tribe and “when the Maori chief was a gentleman”. But the report is really concerned mainly with ease and convenience in alienation, more than anything else, although considerable thought is given to the providing of safeguards against unfairness to Maori settlers. The report is not particularly impressive, on the whole, bearing indications that it is mainly the work of Rees, who was something of an amateur political economist. He has, of course, a particular interest in connection with Maori land since he was largely concerned with the promotion of the Native Land Settlement Scheme on the East Coast, which if it had not been for the intervention of Government at the eleventh hour, would have resulted in the loss by many Maoris of the East Coast of the greater part of their land. However, the report did serve to draw attention to the complex and inconsistent web of legislation, and the separate memorandum by Carroll is remarkable for its discussion of the need to assist Maoris by training and finance to farm their lands for themselves.

All the argument has been as between the individual and communal type title. Would the retention of a communal title have helped the farming of the land by the Maoris themselves at an earlier stage? There are some indications this way. In certain districts especially, particularly in the early 1850's, considerable quantities of produce were provided by Maori communities for sale to Europeans—usually sent to the cities or towns by coastal shipping, frequently owned by Maoris themselves. Wheat, maize, potatoes, fruit, pigs, kumaras were produced as it seems by something approaching the old communal system. In the old records of the Native Office one comes time and time again across references to the giving of a plough, a horse, a mill (often a steel hand mill but occasionally a water-powered mill) or seed to various chiefs (i.e., to them and their tribes or hapus), or the loan of moneys to buy some of these things. Small ships as well, should be included in the list. A thrifty people could perhaps expand their activities from their profits but it must be remembered that the Maoris were quick to desire the warmth and smartness (?) of European clothes; the relish and softness of European foods and tobacco and drink, to purchase (even for peaceful purposes) guns and ammunition and a hundred and one other things. So long as settlers were pouring into the country to be fed, and the pattern of New Zealand farming had not as yet settled itself, when white farmers were “mixed farming” and feeding themselves before producing a saleable surplus, the crops of the Maoris sold. But once farmers began to specialise, the market for Maori goods contracted and they

could no longer get for their relatively poor produce the prices which formerly induced their energy. It is to be noted, too, that a strong market has been created for all food produce by the Californian and Australian gold rushes. When this extraordinary demand ceased prices dropped heavily both in Australia and New Zealand.

Meanwhile, the good lands were diminishing fast, by sale. It may be that the rate of sale was too fast, but it is plain nonsense to blink the fact that the pressure to sell was irrestible. Once let settlement commence and the rest had to come.

Chiefs Lose Power

Notwithstanding all this, could not the Maoris have gone on on the lands they occupied on a communal agricultural or even pastoral basis—to a greater extent than in fact happened? In my view this was impossible because the old system of social government was breaking down, and there was nothing to replace it as yet. Under the older system, there was a coherent will in the community, expressed finally perhaps through the chief or chiefs, but nevertheless naturally flowing from all. Management on details would be vested in the chief or such other person as might be delegated. As settlement spread, however, and employment could be obtained either with settlers, local authorities or Government contractors, the relatively tight group fell apart. Some at least of the men sought work with a cash payment, or if not for that for the adventure and interest of novel ways. There was, in fact, little to hold them together. The office of chieftainship became more and more a ceremonial status and pakeha law began to permeate the tribal settlement. The ultimate authority of force was little by little prohibited. The slaves were now free men and had an interest in maintaining their changed status.

This short essay must omit to deal with the effect of the wars which did not touch all districts or even a majority of them. The Waikato, Taranaki, the East Coast and Bay of Plenty were affected but some to a minor degree only. Notwithstanding the temporary tightening of tribal ranks around the chiefs and men of influence it seems that even these episodes would in the long run accelerate rather than reverse the decadence of the corporate entity that once existed. The more travelling involved, the long absences from tribal lands, the loss of those lands and the settlement on them of pakeha—all these spelt the end of the communal working group.

It seems unlikely that the preservation of the communal type of title would, by itself, have held together the tribal or hapu community as a working and living group.

Perhaps there could have been a middle course—something short of a title vested in all the owners in defined shares. Possibly an incorporated body such as is common today, managed by a committee of management composed in the main of the recognised leaders of families. Such an arrangement would be closer in spirit to the ancient ways. But even here, there is room to think that the other forces already mentioned might have been too strong. It must have been a necessary part of any changeover in title that the membership of the tribe or title be fixed and this recording of membership would at this stage at any rate contain the seeds of individualism. It was not until much later that, after a period of despair and poverty, the East Coast people prompted by men trained in the pakeha world, drew more closely together again in communal farming projects.

Individual Ownership Inevitable and Successful

One is drawn more and more to the conclusion that the type of title given to the Maori people by the laws of the Europeans was relatively unimportant in the general circumstances that then existed. The brutal facts are that no one was genuinely interested in preserving Maori land in Maori ownership. On the contrary the Government, the settlers and many Maoris were concerned mainly with buying and selling. No device of titles or restrictions could have held up the irresistible pressure of settlement. By the time this pressure was relaxed, it was too late in many districts. The cream of the land was gone. What was left was relatively unattractive, and while it might be suitable for a papakainga area was by no means adapted to modern farming use.

It is with this remnant of land that we are now concerned. There is little enough in comparison with the growth of the people. It is too late to change the broad outlines of the system, even if there were good reasons for doing so, but there are plenty of ways and means of improvement. The pattern is fairly clear. The main line of progress must, it seems, be towards true individualisation—one person or family owning and using land in the most efficient and productive way. Another special line is that of the incorporation where a central management runs a large block for the benefit of the owners.

There is an enormous amount of work to be done before we can be satisfied about the condition of Maori land. The question is whether this work can be done within a reasonable time. This will depend largely on the recognition by the people of the extent of the task, and their determination to tackle it. Fortunately it is clear that most people are now aware of the problems and are doing their best to overcome them. If this attitude is kept up there can be no doubt of success.

WAIATA MO NGA TUPAPAKU KATOA

Ko tenei waiata he waiata tenei ka waiatatia ake e au. Ko tenei waiata no Ngapuhi. Ko au e korero nei ko Te Aka Rapana, ko taku iwi, ko taku hapu ko Ngati Pikiao, ko Ngati Kauwhata, o te Arawa. Ko ahau e whakatikatika nei i etahi o nga waiata kua mutu ake ra, a me nga patere. No reira ka waiata ake au i te waiata nei, ko tenei waiata e tika ana mo nga tupapaku katoa.

E taka ki te raro mai koia ana te aroha,
Te roimata e tae ke i runga he puna noa ra,
Utuia i te roa, ko te tau ko te aroha ra i,
To tinana te akau e hunga i, whitirere ki te Ao,
I oma ai me whakau, kua tatu ki taua, ki te ipo
Tipare ai, e mohio atu nei ko te wairua kei te
Whakatata, komingo ana te tau o taku ate pehia
Rawa i Puke me he manu tu aurere ana te whakapai;
I aku rongo tuku nui kei honaia e te korero;
Kau mai ana ia i te tai timu kei Kaipara, te
Ngakau ra e kawe ana, kia tomokia te ngaru, taua ki
Te reinga; e tae ki reira, kei hoki muri mai ko te
Wairua mate, ki te iwi.

Na ka mohio mai ai koutou te tikanga o tenei waiata i ki ake ra au ka tika mo nga tangata katoa. Kahore hoki i whakahua tangata, kahore i whakahua koroke, tane, wahine ranei. Ko tenei waiata no Ngapuhi, no roto i Ngapuhi. Na koina te mea e whakatikatika ake ana au i tenei mea i te waiata ka tika mo nga mate katoa. Kahore he mea kia wahine rawa, kia tane rawa, e tika ana mo tenei mea mo te aitua. Na kati ake taku whakamarama mo tenei waiata.

WAIATA TIKI TUPAPAKU

Ko tenei waiata he waiata mo tenei mea mo te tangata mate. Haria mai ana ki tetahi wahi. Koira au i whakamarama ake ai, i waiata ake ai i tenei waiata me ona whakamarama, kia mohio ai nga tangata ehara ke tenei waiata mo te tangata, engari i roto i tenei ra kua hurihia mo te tangata. Ko te tikanga ke o tenei waiata mo te huahua kuku tona tikanga. A e hiahia ai au ki te korero i tenei mea, hei whakatikatika i tenei mea; kei haria tonutia hei waiata tiki tupapaku.

Ko etahi o tatou takiwa kei te mau i tenei kaupapa i te ahuatanga o tatou tupuna o mua. Ko tenei mea ko te tiki tupapaku ki te haere ki te tiki, ka karangatia, ka haere atu, kahore he tangi. Mehemea ki te tangi te hunga haere atu ki te tiki i taua tupapaku, kua waimaori te tangi. Na, no reira ko tenei waiata i waiatatia ai hei tohu ki te iwi kainga, e tikana atu ana taua tupapaku, e mauria ana. Kei roto tonu i tenei waiata e mohio ai te iwi kainga, te iwi o te marae, he waiata tiki tupapaku, e haria ana. Na taihoa au e whakatikatika haere i nga kupu o tenei waiata kua haria hoki i roto i tenei ra, hei waiata tiki tupapaku. Na ka timatatia ake nei, ka haere te ope ki te tiki, te mea tuatahi he waiata paoho kotahi te tangata mana e waiata.

Tuhia te kawe, te kawe, te kawe oi ko te kawe o te haerenga. kawe o te haerenga.

Tu atu taku tira i te ahiahi ko Ue ko whakataka te manu ki a tane, nau mai e waha i toku tuara.

Na kua mohio tonu mai te iwi kainga kua whitiki.

Heu e, heu e te pu o Tongariro kia whakatangatanga hopuhoputanga ki tona wai pehapeha e tangi haere ana ki roto o Maea a te, waho te kainga o aku manu.

