TE RU I MANIRA.

Maori Messenger : Te Karere Maori, Volume V, Issue 119, 14 July 1853, Page 3

TE RU I MANIRA.

Kua tukua mai ki a matou nga korero mo te ru i Manira; Kua rougo te Whakaminenga ki taua mea. Ko te pukapuka na tetahi tangata noho tuturu o reira. "Korero wliinwhii'i o to ptiknpuku i inliia inai i Manila, itoßito 12 oln innraiiia. Ito I!) o to Miirania ka paliuro, ka rnngmin o konci, leialii Kii niii. To pangn tuatalii, no to, nliialii, no to nno o nga liaor.i walii ki le

where they immediately fell on their knees praying and crying pielously. Il was a moment of severe trial ; the earth was rolling under us, and we, could hear llie house cracking all around. The shock continued Tor about three minutes, hut during that time all the. horrors of uncertainly presented themselves, from llie fact thai we did not know when to lice to salty. The house may rumble and crush us: the earth may open and dose upon us; such, I believe, was llie general reeling. I'rom the liiM shock till about 11 o'clock at nighl, we had a repetition of .shocks more or loss strong us llio firs! und i am fully persuaded that bad a second occured e(ju;il ill strength, the half of Manilla would have been in ruins. The roofs of two of llie principles churches fell in with a fearfull crush, carrying with them the walls and several houses near. As yet wc have heard of only -J or ;> lives being lost. In my opinion the cause or the earthquake was the fact of the volcano of'l'aal being closed for the last 100 years; but since the earthquake wo were all 'again startled ! y a loud report like that orarlillery. but which proved to be the opening of the crater ol licit moiiiiiain, which lias been the active operation, and I have hope that wc will not have a revival of j earthquakes, and thai I may never -gain experience such dreadful feelings. Al 0r..; place, about 20 miles from Manilla, the earth opened several hundred feet iu length, and about 18 inches wide, and threw up a considerable quantity ofliue black sand, such as was never before seen in the neighbourhood, ! which covered ihe ground lo a great extent. . What the nature of the sand is I cannot yet say, not ha\ing seen any, bill I shall endeavour lo send you some of it. A essels coining to .Manilla experienced the shock at sea, as if they had struck on a coral reef. A brig or ours let go her anchor iu deep water, and lost it, iniaginging she was on a reef. The shock fell at sea were from 80 lo 100 miles from Manilla, but not more llian 10 or 15 from the Mam ofLuzonia. On llie I2lh of October (this morning) wc bad another sharp shock at about iih o'clock. I was awakened by my bedstead violently j shaking under me, and quickly dressed, and j gol out of the bouse. Il lasted but a few i minutes, —I have not as yet heard of any damage done." i Auvkntiw.s with I.ions. —Virgil tells us of a youthful hero, who, while enjoying the puny sport ofslag-hiinting, longed lo see the tawny lion approach: but even Ascanius might have been taken aback had he found binisL'lf unexpectdly brought face lo Tace with four; audit was no disparagement lo my friend's courage to say that he felt, as he candidly confessed, any thing but eomlorlable. "lie was armed only with a singlebarcllcd rifle, and his horse, old Scliulkraal, was iu no plight for a race with the king of beasts, which can outstrip the swiftest antelope. In this emergency, however, his presence of mind did not forsake liiin, and knowing lliat any symptom of rear would increase llie danger ol' his position, he pulled short up, and sat motionless, with bis eye fixed upon his formidable adversaries. 'lhe three females dropped quietly upon their hunches, gravely returning stare for siare ; while the old mamiclje, as the. Dutch familiarly call liiin, a splendid fellow, with a long black mane, and his sides litlerally shaking with fat, stood a lillle in front, ever and anon whisking his tail over bis back, but made, no movement in advance. Uarkley, on his part, had no idea of commencing hosllitics, and, when this mule interview had lasted some minutes, he turned his horse's head round and rode slowly away. No motion was made iu pursuit, and, as long as the spot was in sight, lie could distinguish the four figures lo all appearance remaining precisely iu the same position as he had left them. In his way back he found the carcase of a quagga, not a quarter of a mile from our tenl, recently killed, and bearing evident marks of his lale acquaintances' workmanship. We scut llie boys for il; the ribs bad been picked clean, but the hind-quarlers gave llie poor degs two or llirce hearty meals. Wc congratulated our friend on his narrow escape, which was the more remarkable as, Ibis month ami the next, these animals are especially savage and unapproachable. Lions are indeed something more than mere bugbears iu ibis country. Some tiuiebeforeour arrival Hans de Lange had a valuable horse destroyed by llieiu iu llie very marketplace of Ilarrismilh. His native scrservant, on rising one morning, to set about his daily labours, was suddenly beard to exclaim, " Dmr ley ecu zmirl dintj!" (There lies a black ibing.) and, immediately afterwards, Keek! daw loop ecu yet I tliwj! hit ytk net xno nl.i cen lecutv." (Look! there goes a yellow thing. It is very like a lion.) And a lion it was, who, after deliberately

