Tange at Ohinipuhi.

Feilding Star, Volume XVIII, Issue 66, 15 September 1896, Page 2

Tange at Ohinipuhi.

(From a Correspondent.) For over a week Maoris from various parts of the West Coast had been congregated at Ohinipnhi, an old pah on the Kangitikei river, paying in their own way their last respects to the remains of the chief Hue Te Huri, who died at his own little pah, Pareki, two miles farther up the river, on the 4th inst. Hearing that the funeral would take place on Sunday hundreds ot Pakehas assembled to witness the natives disposing of their dead chief, whom they found had been encased in a hermetically sealed coffin, placed in a solitary hut guarded by nine ancient Maori women of his trioe dressed in loose black robes and bedecked with sprigs of weeping willow. Occasionally these dames would aronse themselves from tneir apparently semi- unconscious state, utter a Ion?, deep, monotonous wail, and then sink back on their bedding of straw, perfectly indifferent to the curious gaze of strangers. Before the arrival of the brake which acted as a hearse, the covering was removed from the handsomely finished coffin, and the deeply tatooed features of the dead chief were plainly seen through the small gassl pane purposely inserted. Led by the Otaki Maori band playing the Dead March, the funeral procession I moved slowly up the beautiful valley of the river, through mud and sand, over great boulders, and through streams, until a quiet nook under the great bluffs across the Waituna was reached, and there the loDg mournful -wail of the females, squatting on the ground, announced their arrival at the grave. Two Maori laymen Tu-ruru and Aroua read the Church of England buiral service, and the remainder of the ceremony was performed in English style. This over, all excepting the old women threw aside all appearance of sorrow and in a very short time Ohinipuhi was reached where every preparation was made by the local natives for a very sumptuous repast. One cannot but be struck by the excellent conduct of the Maoris on this occasion. The native policeman remarked rather sadly that as no " drink " was allowed at this tangi there was nothing for him to do. In the death of Hue another of the few links connecting the | present with the past savage times of this coast is broken. He was supposed to have been born the year after Waterloo, and to have been a warrior away back in the time of William the Fourth. Piki-ahau, the tribe over which Hue Te Hun held power, is a branch of the famonf Nga-to-rau-kawas, who, many years before the advent of the white man, made a victorious descent on the West Coast, chasing the few who escaped their murderous attacks inland towards the ranges and across the Manawatu, where the remnants of an tribe may still be found. The Pikiahauas are by no means a superior tribe Their personal appearance is not intelligent, and the utterly neglected state of their whares find fields bears testimony to their indolence, From time immemorial they were despised by the Parewanui and other intelligent tribes, who, at the recent tangi, were conspicuous by their absence.