Ko te tino tikanga tera o te waiata nei. I tenei ra, waiho te kainga mo koutou. Na ko te hurihanga mai tera i te tikanga e mea nei au he waiata manu.

E tae koe ki te rangi e uia mai koe.

Kei hea, kei hea, kei hea te kura matapipiri, Na Rua-koruato-whangawhangaia-ariki ko Pu

Ko Whiti ki te wharau rohe o Paura o Wheoro

Ko ianei i te pa te pa whai hei he hiki i te

Manu i te aha ko te manu i te aha i te manu repo.

Kani ake, kani ake, kani mataura i raro ra tapore.

Tapore taku wairua ki roto ki kiri maurirere, ki te manu tawe o Rehua tau toru,

Ka hona ki te Ao Pipiri Ka whakairia ki runga o taku tuara.

Kua huri tena wahi, kua hapaingia te tupapaku, kaore he korero. Na haere atu ana. Na i mea kea au i tenei waiata, e kei te mahia tenei waiata hei waiata tiki tupapaku, engari ko te tino whakamaramatanga o tenei waiata tona tikanga, he waiata huahua kuku. Tenei kainga ko Hurakia koia tera te wahi o tenei mea o te kukupa. Ka whakairia ki runga Hurakia koia na, na ka koukou ki roto i taua whenua, me he manu. A no reira au i hiahia i tenei waiata, kia whakatikaina kia whakakore a ranei, i te mea tenei waiata, he waiata tiki huahua. He mea nui hoki tera ki mua, tata rite atu ano tera momo mea i mua he tangata. Te ngakau whaki i tera mea. A koia tenei ko te waiata. No reira kati ake taku whakamarama i tenei waiata kua oti nei te waiata ake.

A REPORTAGE OF THE MAORI SPRINGBOK MATCH

by Kem Tukukino

As for the weather, dark clouds were gathering, but the sky was far from overcast.

The more serious ones discussed the question uppermost in everyone's mind ‘Can they do it?’

Eden Park was a wonderful sight. Here were gathered the thousands who had waited so long for this match. From the Bluff oyster beds, the sheep farms of the East Coast, the dairy farms of Waikato and Taranaki and from Northland, the people had assembled in what must be considered one of the greatest tribal gatherings of modern times.

The atmosphere seemed strangely subdued; the carnival spirit which had been apparent in the city and at pre-match functions the night before had disappeared, and in its place there was left a state of tension.

There was, in that large crowd, a feeling of belonging, of one-ness and of pride, such as is apparent at any large hui. As one university student put it, it makes you feel great to be a Maori.

It seemed a pity therefore that the organizers did not make full use of an opportunity to show the pakeha—and the Maori too—aspects of Maori culture which would have proved both beneficial and entertaining. This however was only one fault in a huge administrative job, which in all other respects was done most creditably and efficiently.

As match time grew nearer, excitement revived; it increased during the last curtain raiser and reached a crescendo as the black and green players ran on to the field.

There was silence while the National Anthem was played and then terrifying roars as the Maori team did their haka.

The composition of the teams was as follows:

SOUTH AFRICA

Full-Back—Viviers.

Three-Quarters—Briers, Kirkpatrick, Nel, van Vollenhoven.

Fly-Half—Howe.

Scrum-Half—Strydom.

Back Row—Retief.

Middle Row—Ackermann, Claassen, Du Rand, Starke.

Front Row—Bekker, van der Merwe, Walker.

NEW ZEALAND MAORIS

Full-Back—Walters.

Three-Quarters—Menzies, Walsh, Katene.

Five-Eighths—Taitoko, Gray.

Half-Back—Davis.

Back Row—Pryor.

Middle Row—Potae, Hill, Hiha, Emery.

Front Row—Clarke, Kite, Hohaia.

From the side-lines, the features of play which brought victory to the Springboks seemed to be:

*The exceptional power and mobility of the South African pack from the first scrum onwards.

*The almost complete domination of line-out play by the South African forwards, especially Claassen and Du Rand.

*The latitude allowed the South African half-backs Strydom and Howe, who ran almost at will and simply tore the Maori defence wide open.

*Glorious kicking by the Springbok captain Viviers, who converted five times and kicked two brilliant field goals.

*The strong running of Nel, Kirkpatrick and Briers, whose task was made easier by the absence of any Maori cover defence.

The ineffectual tackling by the loose forwards and Maori inside backs were features which did not appeal to the large crowd.

The Maoris were defeated; they were outclassed by a team that was fitter, faster and more brilliant on the day, a team which showed that they were worthy of the name Springbok.

It was a great disappointment to the thousands of Maori people present, especially those who had travelled long distances. The score was hard to believe, but the people were loud in their praise of the Boks' display. Amongst the rows of buses and cars outside the ground, one could sense an almost unnatural quiet, the people were subdued, the overwhelming defeat had come as a great shock.

However, there was little time for immediate regret and it is typical of the Maori that win or lose there should be some form of celebration. In homes and halls all over Auckland thousands met. The people found an opportunity to have family and tribal reunions and others found a good excuse for just having a party. The scene at Te Papapa—a hall hired by a private Auckland citizen to entertain some 120 visiting relations—was a typical one. Here the programme took the form of a hangi kai followed by a social which lasted till the early hours of the morning. At these gatherings the traditional songs and dances of the Maori made up for the day's disappointment.

The game was over and now the opportunity came to sum up the pleasanter aspects of the weekend. Most memorable probably was the way it brought people closer together. Maori and pakeha mingled with one another, new friendships were created and old ones renewed. Rugby showed that it was not just a sport but also a social institution for forming healthy relationships. As the Minister of Maori Affairs said the following day when the Springboks were welcomed at Turangawaewae: ‘Sport serves as a channel for the instilling of goodwill and fellowship among people, races and nations.’

A sixth form pupil at the Epsom Grammar school, Ngaio Te Rito, originally of Masterton, was the second Maori to be awarded an American Field Service scholarship. She left for San Francisco last July and will spend two years living with an American family and attending an American college.

She was educated at the Queen Victoria School for Maori Girls, in Auckland. The first Field Scholarship winner, Miss Tuhingia Barclay, was also educated there.

Miss Te Rito is the granddaughter of Te Makirangi Te Rito of Kihitu, Wairoa and the great granddaughter of Eru Mete of Wairoa. Through him she is descended from the Ngapuhi chief Patuone.

* * *

A new Maori church in permanent materials is being built near the old Pamapuria Maori Anglican Church, Kaitaia. Much of the work is being done by voluntary helpers, and it is hoped to have the bulk of it completed in about a fort-night. They are using concrete blocks as the main material. The old church is to be pulled down, and rebuilt elsewhere as a parish hall and Bible Class hall. So far all the money needed is not to hand, but the community is pressing on with the work, hoping that more money will be found as the building takes form and shape.

Symbolic Carvings

The conduct of this meeting left nothing to be desired, and the host tribe of Ngati Ranginui are deserving of the highest praise for the tremendous amount of work they carried out from the first to the last day of this memorable gathering, and for the never failing spirit of goodwill, the lavish hospitality and efficient organisation in all branches of the affairs of the marae. The marae workers; from the cooks, the waiters, the groundsmen, the wardens, the caretakers of the marquees and sleeping quarters, the pa traffic officers and the office staff all contributed in full measure to the great success of the meeting.

The catering was of a high order and was most favourably commented on by the visitors, both pakeha and Maori. The women of the visiting tribes were loud in their praises for the high standard set by Ngati Ranginui in the quality of workmanship of the whariki (sleeping mats). The kiekie weaving in attractive traditional patterns of the whariki—not only in Tamatea-pokai-whenua but also in other sleeping quarters—was a point that was not lost on the hundreds of visitors and will constitute a challenge to many a marae throughout the land. Well done Ngati Ranginui!

The subject of intoxicating liquor and gambling was touched on by His Lordship Bishop Panapa in his sermon during the Sunday morning service. “These two things were brought to this country by the Pakeha”, His Lordship said, “and generally speaking the Pakeha knows how to deal with them. I take a broad view on these matters, and I say to you, ‘if you abstain or keep control at all times all is well. Never let them become your masters’.”

A Judea memory which will be remembered was the misty rain which lasted on and off throughout the gathering. In a talk to European visitors on the Sunday afternoon, Dr Maharaia Winiata spoke somewhat humourously and said, “We Maoris believe that whenever big chiefs travel to strange places they bring rain with them; and to-day we have with us the very highest and most noble blood in the land.” This feature of the gathering was the subject of quite serious discussion by tribal elders. The weather element was linked with other occasions. There was the occasion when the Sim's Royal Commission opened its enquiries into the Confiscation of Maori tribal lands. Just as it was announced the Commission would commence its Waitara sitting a sudden sharp shower of rain came on. On the Waahi marae, when Tumate, son of King Mahuta, announced he was proceeding to Wellington to negotiate for a settlement of the Waikato-Maniapoto Confiscation, there was a similar shower of rain. On Judea Marae at 3 p.m. on Saturday, 5th May, 1956, just as the unanimous consent of the assembled tribes was given to the Ngati Ranginui Confiscation Resolution (Resolution No. 1 of the Runanganui Conference) there was a short sharp shower of warm rain. A voice spoke across the marae and said. “This rain is a good omen and it is welcome. The tears of the departed of Ngati Ranginui, who suffered so much, bless us for what we have this day resolved.

Tribal leaders promised Ngati Ranginui every help possible in any approach they might make to the Government for some measure of redress in the matter of the Confiscation of their ancestral lands.

Marae Complete

The culmination of over 4 years voluntary work in the construction of Tamatea-pokai-whenua, and Ihuparapara and Iwipupu under such auspicious circumstances augurs well for the future of Ngati Ranginui. The dreams of their departed elders;

Te Rohu Ranui, Ngatoko Rahipere, Winiata Piahana, the families of Te Hikuwai, Peri Kohu, Matiu Kohu, Karora Kohu—all of whom have gone beyond the veil—have now been fulfilled. Two links with the past and the dreams of the Ngati Ranginui elders are the two elderly ladies of Judea marae, Ngawhetu and Ngawaikaukau; these two fine ladies were mentioned as being responsible for the wonderful response of the Ngati Ranginui.