contemplating the "black thing," 110 other llian ihe carcase ofDo Lange's favourite black lioiso, turned round, and trotted away, as if'" indifferent about pursuit. Hans, however, did not lake the matter quite so coolly; but, burning with rage at his loss, and at the impudence of the old skclm, as lie called him, seized his trusty mcr, and throwing himself upon the first horse he could find, without wailing for assistance, started off at a speed that soon brought him upon the heels of the lion, who, finding himself pressed, bounded up a small/ant, and, having thus secured a vantage ground, faced his pursuer, and stood at bay. A large dog that was rash enough to venture within his reach lie caught up, and Willi one light stroke of his paw, swept him under his chest, when the nowiug main complelly hid it from sight. Meanwhile Hans had dismounted, ami, now taking a steady aim, loged a bullet just behind the shoulder. The lion neither fell nor moved till a second bullet from llie same barrel had struck him, and in the same fatal spot. 11c than spranf) forward. One bound would have ended.t' old Dutchman's history; hut another Of h' faithful dogs throws himself in the way, only to share liic instantaneous fate of his comrade. The delay is but for a moment; but Hans, whose self-possession has never failed him, lakes advantage of it to reload, and, as quick as lightning, the heavy roer is at his shoulder, the unerring ball finds its mark, and the noble beast sinks slowly down and expires without a struggle.—Six Months at lXatul, by Charles Barter. Can I.nsixts Tai.k ? —This may indeed seem a strange question to those who would limit the meaning of the word lo the capability of expressing ideas by means of articulate sounds, nevertheless a little reflection will convince any one who is conversant with the habits of these creatures, that though they may have no tongues, they can express themselves 111 some way or oilier "with most miraculous organ." Various experiments might be quoted in proof of this assertion, let lis however select one of iwo which seem to leave no room for dispute about the mailer. Any one who finds himself in Ihe vicinity of 011 ant's nest may soon be conviccd that these industrious liitle laborers are by no means destitute of the power of communicating information lo each oilier relative to liic affairs of llieir commonwealth. Lei him, for example, place a heap of food in the neighbourhood of an ant-hill, and watch llie proceedings of its inmates. A short time will, probably, elapse before llie discovery of ihe treasure, but at length some wanderer in his morning's ramble has llie good fortune to slumble upon it What does lie do? He docs noilike, an insolate individual capable of asking for assistance, begin at once llie task of removing the heap, hut on the contrary off he scampers wiili llie glad intelligence, and running his head against that of every ant he meets, manages in some mysterious way, not only to intimate the fact of llie discovery, but also to give information relative to llie locality where llie provisions may be found, for speedily it will be seen that troops of porters, summoned at llie call of the first finder, hasten to Ihe spot, and all is bustle until liic slore is safely warehoused in the ant-hill. Another slill more striking instance of the possession of a capability of spreading intelligence, and that of a somewhat abstruse character, is funmhed by experiments that have been made by Iluber and others upon bees. Every one is aware that Ihe queen-bee is an object of die greatest solicitude and attention lo all the workers of ihe hive, and yel, among so many thousands, all busily employed in different and distant pails of the colony, it would appear impossible for Ihein lo ascertain, at least before llie elapse of a considerable time, whether she was absent from among llieni or not. 111 order to see whether bees had any power of conveying news of ibis kind, the queen-bee has been stealthily and quietly abstracted from llie hive; but here, as elsewhere, ill news was found to lly apace. For some half hour or so, llie loss seemed not lo have been ascertained, but the progressively incrcasii. 1 buzz of agitation gradually announced lli growing alarm, until shortly ihe whole hive was in an uproar, and all ils busy occupants were seen pouring forth their legions in search oftlieirlost monarch, oreager loavongc with llieir slings llie insult offered to their sovereign. On restoring llie captured queen to her subjeets, wilh equal secrecy, the tumult spzeilily subsided, and the ordinary business of the community was resumed, as before the occurrence.—Sulurul History of Animals, by J. It. Jones.