MAORI DANCE AT SYDNEY.

Greymouth Evening Star, Volume XXXI, 16 January 1901, Page 4

MAORI DANCE AT SYDNEY.

A Sydney paper gives the following account of a performance by tho Maoris on December 27 :—The Maoris stepped to the front, and at a signal from the leader broke with startling suddenness into a verso of a song, which, in the olden days, before the foot of tho white man had trodden the turf of the King Country, it was customary to chant just before going to war. Forgetful of their uniforms, regardless of all encumbrances, with the first few liquid sounding words of the song the stalwart Maoris threw themselves into the spirit of tho chant. They clubbed their guns and waved them aloft;

stamped upon' the gravel with vigour, bent and swayed their bodies to the rhpthmic cadence of the song ; threw backed their heads and lolled the tongue to an almost alarming ex Lent. The com r lateness with which they abandoned themselves to the stirring sentiments of the native hard was strikingly apparent. One, a huge fellow, 18st in weight, with the jollicst of countcnaccs, enjoyed himself immensely in the brief relaxation. He bounced like a hall, gesticulated excitedly, and shouted with the lungs of a giant. It appeared doubtful as to who enjoyed the performance most, the spectators or the performers themselves. When it was over, and they had once again become soldiers as distinguished from warriors, as they knew the term, they marched up to their camp at the Centennial Park.