Under the guidance of Maharaia Winiata (now Dr Maharaia Winiata) the families of the departed elders of Ngati Ranginui rallied to the call of their tribal leaders. Under the tuition and supervision of Henare Toka and his wife, Mere, the carving, decorative scroll work, and the weaving of the tukutuku panels was carried out to a triumphant conclusion. The completed marae project on Judea will be a striking monument to the skilful and artistic work of those young people; the names of most of them are recorded in the Souvenir Booklet.

Showplace of Tauranga

It is certain the Judea marae as an assembly place will be one of the show places of the flourishing town of Tauranga. The history of the

building programme is an inspiring and fine example of co-operation between the Maori and the European people of the town and district. During the celebrations Dr Maharaia Winiata paid a tribute to the generosity of the Tauranga people and made a pleasing reference to the never failing help which was given freely by His Worship the Mayor of Tauranga, the trades-people and the citizens of the Borough. It was particularly pleasing to all those who were present to see the complete and fine understanding which was exemplified in the participation of both races during the festivities attending the ceremonial opening of “Tamatea-pokai-whenua” and “Iwipupu”.

The Ngati Ranginui are deserving of every encouragement. The resurgence of tribal pride in the cultural aspirations of the race, and the fine achievement of completing community buildings of outstanding excellence on their ancestral marae reflects a moral fibre of remarkable resilience.

Others Will Follow

A feature which must give the Ngati Ranginui tribe a great deal of satisfaction was the reaction from several visiting tribal leaders who announced during the celebrations their determination to go ahead with some similar project to the fine buildings of Judea. This is a distinction in the field of cultural art for Ngati Ranginui which comes well as further proof that the work of the late Sir Apirana Ngata in promoting this aspect of Maori culture will still go on.

An interesting and valuable feature of the Souvenir Booklet is the inclusion of classical Maori poetry in the form of powhiri (welcome chant), waiata (old time songs), patere (tribal action songs of old), ngeri (war chant), karakia (ritual chants). These compositions enshrine the ancient and proud history of Ngati Ranginui.

Many Forms of Music

Various speakers stood up that evening to describe the club's educational activities. They were so many that it seemed incredible for a group of men and women on a public works project to attempt such a programme. Of the European fields of knowledge, the club concentrates on community singing, band music and dressmaking. People are taught to read music according to the solfa scale. On the Maori side, there are now not only action songs and hakas, but also pao and patere; they play stick games; they have learnt the proper way of making piupiu and taniko.

Where do they get their lecturing staff from? They hardly go outside their own circle but everyone tells the others what he knows. They are always looking round for people with talents; for instance, Mardi Taipeti had learned taniko at Turakina Girls College; so she was asked to be teacher. Taniko became part of the club programme. Mr Wari Ward, the chairman, learned music when he worked at the office at Ratana Pa (a fellow worker was learning music, and he followed his example) and led a choir and a string band at Ratana. He now teaches part singing at Mangakino. Mac Moses, who like Bill Waiwai is a foreman rigger, was taught the saxophone and clarinet from some Englishmen at the Tuai hydro settlement when he was very young; he has been working in music ever since, leading dance bands at Waikaremoana where his home is and elsewhere. Two of the Aotearoa Quartet now touring England were first trained by Mr Moses. At Mangakino he continues doing what he has always done: encouraging some of the boys to play instruments, and going to dances to play. Mr Waiwai's specialty on the other hand are the Maori arts and crafts.

Yet the club invited experts where needed.

(Continued on page 52)

HOW KORORAREKA WAS WON

Some four years after the signing of the Treaty at Waitangi in 1840, Hone Heke of the Ngatitautahi of Kaikohe journeyed to Wahapu to meet Kawiti. The object of this visit was the conveying of ‘te ngakau’ to the Ngatihine chief. This was an old custom observed by those who sought help to settle a tribal grievance.

Various methods were used by different tribes to show that serious action was necessary.

For instance, after a certain murder, a female relative of the victim conveyed ‘te ngakau’ by travelling from Hokianga to the Bay of Islands to enlist suport.

In another case, the chief, driving a pig before him as an offering, travelled some considerable distance. The mission completed, the pig was killed and the carcase distributed throughout the district. This meat was a “ngakau”—a signal for the mobilization of all fighting men.

Another was announced through a specially composed chant, and needless to say these appeals seldom fell on deaf ears.

So it was with Heke, a distant relative of Kawiti. He brought with him a mere smeared with human dung. No explanation was needed, the meaning was obvious. Someone had defiled

the mana of Ngapuhi and such a challenge must be met!¹

There was an all night gathering of leaders. Once more the ‘tatai’ or line of descent from Rahiri and Hineamaru was traced and described by the tohungas. The genealogical net when completed would cover the whole of the tribal district. Rahiri and Nineamaru, Ngapuhi ancestors, would bring a number of subtribes together: Ngatihine, Ngatitautahi, Te Kapotai, Ngatimaru, Te Waiariki and many others. Once these knew that the cause was right, the choice of partnership was backed by tradition.

Heke had come to ask Kawiti to join forces with him to fight the pakeha.

Kawiti belonged to an earlier generation, older and more experienced in warfare. With Mataroria, Ruatara, Paraoa, Motiti, Hewa, Mahanga and other warriors he had been an ally of Hongi Hika in many battles.

His reply to Heke was ‘Poroporoa i nga ringa-ringa me nga waewae’ meaning ‘Cut off the hands and legs’. Their plan was that Heke should fell the flagstaff above the settlement of Kororareka while Kawiti with Kapotai warriors attacked the town. The outcome of these encounters has been recorded before and there is little to add. From the point of view of the Maoris, both offensives were carried out successfully. Heke succeeded in his task, the felling of the flagstaff. Kawiti sacked Kororareka, losing Pumuku, one of his warriors.

A story is told of an encounter with an officer during the battle. Pumuku had fallen and the

officer, seeing Kawiti with some of his followers near the Church, advanced towards him, sword in hand. The old chief called out to his men ‘E te whanau, tukua mai ki ahau’. Well past middle age he would be then, but still able to give the foe their play. The taiaha too would be severely tested against the sword.

‘My people, leave him to come to me’ was the

order he gave as he knelt down to the ready position. Had the soldier known how invulnerable a Maori warrior is in this position, he would have changed his method of attack. However, according to an eyewitness—Mikaera Rini of Panguru who told the story to Hone Wi Mutu, also of Panguru—the officer failed in the attempt, was thrown to the ground and despatched with Kawiti's mere.

The European residents boarded the ships, leaving the town in the Maoris' hands.

Orders given by the two leaders on this occasion are still remembered. Heke was quoted to have called out ‘E te iwi ee wiwirautia!’ Kawiti however shouted ‘E te whanau ee takirautia!’ According to my informants, the first of these sayings meant ‘a clean sweep’ but the second ‘spare the women and children’.

THE SIEGE OF OKAIHAU

After this battle the Maori forces retired to Okaihau, inland and between forty and fifty miles to the north-west. This pa may have been Heke's choice. It was centrally situated and on the boundary between Ngapuhi and the northern and western tribes.²

It should be remembered that so soon after Honga Hika's battles against Ngatiwhatua in the south-west, Rarawa in the north-west and Nga

tipou in the east, Ngapuhi could not expect any assistance from these quarters. On the contrary they might be found on the opposite side to settle old grievances. This is what actually happened. Here was the best opportunity to defeat Heke. However, there were one or two compensating factors limiting the war effort of the Maoris who joined the pakeha.

First of all Waaka Nene, and Patuone, their leaders, were already Christians and really did not enjoy their part in the fighting. Secondly, Ngapuhi themselves, they were fighting against their own kith and kin. Furthermore, their allies were ‘tauiwi’ or foreigners whose methods of warfare were totally different. There was no tapu on the person of the pakeha. The Maori on the other hand had to wear the tapu armour or he met disaster. The breaking of tapu on the battlefield was believed to bring misfortune to the person or to the whole army.

The battle of Okaihau therefore was the first test of strength between Maori and pakeha on the one hand and between Heke and Waaka Nene on the other. Of the losses Kawiti suffered three warriors are remembered, Taura, Tara and Ruku, but there were others.

One fact that deserves note was the absence of hatred in either camp. There were no cannibalistic practices such as had occurred in the past in battles between Maori and Maori. Instead, the utmost courtesy was shown to the foe. The pakeha had not eaten those who were slain so that there was no call for retribution. The ‘hoariri’ enemy belonged to the same tribe as the missionaries and must be treated with respect.

Experience in the art of war, the fullest knowledge of the country and permission to choose their battlefield was a distinct advantage to the Maori. The British troops, though unaccustomed to the land they had to pass through, were better equipped in guns and ammunition which made their chances even.

Success or defeat in battle is measured by the Maori not by the number slain but by the number of chiefs that were captured or killed. For instance, the death or capture of Kawiti or Heke would have meant the end of the battle. Kawiti lost his eldest son, Taura, here. It is said that he failed to give ready help at Korokareka and was rebuked by his father. Here he walked right into the battle and was slain.

THE STORMING OF OHAEAWAI

We still remember some words spoken by the Ngatirangi chief Pene Taui: ‘He aha tenei e toia nei i runga i au?’ (What is this thing dragged over my head?). They commemorate a slight difference in the Maori camp regarding the place for the next battle. Kawiti, it seems, asked for a stand to be made in his territory, but Pene Taui's reply decided the issue, and the choice of battleground was Ohaeawai, Pene's own pa, just a few miles south of Okaihau.

Here new methods of warfare were adopted by the Maoris. In addition to the usual pallisades of heavy timber, flax-leaves were also used to protect the defenders, and this flax actually succeeded in deflecting bullets.

