MAORI ENTERTAINERS.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 880, 28 July 1910, Page 6

MAORI ENTERTAINERS.

, Quito a number of people wore unable to .obtain seats at the 'iowu Hall last evening, for the. second, of the series of unique entertainments, which are being given this week by the Rotorua ' Maori Mission Choir and Entertainers in aid of the .Y.M.0.A.. in Wellington. The. programme, which .was entirely different from that presented:at tho opening* entertainment, was an.excellent one, of interesting variety. .Perhaps tho most popular., item,, and certainly oho of the best from the musical point of. view,-was llr. E. J. Hill's Singing of Aif. .Hill's celebrated "Waiata.Poi," the song being sung to a' poi; accompaniment by. the Ngati Raukawa Poi Party, led by Maggie Papakura.-, The', rythmic swing of the poi balls by tho girls lent a peculiar charm and Native sentiment to this pretty little song. Of course, tho item hail to bo repeated. An eccentric item was a Maori game,- "Matematc," by. two Natives oi opposite sex. In"'Matctnatc" tho players kneel, facing each other, and engage in amusing endeavours to entrap each other by the same timowdrn process as schoolboys do when playing the old game of 'Tigs fly, rabbits lly, birds.fly," slapping their knee. When such phrases as "birds fly" are uttered, but keeping the hands still if. the player says that something flies which cannot. An excellent number, too, whs tbc fine series' of kineiuatographic views of the Thermal Wonderland in and around Rotonm, Guide Haggle personally conducting the; audience round tho various points of interest. Then thcro were tuneful quartets by tho ' Botonui male voice party, solo items by Mrs. Pitt, poi dances and hakas, tho programme concluding with a stirring wai dance, "Perupcfu." To-night tho programme will be again' changed.