Rockets were used by the British, but met with little success.

Women, too, played their part in the trenches behind the pallisades by loading the guns for the men. When the soldiers charged the pa, they were met by an uninterrupted volley of lead from the defenders, causing the loss of many brave men.

It is said that the Maoris had managed to obtain a Union Jack by creeping through the bush and stealing it. The Officer seeing it in the pa, flying below the Maori flag, lost his head and ordered his men to charge. That was exactly what the Maoris in the pa wanted to happen. Pene Taui's pa had withstood the heavy bombardment of the British artillery and the defenders had repelled the soldiers' onslaughts, striking back with devastating result. Thus Pene's choice of battlefield was justified.

Hone Heke was wounded at this engagement. Some say he had broken the tapu laws of the field of battle. He had taken some object from a dead soldier's person and so become ‘noa’. Be it as it may, Heke after this began to lose heart for the fight. Now a wounded man, taken away to the ancestral ‘tuaahu’ shrine at Hikurangi, he began seriously to think of peace.

He even made an appeal to Kawiti, who replied in words that have become proverbial ‘I mea au i tu ai koe ki te riri kia taea teika o te kopua, kahore i te patihitihi nei ano, kua karanga koe kaati’. (I expected when you took up arms that you would go out to catch the fish of the deep; now, only in the shallows, you are calling out for peace). Kawiti was determined to continue the war.³

Up to now Kawiti's forces had fought outside the pa defences in every battle. A master of flanktactics, he had taken on the task of forcing the pakeha to fight on two fronts. He now retired to his own pa, where he could face the foe from behind his own defences. He would show that he could build a pa like Pene Taui's, if not a better one.

THE BATTLE OF RUAPEKAPEKA

So Kawiti with his warriors returned from Ohaeawai to prepare a new pa at Ruapekapeka. Tools and implements from Korokareka were brought to the spot for the construction of this fortress. Actually it was one of the most up-to-date pas ever built in Maoriland.

Two cannons were brought up the Kawakawa River on canoes and hauled overland. The distance from Kororareka being approximately 25 to 30 miles to the south-west. One of these guns, a deck-cannon, about four feet long, is still to be found at the pa. The other, possibly a field gun, was longer, being about six feet long but with a narrower barrel. The former weapon was rendered useless by a direct hit during the bombardment which followed. It is said that a marine-gunner scored a direct hit after three shots. From a distance of about 300 yards this was no mean feat. Whether the gun was in action or served any useful purpose to the Maori at all is not known, but it is certain that its loss had a cooling effect on the enthusiasm of the Maoris. Even if the fragments did not hit anything, the noise alone would lead the Maoris to expect a great calamity. For this was the first time the Maoris had ever owned a cannon.

To keep such a weapon supplied with gun-powder would be an important problem for the Maoris to consider. Therefore, its loss, apart from its possible effect on their morale, may have been an advantage in that it led to a reduction in the consumption of gun-powder.

The other weapon, the field cannon lying near the Waiomio meeting house is still being used at funerals.

Kawiti, Mataroria, Motiti and others tried warriors of a hundred battles, were at Ruapekapeka during the planning and preparing of this new pa. Large puriri trees were felled, and the trunks were used to form the pallisades.

These logs were erected high enough to prevent scaling by the enemy. Sunk deeply into the ground they formed a line outside the inner trenches so that they could not be pulled down with ropes. A front line of trenches (‘parepare’) was dug outside the pallisades and connected to the inner trenches by alley ways at intervals through which men could retire. Their primary use was to give protection to the men who were awaiting attack by the enemy. They were also used when launching an attack. Under pressure Maori warriors would retire through these to the inner defences behind the pallisades. A frontal attack on this pa would have been very costly in lives, as the defenders under cover and in comparative safety, could thrust their guns and fire between bullet proof pallisades.

Deep pihareinga, or dugouts with narrow circular entrances at top, gave access to shelters. These caves looked like calabashes buried underground, the narrow end uppermost. The bowl, spacious enough to accommodate 15 to 20 men, provided shelter from the weather. The occupants could sleep in comparative safety from the firing which went on overhead.

In the event of a surprise attack however, these ruas, or as they have been aptly called, ruapekapeka (bats' nests) could become veritable mantraps.⁴

Well back on higher ground an observation post was erected. A deep well was also dug near the rear of the pa. Intended to ensure adequate water-supply in case of a seige the well was sunk some 15ft deep into a sandstone formation.

The rifle and bayonet had not appeared on the battlefield at this period. But there was the Tupara—the double-barrel muzzle loader, and the ngutuparera—flint-lock musket, so called because the hammer holding the flint looked like a duck's beak. There was the Snider-gun too, as well as some rather long and heavy revolving pistols.

Until 1910 a number of these weapons were stored in the wharehui at Waiomio. Owing to the Maori tapu laws or the passing of the arms act, the writer saw these gathered up and taken away to be thrown into the limestone caves.

For close fighting the taiaha, the patiti and the mere were still the main weapons of the Maori.

Now that the tribe was at war, great reliance was again placed on the tohunga who needed to be of Ariki descent. His was the office of foretelling the future, of expounding the tapu laws and seeing that they were kept, breaking down enemy resistance by incantations, curing the sick and giving succour to the wounded. Before battle he had to render fighting men immune to the evil effect of the opposite priest's incantations.

At Ruapekapeka a garment, thrown over each man to make him “tapu”, kua oti te whakauu, and ready for the fray, was used. Before departure to a distant land such a ceremony took place at the ariki's latrine where the participants were required to bite the seating-bar. On more peaceful missions however, a branch of the kawa-kawa tree was deposited on a ceremonial shrine to appease the gods.

Preparations and ceremonies over, the pa awaited the hour of battle.

THE PA IS ENTERED

When the British troops arrived, they encamped some distance away to the north. Scouts from both camps spied out the strength and dispositions of the enemy. Clashes occurred during this reconnaissance. A negro, spying for the British side, was shot near the well in the pa.

The bombardment of the fortress by the British, and its effect on the defences as has been described by historians, must be accepted as correct, heaviest and most powerful cannons were brought against this pa. A woman was decapitated by being struck by a cannon ball. Otherwise nothing of real interest hapepned till one Sunday, feeling the need for rest after the pounding that had been going on for some time, and thinking that no attack would be made by the British, the Maoris left the defences in order to hold a church service behind the pa. Fortunately for them they did so, for had they retired into the dug-outs they would have been trapped like rats. Instead, they retired to a position nearly 100 yards from the front line trenches. Prepared for immediate action they were able to take up the attack from outside the pa when the alarm was given.

Kawiti and his slave were the only ones in the

pa when it was entered. It is said that he was asleep in his own dugout near the look-out position and close to the rear of the pa. This probably saved him as it would have taken a while for the soldiers to reach this area which was close to Kawiti's fighting men encamped outside.

Maori warriors, using their muskets, taiahas, patitis and other weapons quickly returned to join in the fighting outside the pa. Toughened by experience, Mataroria, Ruatara and Motiti would equal many men. A fierce but brief encounter took place, and before long the soldiers and friendlies took to flight. Casualties were suffered by both sides.

Ruatara was fast and it is stated that he alone slew a number of men. An incident or rather a series of incidents is described regarding the escape of Pukututu from possible death by Ruatara's tomahawk. Pukututu was a local chief, a relative of Kawiti, but owing to tribal differences, found it convenient to be on the opposite side.

TUKUTUTU SAVES HIS LIFE

Ruatara found him in the general retreat. Being fast Ruatara was rapidly gaining on the more powerful but slower warrior. Pukututu realised only too well the seriousness of his position. Ruatara close behind him making the most hideous yell imaginable, added speed to the pursued. Pukututu, realising that he had to do something however, stopped. There was no time to call out to Ruatara for mercy. He might not hear anyhow because of the noise that he himself was making. Time was running out, when a soldier suddenly appeared right in front of him. Pukututu thrust him back with the barrel of his gun and thereby propelled himself ahead of Ruatara. The last words the soldier uttered were, “Kapai Maori, Kapai Maori,” but there was no mercy. Ruatara, temporarily distracted from his main objective, of slaying the Maori chief, gave Pukututu the much needed respite. He had reached a position of safety, and was kneeling in the ready position. Ruatara though a tried warrior, dared not attack.

So Pukututu together with Ruatara escaped, to relate the above story some years afterwards. In a friendly rivalry Pukututu was said to have challenged Ruatara to a wrestling bout, so sure was he that he could beat him, but at the same time admitting that speed was the only advantage to Ruatara.

END OF BATTLE

Blood has been spilt in the pa, so to the Maori it had become tapu, and no longer a fit place in which to live. Some of the men would therefore return to their own homes, and some, according to the custom, would stand by in the event of a further call to arms. The dead and slain would be taken to the kainga's, where tangis or mourning ceremonies would take place, before the remains were taken to the Toreres or ancestral burial caves.

During the night that followed, Kawiti and his followers with their dead left the pa for Waiomio, some four miles north-west. This is the ancestral home of the Ngatihine tribe, where, for seven generations the remains of Hineamaru and her descendants lie buried in the Pauaka-a-Hineamaru.

Because the Maori forces were fighting always in separate groups and never under the one command, no complete count of casualties was ever kept. Neither was the loss of slaves included in the “wananga” (recitals by tohungas relating tribal history) which refer only to those of some consequence. The “tangis” or funeral dirges, usually composed by the widow or some female relative, are the only records handed down. For it must be remembered that at this period, there would be a very limited number of Maoris able to write.

To Kawiti, there was in relation to this battle nothing of importance to relate, for no pakeha chief was killed here. Had there been one, this would have been some “utu” at least. To show his disappointment he composed a chant and it is here recorded.

Te Takuake a Kawiti

Kahore te mamae e waahi ake nei
E whakapatuana te tau o Takuate e
Kite iwi raia kua hurihia atu nei
Ki raro ite maru ote Kuini ee
Hei hapai mai ite patu a ware ee
Ki runga ki taku kiri ngarahu e
Te ngu o taku ihue whakamaua mai ra

Etini ete hoa kia waiho ko ahau
Hei matangohi mo roto ite pakanga
Imahara hoki au ee hei riri kotahi ee
Hei riri pupu te riri a Ngapuhi, te riri a Rahiri ee
Te riri a kaharau.
Kai tohia iho ana kite tohi ote riri ee
Kite tohi nei o Karakawhati ee
Kirunga ki te kauae ote riri ee
Hei huna ite tangata ee kite po nui o Rehua eei

Tenei ka whakaohirangi te tapu ite tinana
Te tapu ite whenua ee
Etitiro ana au e nga hau e wha ee
Onunga ote rangi ee
Tenei ka tukumai ko Ngaitai kote mere
Whakakopa ee
Ite hauauru he tai tama taane e
Kote maroharanui, kote ripoharanui i waho
o Mapuna,
E tangi ana ia he mumutai he waa whenua ei

Kia too te marino ki roto o Hokianga
I tupu mai i Panguru i Papata eei
Nga puke iringa korero ote hauauru ee
Katere-te-Taitapu te kauanga ote rangi
He au maunutanga-toroa, he hurihanga-waka-taua
Kite riri tauaki, kite riri horahora ee
Kite riri whanannga ki roto o Ngapuhi

Kaati kawea mai te riri ate manu waitai
Kiroto o Ngapuhiko wahaorau eei
E kore au e mutu te tu kiroto ate pakanga
Kia kai rano au ite rereua ote po,
Katahi ano au kamutu te tu kite pakanga
Ka hinga hoki ra te-wao-nui-o-tane
ki raro naai.

The sorrow of love wells up within me,
strikes at my heart strings
for the people who have turned away
to find their shelter under the Queen
and have raised weapons of slaves
to set upon the tattoo of my skin,
the spirals sculptured on my nose.

Oh my many friends, why forsake me
to become first-slain in this battle?
I thought this a war for all,
war of men bound together, a Ngapuhi war,
war of old man Rahiri, war of Kaharau,
to be baptised to the rites of battle,
the ceremonial of Karakawhati, before the shrine
of war,
for the hiding of men in the great night of Rehua.

I perceive now holiness in the body,
holiness in the land, as I look up
to the four winds of heaven,
Ngaitai arrives with the hidden mere,
from the western seas—the male child—
from the great ocean currents, mighty surges
beyond Mapuna,
resounding the roar of the ever moving tide
crashing upon the land.

Let the great calm spread through Hokianga
springing from Panguru and Papata,
mountains, heavy with tales, in the west.
The sacred tide flows, crossing the sky,
the current bearing the albatross, turning the
warriors' boats
to the war up-flung, the war out-spread,
the war of kinsmen of Ngapuhi.

So let the war, brought here from the sea
enter Ngapuhi of a hundred folds.
I shall never cease to fight my kinsmen
until I taste the driving sleet of death.
Only then shall I cease to fight my kinsmen
for the great tree of Tane will then lie low.

Explanatory Notes:

Rahiri Kaharua, Karakawhati: ancestors of Ngapuhi tribes.

Panguru, Papata: mountain ranges in Hokianga.

THOUGHTS ABOUT THE WARS

Certain questions persistently arise in connection with the Ruapekapeka battle: Firstly, why is it that there is no written record of where the soldiers fell, where they were buried, and the number of the dead? My informants said that they were buried in one L-shaped grave, head to head, below the position where the troops were camped. Secondly, why do all written records end abruptly, giving little or no Wanaunga or other details of the one and only encounter which took place of Ruapekapeka? Some of my informants declared that by the time the soldiers arrived back to their camp the main body of Maori warriors on Kawiti's side had already left for their homes. If this then be true, the Maoris who were left behind may have done the burying, hence their more detailed knowledge of this affair. The soldiers certainly left a lot of cannon-balls behind them on the camp site. Many years afterwards a quantity was found in a gully near by.

Others declared that the Maoris followed a long way after the retiring soldiers, but did not relish the idea of shooting them in the back. However, stories such as these, lacking detailed accounts of some actual happenings, cannot be relied upon.

In connection with the wounded, a story is told of one, Te Whata, who was wounded in the groin. He was carried to and bathed in a spring some distance to the south of Ruapekapeka Pa. The spring is called Tou-wai-nou (towai—tou to dip, wai—water) to commemorate this event.

It will be admitted, because of the lack of information to the contrary that the pa was breached by the heavy pounding it had been subjected to. It would be difficult at this time to estimate the extent of the damage, but the pa was still in the fight. The Maoris had not considered abandoning it. The soldiers on the other hand, realising that it had still plenty of sting in its tall, and probably realizing too that the lay of the country did not favour an assault, decided on the method adopted, that of attacking on Sunday after first spying out the ground. To think even for one moment that Kawiti's men outside would consider clearing out into the bush without a fight, would be entirely false. If anything had happened to the old leader they would have fought to the last man.

There is no support for stories that the Maoris were driven into the forest.

THE RETURN OF PEACE

This battle however, brought to a close the war in the North. Each tribe had had its share of the fighting. Kororareka had been pakehas' territory, to Okaihau, Heke's: to Ohaeawai, Pene Taui's: ending at Ruapekapeka, Kawiti's choice.

To continue would have meant a struggle to the point of extermination. Reckoning up the costs in lives lost during the fighting every one appeared to have arrived at the same conclusion, that an honourable peace should now be concluded.

It may be of interest to relate here a story written by an ex-soldier in his diary. This story concerns the emmissary who on behalf of the Governor, asked Kawiti whether he had had enough of the fighting. The reply was “If you have had enough I have had enough, but if you have not had enough then I have not had enough either”. The pakeha replied, “You are a noble sort of a New Zealand savage”.

The peace which followed was an honourable one with no lands confiscated. It no doubt brought happiness to the Maoris of the Bay. War had come to an end and men and women could return to their homes and families. Those who had been kept in readiness for any further fighting would now be disbanded.

So Kawiti went to Whangarei to return one of the tribes who came to help—the Waiariki. One Waiariki warrior, Tuhaia, had lost his life at Ohaeawai.

The meeting took place at Pukepato, a pa near Glenbervie on the road to Nganguru. This must have been an event of no little importance for the local tribes. For, was not this the Kawiti who answered ‘Yes’ to Whareumu's appeal for help against his enemies in the past? Was it not right that he should return the death of Tuhaia? “Ka tika”—quite right.

OTHER MEN'S QUARRELS

During the meeting it is said that Kawiti uttered the now famous saying “E te whanau, i tu au ki te riri ki te atua o te po, a, kahore au i mate. Na reira, i tenei ra takahia te kino ki raro i o koutou waewae. Kei takahia e koutou nga papapounamu a koutou tupuna e takoto nei i te moana. Tirohia atu nga tuatea o te moana. Hei poai pakeha koutou i muri nei. Kia mau kite whakapono. Waiho mate kakati o te namu ki te wharangi o te pukapuka, ka tahuri atu ai. Whai hoki, te tangata nana i tatai te kupenga, waiho mana ano a tuku, mana ano e kume”.

“My beloved people. I have stood before the God of Darkness, and I was not destroyed. Therefore, from this day, trample hatred under your feet. Do not dishonour your ancestors' peace memorials in greenstone that lie on many seas. Observe the white objects of the ocean. You shall be pakeha boys. Be firm to retain religion, turning only when the sandfly bites upon the page of the book. Also, whosoever weaves a net let him set it himself, and let him draw it in himself.”

The last clause, an ancient proverb, conveys the meaning that the net maker knew best how to float his net and is also best able to draw it in. A warning is made against taking part in someone else's quarrel. In this case it was Hone Heke's quarrel with the British for the loss of his harbour dues from shipping that used to call at Kororareka; and Pomare's quarrel because he no longer collected payment from American ships that called at Otuihu across from Opua, to the south. After the signing of the treaty, Pomare found that the monies received from the American shipping agent ceased to come to him. On enquiring he was told to “behold the flag that flies above Kororareka”. So that was the cause. Hence Kawiti's instructions to cut off its hands and feet.

THE FLAGSTAFF RE-ERECTED

For many years after Heke's final felling of the flagstaff (it was felled three times) it had remained down. The pakehas, no doubt fearing another rising, wisely left it alone till some twelve years later. Kawiti had passed on. His youngest son Maihi, had become chief in his stead.

During the war Kawiti sent him away to Mangakahia—to use the Maori term, “hei putanga tangata”, a remnant of the tribe, in case of defeat. After Kawiti's death Maihi returned.

It was to him then that Waaka Nene came, proposing that he was the fit person to re-erect the flagstaff. Maihi replied “Mau ano e whakaara tau tupapaku”. “You resurrect your own corpse”.

After further representations Maihi agreed to set up the pole. A kauri pole was procured from up the Whangai River about a mile or so from Opua.

The re-erection of the flagstaff took place during the time of Governor Gore-Browne. It then became known as the Maihi Flagstaff. As a mark of appreciation, and to show the friendly relation between them, Maihi accepted Governor Gore-Browne's proposal of using Browne as a namesake so Maihi became Marsh Browne Kawiti. There is also a seal, said to signify Queen Victoria's hand on a clenched female hand of ivory. This was presented by the Governor, and is still in possession of Maihi's descendants.

As a “whariki” or mat for the flag to repose on, Maihi offered to the Governor all lands between Karetu and Moerewa to north of Waiomio and as far south as the Ruapekapeka Pa. This offer was accepted but was paid for at half the value.

Whereas Kawiti was a warrior whose past-time was fighting, Maihi was different. He was more peaceful, and he spent much time in settling his people into a more peaceful system of living. There were many difficulties. The Maoris at this period, were still in the twilight of the dawning day. They were still trigger-happy—or shall we say “patiti” happy. The least provocation or even suspicion of provocation would start off a chain of events which took a great deal of trouble to stop. Tribes, who were allies in war, found that when they tried to settle down in peace, they were again in opposite camps regarding land rights, but their differences were now resolved by more civilised means.

Te ao tawhito was drawing to a close, Te Ao Hou welcomed the dawn of a new day. The old net is cast aside, the new net goes afishing.

Wellington Diocesan Synod was told last week that 64 Maori scholars now hold scholarships from the Otaki and Porirua Trusts Board. Seventeen of these are attending Anglican schools.

Delegates said it was most satisfactory to note that a number of scholarships had been renewed for the third, fourth and fifth years. This meant that the parents were placing the true value on higher education.

It was revealed that the number of scholarships from another trust board, the Papawai and Kaikokirikiri, has increased over the last three years from 60 to 112, of which 36 are held at Anglican schools. Seven students are also receiving grants for higher education.

MAORI OPERA

The highlight of those concerts occurred when it was decided to incorporate the various items into a Maori opera. Mr J. Kohu of the Judea group did this integration of items and an opera, Te Iwi Maori, was produced in the open-air at the Tauranga Sound-shell. Unfortunately weather conditions were bad, but there was a large audience nevertheless. It was the story, simply, yet proudly done in song and action, of the Maori race from their home in Hawaiki to Aotearoa of today. It concluded with the award to Maharaia Winiata, whose home town is Tauranga, of his Doctorate in Philosophy.

The All-Maori Day which concluded each season's activities, and at which the cultural championships were held, was something unique, lasting from eleven in the morning until midnight. To keep entertainment going for that length of time was no mean feat, but its very difficulty determed the spirit of all that it should be done. And it was done! The outstanding features of that day were the championships for which nearly all groups entered, and a Maori beauty contest.

Comprising the championships were six classes: Waiata Maori (with and without action), patere Maori, himene Maori, combined poi, and haka. In addition there were competitions in stick-games, hand-games, whiu, and various forms of the poi. The karanga and powhiri ceremony was also performed to welcome the local Mayor (Mr L. R. Wilkinson) and the local Member of Parliament (Mr G. A. Walsh). That the final night was marred by torrential rain, putting the park under water, was unfortunate. Nevertheless about a thousand people braved the weather to participate in an outstanding entertainment which concluded with a colourful Hawaiian crowning ceremony.

The Maori beauty contest was something quite different from accepted beauty contests. The girls and young ladies appeared, not in bathing costumes, but in ceremonial Maori dress. Treasured articles of Maori clothing and personal adornment which had not seen the light of day since yesteryear were proudly paraded with the poise and dignity of the kui. The winner, besides annexing a monetary prize, was invested with a sash inscribed: Te Tamahine o te Iwi; Tauranga, 1956.

As has been said the financial result has been very satisfactory and shortly the Maori people of Tauranga will have a building which will cater not only for their material wants but which will act as a rallying point for their cultural needs. Other values also have stemmed from these activities. They have learned the value of united action; by the inclusion of pakeha members in their committee both races have exemplified racial co-operation. This goes also in regard to the audiences; pakehas have shown their appreci-

(continued page 50, column 2)

THIRD IN A SERIES
OF SHORT STORIES BY
MAORI AUTHORS

The clock ticked unheard on the mantle piece.

Presently the boy's father came hurrying down the passage. Running in his light footed way A cold draught lifted the fine hairs on the boy's legs, as the man opened the door. Then he heard him say to his mother, “Hurry Annie, Dudley's been hurt in the mill. Hurry now girl.” And he turned from the door. The boy heard him fumbling about in the dark passage-way for his coat. His mother had turned from her work and the colour left her face. A flickering of annoyance past her eyes, then she was out the door and hurrying down the passage.

The boy got up from the stool and stood for a while staring at the glowing embers that were pressed against the front of the stove.

The music of the wind and rain were gone now. The noises and smells that were in that warm kitchen were no longer about him. All feeling for anything else was dead. And he knew only a great emptiness within him. Even then he realized that this emptiness was a feeling of despair. And that it was despair towards his mother. Strange he thought that his feelings should be towards her and not for Dudley.

He went slowly down the passage and stood by the centre door. His mother had a large coloured handkerchief covering her hair and tied beneath her chin. She was shaking her arms into the sleeves of her overcoat when she saw the boy. She stood for awhile looking down at him, then she said, “You wait here Curram, that's a good boy. If I'm not back before the girls get home, tell Edith to go and get your auntie Harriet.” She turned towards the door. “Look after the pots now will you?” And she went down the steps, hurrying to catch up to her husband and one of the men who had brought the news from the mill.

The boy stood for a long while in the quiet gloom of the passageway, his hand resting on

the frame of the centre door. His stomach was burning with anxiety, not only for his mother now, but for himself and for his brother Dudley and for the whole of their family.

The corners of his mouth were pulling down involuntarily as he tried to fight back the sobs that were rising within his chest. He was alone in the house now, and he was frightened.

In the mill Dudley lay dying. His chest had been crushed when a jack he was using slipped and a log had rolled back onto him. Blood came into his mouth with every gasp, and it forced him to cough. It was when he coughed that he really felt the pain. Otherwise there was only a numb heavy feeling about his chest. Like a great weight was upon it. He wasn't sure whether they had gotten the log off him or not. But with returning consciousness he became aware of a man holding him. His grip tightened on the sleeve of the man's coat, pleading him to release the weight upon his chest.

The log had been removed somewhile back and he was lying in the arms of his cousin Jimmy. The man had been holding him for some time, waiting for the life to leave his body, knowing there was nothing he could do. He was watching Dudley's face with a strained hurt look, for he loved Dudley.

The wind swept across the damp slippery skids and lifted bits of bark and twigs as Mrs Hannah and her husband came hurrying in under the shelter.

“Here's his mother now,” one of the men said and they all made way while the little ageing woman stepped down to where her son was lying. Jimmy was still holding him in his arms. He looked up when the mother came beside him, and lay Dudley back on the ground.

A low moan left the woman's body as she saw her son lying there. Blood was covering his mouth and the front of his shirt. She fell on her knees beside him in the damp sawdust and took his head in her arms.

“Oh kure, kure” she cried and she began to make strange noises in her throat as though she were undergoing some physical exertion.

Hannah knelt down beside her and the tears were running slowly down his hard-lined face. It was the first time the men had seen him crying. Then suddenly his face became taut and the tears seemed to soak up into the hot flesh. His mouth shook and it looked as though he were about to say something. But all he could do was shake his head.

Dudley died not knowing that he lay in his mother's arms.

The woman took her handkerchief from her head and wiped the blood from his mouth and hands. One of the men brought a stretcher in from the office and they lifted Dudley onto it.

“Will you please bring him home,” the mother said speaking in her tongue to her nephew Jimmy.

The man nodded and they lifted the stretcher from the ground.

It began to shower again when the group left the shelter of the mill. The rain made music on the bare irons of the roof. The wind cut in under the huge painted rafter and moaned long and low.

It was then that the woman saw her youngest son standing by one of the great beams that held up the mill. He was unsheltered from the rain and cold. He watched his mother, frightened to the very roots of his being. And as the group passed him, he looked away not wanting to see the face of a dead man.

“Come on Curram,” the mother said. “You shouldn't have come out without your coat.”

The boy went to her and buried his face in her wet clothes. His warm breath smothered his face and he forgot time as he walked home with his mother's arm on his shoulder.

The woman stared out ahead of her with her chin jutting defiantly into the air. She patted the boy gently, making a rhythm on his back with her fingers. She was thinking back to the time when Dudley was a boy and had nearly died with the ‘flu. How she had spent many nights by his bed and how she had neglected the others just to give life to him, thinking that one day she would be rewarded, when he went on to achieve something in the world. But now she realised she had only nursed him back to life so that he could die a few years later, not having achieved anything, and just beginning to realise the fullness of life.

She shook the despair from her head and uttered to herself, “Oh forgive me Lord, please forgive me.”

The soft falling rain touched upon her hot face and cooled it. She looked down at Curram who still had his face buried in her coat. “We'll have to write to John and tell him,” she said, speaking past the boy's head. “Poor John, I hate to get him home just to see this.”

“STUDY ABROAD”

More than 50,000 fellowships and scholarships offered to foreign students by institutions in over 100 countries and territories are listed in the 1955–1956 edition of Study Abroad published by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization. In 1954, 125,000 students were studying in foreign countries.

The world's leading host country for foreign students is the United States with 33,833 students, Study Abroad reports. France ranks second with 9,329 students, and the United Kingdom third with 8,619 students. In Latin America, Mexico heads the list with 2,039 foreign students, while in Asia Japan leads with 3,768 students.

—(UNESCO.)

ROUTES OF INFECTION

Tubercle bacilli may enter the animal's body in different ways, the most important being

through the nose in breathing. An animal affected with tuberculosis of the lungs may cough frequently and discharge into the air millions of bacilli. These are readily inhaled by animals close to the affected one.

Tubercle bacilli may also be taken in through the mouth with food and water. In a tuberculosis infected herd, a lick to which all stock have access is very undesirable.

Tubercle bacilli can survive for a long time on pastures. As infected cattle may pass out large numbers of bacilli in their dung, the pastures may become heavily contaminated. Lick or feed boxes or communal water troughs are other possible sources of infection.

Tubercle bacilli may also enter the body through wounds, scratches, or abrasions.

SYMPTOMS

The disease is chronic and usually develops slowly after months or years, but sometimes, due to the lowering of the animal's resistance, tuberculosis may become suddenly active and acute. A cow has often had the disease a long time before noticeable symptoms such as loss of condition, a dry, harsh, and usually hide-bound coat, sunken and dull eyes, and variable appetite appear. Coughing is a common symptom and breathing becomes more rapid and laboured.

Tuberculosis of the udder cannot be diagnosed until it is well advanced. The affected udder may be greatly enlarged, very uneven, and the milk at first brownish and later thin, watery, and straw-coloured with yellowish flakes in it.

The only accurate method of detecting animals affected with tuberculosis is by the tuberculin test. This test is given by veterinarians. As many Maori farmers are members of veterinary clubs, such tests should not be too difficult to arrange. Tuberculin is injected into the thickness of the skin just under the root of the tail.

HERD CONTROL OR ERADICATION

Some method of control must be adopted if progress is to be made in reducing the incidence of tuberculosis. All animals reacting to the test must be slaughtered without delay, but this creates serious difficulties for owners of badly infected

A HAPPY CHRISTMAS GIFT

A Subscription to Te Ao Hou is a very good Christmas present. Relations or friends will appreciate receiving the first copy of their subscriptions just before Christmas, and when the magazine turns up every three months after that they will be reminded of the kind giver.

We shall send a Christmas Card to the recipient of each gift subscription. All you have to do is to send the name and address of the person to whom you wish to give a subscription and we send him or her a card in your name at the same time as a copy of Te Ao Hou JUST BEFORE CHRISTMAS.

Subscription: One year 7/6. Three years £1.

herds. These animals are condemned by a Livestock Instructor or Government Veterinarian under the Stock Act, with compensation at a maximum of £6, in the case of reactors with no outward signs of T.B. Where the infection proves heavy only a proportion of the herd is tested and the owner is encouraged to rear as many heifer calves as possible to provide these replacements and so permit culling of older cows. The proportion of the dairy cows tested should be as high as possible and testing should be done annually about the end of the milking season. A close watch must always be kept for any suspicious symptoms in cows that have not been tested and if a veterinarian advises that they must be slaughtered, this should immediately be done.

Resistance against tuberculosis is built up by good nutrition. Ample reserves of good supplementary feed must be maintained and over-stocking avoided. Care should be taken that cows are not subjected to undue physical stress by feed shortages in severe weather or in the latter part of pregnancy and during heavy lactation. When eventually the herd has been cleaned up it should be re-tested every year. As far as possible the herd should be self-contained, but if replacements have to be bought, it is advisable to have them tested before they are brought on to the farm. Where trouble has been taken to eliminate tuberculosis from a herd, a continued effort to keep the herd free of the disease will increase cream cheques and protect the health of families.

* * *

Maori rate collection in the Rotorua County has increased from £5,159 in 1954–55 to £8,980 this year largely as the result of the council's appointment of an officer who investigated land titles and brought them up to date on the valuation roll. Percentage of levied rates collected rose from 41.3 to 50.4. The difficulty of finding owners and apportioning rates among them has been a principal cause of the low percentage collected in the past, so it was found.

Tourist in Tahiti

Tahiti, by George T. Eggleston, is a travel book.

The story begins at Papeete, the main port of Tahiti, if not of Polynesia itself. Here the author and his wife eventually find a small schooner to take them the round trip, and the reader finds himself roped into a rather monotonous and superficial conducted tour, islands being dealt with and ticked off, chapter by chapter. We pause to note the difficulties of the harbour entrance, sample the food and hospitality of the inhabitants, admire the dancing and the scenery, always visit any outstanding landmarks, and if there is nothing tapu to fossick out, move on. Bad weather between islands provides some variation. If Mr Eggleston had stayed in one spot long enough for the novelty to wear off and the reality to sink in, he wouldn't have done what he set out to do, but he might have come nearer to capturing the reader's imagination. However, the book must be recommended for its superb photographs.

Happy Rarorians

In 1947, the Kon-Tiki raft was cast ashore at Raroia, a small coral island in the Tuamotu group. Bengt Danielsson, a member of the expedition, was so impressed by the place and the people that in 1949 he returned there with his wife and stayed a year. This was no sightseeing tour or search for an unspoiled island paradise, but an earnest attempt to ‘live for a time … with another people … to see if we should make ourselves at home, and if we should be able to appreciate the values in their way of life.’ The Happy Island, translated from the Swedish by F. H. Lyon, is the story of their success. The couple were readily accepted and soon settled into the daily routine. They found copra making monotonous but easy work, fishing at night was exciting, but diving for mother-of-pearl was difficult and unpleasant. The author shows some impatience with the Raroians for throwing away their hard-earned money on expensive rubbish, but he soon comes to appreciate their point of view. Money is not a necessity in Raroia. It is only an ‘extra’ that will buy other ‘extras’ like gramophones and bicycles and patent leather shoes, and the Raroians could live quite easily, though more soberly, without it. But Mr Danielsson can find no excuse or any liking for the traders, usually Chinese, who are always at hand to supply the ‘extras’ at exorbitant prices, along with methylated spirits and hair-oil and other more orthodox kinds of drink. In spite of their insatiable appetite for European pleasures, the Raroians' favourite entertainment is still singing and dancing, and while many of the old customs have been unavoidably lost or deliberately put aside, the traditional songs and dances remain. When they heard the Governor was going to visit them after an interval of forty years the Raroians threw themselves wholeheartedly into the preparations. New songs and dances were composed and practised, and new costumes made. Houses, gardens, wharves and children were tidied up. Presents were made and food gathered and prepared. To top it off they all learned, parrot-fashion, the Marseillaise for the landing-ceremony. Then the Governor passed them by. How they all rallied round after this paralysing disappointment, and gave themselves a sports day, a banquet, and a concert, shows plainly what stuff these Islanders are made of. Mr Danielsson's excellent book is not too good for them.

Traveller's Impressions

If you have a map of the Pacific handy you will see that I have been working my way erratically, but steadily, south, and have at last arrived at New Zealand and a lightweight travel book about our own country. I cannot honestly recommend Islands of Contrast, by Beryl M. Miles, as first-class reading. Allowing that first-hand knowledge of an author's material can turn the average reader into a superior and often niggling critic, Miss Miles' book is still far from adequate. At its best, her writing is amusing and timidly informative. At its worst, her style is that of an impressionable schoolgirl fond of coy exclamations and over-description. Still, it could be much worse. At least she does not attempt to analyse the ‘average New Zealander's character’ after a few weeks' stay in the country, as some other overseas authors have done. Miss Miles, and another young woman came to New Zealand with

an Australian photographer to photograph the country's best-known scenic attractions. The country that emerges from Miss Miles' enthusiastic descriptions of the trip is chock-a-block full of mountains, bush, glaciers, lakes, hot springs and active volcanoes. Quite enough to discourage any intending immigrants unless they are of the pioneering variety or surveyors out of a job. On the other hand, I found her first encounter with a glacier interesting, and their expedition to and through the Homer Tunnel in appalling weather with floods and landslides threatening, quite exciting. Her treatment of Maori material—the migration, several myths and legends, greenstone work, modern Maoris of Rotorua—is quite inadequate, but sincere and not ‘quaint’. In spite of its shortcomings this book is worth reading, because it does make one realise how travel writers, even those with the best of intentions, can distort and touch up the true picture.

Many Shipwrecks

The last book, Islands of Despair, by Allen W. Eden, takes us south of New Zealand and right out of Polynesia into sub-Antarctica. Knowing practically nothing about the Auckland Islands. I read Mr Eden's book in the hope that it would satisfy my curiosity and provide me with some information. And it did. Now I know with certainty that I have no desire to visit the Auckland Islands, and if I am ever forced to do so I shall consider myself lucky if I survive. After tropical nights in Tahiti and sun-drenched days in Raroia, Mr Eden's surveying expedition in the Auckland pole. This account of hard, exacting, and often dangerous work carried out in extremely rough and difficult country in what must be one of the worst climates in the world, is frankly depressing. I don't see how it could be otherwise. Mr Eden's Islands comes like an icy blast from the south restrained style and meticulous attention to detail of time and place may be a shade too near textbook writing for the lay-reader, but it is not this that makes the book so grim. No one could write cheerfully or humourously about a place that has been the scene of literally dozens of ship-wrecks (Mr Eden describes them all), and drownings and violent deaths and unimaginable suffering. The latter part of the book deals with sealing and penguin catching in the same region, and Mr Eden treats us to some hair-raising descriptions of what happened to both animals and men on Macquarie Island before it was declared a sanctuary. The title may seem a little romantic at first, but after reading the book I am sure you will agree that nothing could be more appropriate.

Many Maori women would like to know more about the finer points of facial make-up and beauty care, and the information they want is not always easily found in the usual women's magazines. In order to give Maori women some added confidence in the town environment into which so many are moving. Te Ao Hou is offering here the first of some articles in which beauty care is discussed. In order to see the beauty problems of young Maori women at close range Catherine Wislang visited Pendennis Maori Girls' Hostel, in Wellington, and gave a demonstration in make up to the girls, studying their problems.

IMPORTANCE OF COLOUR:

Most Maoris need very little rouge but lipstick has to be carefully used for attractive results. Those attractive splashes of vivid colour in clothes should always be emphasised by a toning lipstick.

Cosmetics are usually divided into two colour groups. For powders and powder bases there are pinks and yellows, for lipsticks and rouges blues and yellows. There are a few shades in between which are a mixture of both. In the case of powder bases and powders it would be a general rule that the yellow and in between colours would be the most becoming to Maori skins. Pinks could be used only very rarely.

It is best to match the powder as closely as possible to the natural skin colouring. If there is a desire to lighten the skin, it is best achieved by using a tinted powder base underneath the powder. These are obtainable in lotions and creams in all reliable makes.

In the case of lipsticks and rouges the yellow based colours seem to me personally to be the best, as blue base lipsticks turn very purple on Maoris. It may be that the effect of the ancient pukepoto was similar, but those who do not like the purple colour should concentrate on rich reds such as Innoxa Poppy or Flamboyant or Three Flowers Carmen-crimson and American Beauty. These are good to wear with clothes of blue or pink tonings, and also good with black or deep red. There are clear coral and deep red lipsticks with yellow bases suitable for clothes of various colours.

The main thing is to be sure that your lipstick tones with the predominant colour you are wearing, and that your nail varnish if you wear it, is also a good match with your lipstick. For very young girls the ‘natural’ and clear are the best.

HOW TO APPLY LIPSTICK:

When using lipstick it is always wise to learn to apply it with a brush. If a lipstick brush is unobtainable, a small camel hair paint brush cut to one quarter inch long and pointed at the tip is very good. Learn to know the contours of your mouth and don't think of it as being one straight line. There are several curves to the mouth which may easily be overlooked, and so the essential beauty of the mouth may be destroyed by the unobservant eye.

First paint in your outside line, upper and lower, and then fill in the mass of the mouth. Press a piece of tissue paper gently over the mouth to remove the very ugly excess lipstick.

If you like a soft look, lightly dust with powder. This is good if you eat your lipstick off. There are many difficulties which arise with lipstick. Some people get little wrinkles all around the mouth and the lipstick runs into them and causes smudging. This is often the result of badly fitting dentures which cause the mouth to fall in and wrinkle.

By using a brush skilfully, one can change the shape of the mouth should this be desired. A short upper or lower lip may give the face an unbalanced look, so that it may be desirable to lift the lipstick line a fraction of an inch on some mouths. A dusting of powder and then a second application of lipstick gives a fairly safe make-up in these cases.

Fully Carved Meeting House
for Hutt Valley

It is hoped that the building of a £20,000 fully carved meeting house at Waiwhetu can start this summer. So far £8,000 have been raised by Maori effort over a period of ten years. It is intended to instal in this meeting house the fine slabs carved for the New Zealand Centennary celebrations in 1940.

An appeal right through the Hutt Valley to be held from 22 October until November 1 will, it is hoped, provide the remainder of the money needed. European help will be given on a large scale. Patron of the appeal committee is the Hon E. B. Corbett, and the chairman is the Rt Hon W. Nash, M. P. for Hutt. Under Mr Nash's chairmanship, a number of Maori concerts have been organized in various halls in the Hutt Valley and about 1000 canvassers, both European and Maori, will visit every home in the valley on the evening of November 1 to collect money. The Junior Chamber of Commerce, helped by local Maori workers (Rev Manu Bennet, Messrs I. P. Puketapu, N. Gilbert, V. Winitana) are organizing the canvas.

Press, radio, and advertising through posters, hoardings and other means will support the campaign.

Initiator of the appeal is Mr Ihaia Puketapu, elder of Atiawa. He intends also to seek the help of other tribes in establishing a Maori centre in the Wellington area, where it is likely that many nation-wide Maori gatherings of the future will be held.

COMMON ACCIDENTS IN THE HOME

Burns and scalds are the commonest, and also the most serious and disfiguring of accidents in the home.

BURNS: Should this happen in your home, quickly lay the child down flat, wrapping him in a blanket, or something to put out the flames. This having been done, cover the burnt area with clean linen and rush the child to hospital. Don't try to remove any clothing.

SCALDS: Cover scalded area with clean linen and keep child warm, but don't stop to remove any clothing. Rush to hospital. Burns and scalds remain sterile at first and the hospital will keep them this way if you get there quickly enough. Do not put messy oily dressings on them. Large burnt or scalded areas should be treated in hospital, and not at home. You can, however, treat small burns at home.

PREVENT ACCIDENTS in the home by putting things out of a small child's reach. Electric flexes, etc. Tea-pots on ranges, poisons, matches,

Keritapu who writes about health for Te Ao Hou is a Maori woman with years of experience as a District Health Nurse in Maori areas

tablets in any form, medicines, knives and scissors should all be watched carefully.

SWALLOWING OF OBJECTS OR POISONS: Out of curiosity small children will put things into their mouths, up their nostrils and into their ears.

Swallowing a peanut has been fatal merely because it lodged in the wind-pipe and eventually going into the lung caused loss of life. Had it gone into the stomach death would not have resulted.

DRINKING OUT OF TINS and bottles is another common habit of small children who are crawling. Careless adults often leave poisonous liquids where small children can reach them. A fatal case has been recorded of a small child who because he was very thirsty, drank out of a tin containing unlabelled liquid, thus causing his death.

Numerous cases of this type have taken toll of small lives, Put things containing poisons out of small children's reach.

SUFFOCATION: From time to time we read of small babies having been smothered and suffocated. Sometimes this happens in the mother's bed.

There has been steady teaching over the years to the effect that babies and toddlers are healthier as well as safer, not only in their own beds, but in separate rooms wherever possible.

More often the suffocation of a baby happens in its bassinette or cot, or from getting his head through the cot bars. The precautions against such accidents are surely easy. See that any cot or bassinette you may buy has the bars close enough to prevent this type of accident. Make sure also that bed clothes and pillows are firmly placed where the baby sleeps. A frequent visit to the baby's cot or bassinette is well worth while.

NAIL PUNCTURE WOUNDS: It is quite common for a child playing, to run a nail into his foot wherever boxes with nails are left lying around. There is always the danger of infection in a foot or hand. This can be quite serious as to lead to crippling. Should horses and cattle be about there is the further danger of tetanus or lockjaw.

Immediately a child is hurt in this way, wash the affected limb with warm soapy water, dry, then paint with an antiseptic lotion and put on a clean

dressing. Should there be throbbing, tenderness and swelling later, soak the limb for twenty minutes in hot water to which two heaped tablespoons of Epsom salts have been added. Next, apply a poultice of glycerine and epsom salts, repeating this 3 times daily. If this treatment is not effective, see your Doctor. On the other hand, the chances are that you will have no bother if the trouble is attended to straight away.

CUTS AND WOUNDS: If small, clean with an antiseptic lotion and if cut just below the skin, draw the skin together with narrow strips of adhesive plaster, paint with an antiseptic lotion and put on clean dressing and bandage. Leave untouched for two or three days. If clean, healing should be quickly established. In six or seven days the dressing can be removed and the wound should be healed.

Deep cuts and wounds must be attended to by a doctor.

DIRTY CUTS AND WOUNDS: These are often the result of small cuts and wounds not having been attended to immediately. Wash with hot soapy water or a disinfectant solution. If there is redness and inflammation present give long hot water soaks with some antiseptic lotion. Hot poultice every four hours. If there is no improvement, your doctor must be visited.

FALLS, AND THEIR TREATMENT: Another common accident in the home is a fall. Unless he is watched a baby may fall out of his pram or off the bed if left too near the edge. The toddler may trip over his toys, fall downstairs or on a wet footpath. He may run into half open doors or fall out of trees. He may fall heavily onto his head and so be knocked stunned or unconscious. He may be drowsy in which case, give him a hot drink then put him to bed with the head low, and a warm water bottle at his feet. Let him sleep. As he recovers, his breathing and pulse should be regular and normal. There may be a bout of vomiting and headaches and a slight temperature. Keep him in bed until quite normal. Just the same, contact your doctor for further advice.

Some of the most common ailments of children are as follows:

CONVULSIONS: These are due to many causes. They are often caused in young children from indigestion, from swallowing excessive insoluble things such as seeds, skins of fruit, and unripe fruit, or over indulgence in eating generally, or they may be due to some disturbance of the nervous system or from gastro-intestinal irritation, or from faulty feeding or constipation.

Remember that convulsions are not a disease in themselves, they are only a symptom of something wrong.

In highly strung infants difficult teething may bring on a convulsion, but remember that an attack is a sign that all is not well and the cause itself should be sought. Convulsions start suddenly. The child stiffens and may fall, becomes bluish and loses consciousness. The eyes roll up under the upper lids, the hands are clenched and the legs are stretched out. After a few seconds, the eyes and limbs begin to twitch. Gradually the movements subside and the child recovers consciousness or falls asleep. Control of the bladder and bowel may be lost during the convulsion and the tongue may be bitten. Watch this and slip a thin wooden peg or a wooden spatular between the teeth.

DURING THE ATTACK quickly prepare a warm bath adding a dessertspoon of mustard to a gallon of water. If no mustard is handy, plain warm water will do. Place the child into the bath carefully leaving him there until the twitchings cease. Contact your Doctor who will be required to give the child a thorough examination in order to find the cause.

CONSTIPATION has been mentioned as one of the causes of convulsions in a child. To prevent constipation encourage the child to drink plenty of cooled boiled water, and to eat oatmeal porridge for breakfast, wholemeal bread and plenty of vegetables. Roots and greens generally have plenty of roughage. For other meals, fruits of all descriptions are recommended. It is a very wrong practice to encourage the use of enemas in small children for it spoils the bowel rythmn and teaches laziness and sluggishness of action.

DIARRHOEA: The opposite to constipation, could become an epidemic. “Summer sickness” it is often called. Sudden diarrhoea is due to an infection of the gastro-intestinal tract and it may be from any one of a dozen different germs. It's very hard on infants and toddlers. The vomiting and the increasingly frequent diarrhoea cause great loss of body fluid. Unless there is prompt treatment, they become gravely ill. If an infective diarrhoea doesn't clear up in the first day with ordinary treatment, contact your doctor.

ORDINARY TREATMENT: If much purging has already taken place in the form of frequent motions, do not give castor oil. Give frequent drinks of boiled water to replace the loss of fluid and the stomach must be rested. No solid food, or milk to be given for 24–48 hours. Keep on boiled water and glucose drinks only, gradually returning to a suitable diet.

ANOTHER TREATMENT: Give frequent spoonfuls of freshly grated raw, ripe apple. Another method is to wash and slice 6 to 8 apples, including the skins and the cores. Cook in a saucepan with water barely covering the apples for about 15–20 minutes. Add no sugar. Squeeze it all through a jelly bag and give the juice as a drink. Like a charm this dries up the diarrhoea.