The allusion to Rona is curious.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume VIII, Issue 209, 30 August 1873, Page 2

The allusion to Rona is curious.

The following is the legend of Bona. One bright moonlight night Rona was sent to fetch some water from a stream; in her hand was a basket, which contained a gourd. On her way to the water the moon suddenly disappeared behind a cloud, and the road being bad, she kicked her foot against some of the shrubs. This made her angry, and in her rage she cursed the moon, saying " Wicked moon, not to come forth and shine." This conduct of Rona's displeased the moon very much, who at once came down to the earth, and seized her. Rona, in her turn, seized a tree which grew near the margin of the stream; but the moon tore up the tree by the roots, and flying away carried off Bona and her calabash, together with the tree. Rona's friends, thinking she was making a long stay, went in quest of her. After searching for some time, they called out, " Rona, Rona, where are you ? " " Here am I," said she, " mounting aloft with the moon and the stars." This belief in a future world was strong, and could be appealed to with advantage when urging the claims of the Gospel. It was an appeal of this hind that arrested Win . Nayior. Te Awataia was j ust

starting on an expedition of war with an army of his warriors. A Missionary arrived at the moment, and enquired where he was going. The reply was, "to seek utu (satisfaction) for my friends who have been slain." The advice was, " Leave that to be settled in the world to come. There is a day coming when the great God will judge mankind and avenge all the wrong that has been done among men." The idea took hold of the chief's mind ; a ray of light seemed to fall upon his darkness, and addressing his men, he said, "Listen to this Pakeha, he says God will make all things right by and by, we will leave it to Him. Stay at home and turn to this God." He and his people embraced Christianity, and he lived and died a Christian, true and faithful to the last. Their religious system had its Priesthood. Like the ancient Britions who had their Druids, the Maoris had their Tohungas. In some of the tribes the principal chiet was also priest, uniting in his person the rank of Arika, or lord, and Tohunga, or chief priest. The office was heriditary, passing from father to son. Each priest has his own god, and his own forms of karakia. The secrets of his worship were mysteries concealed from the people. In fact his incantations were performed in language only to be understood by the initiated. I have sometimes heard an old priest, as I laid in my tent, initiating his son into the mysteries of his profession duriDg the lone hours of the night, when the people were asleep .in bed. Their persons were sacred. They did no work, and never entered a place where food was cooked. They were treated with great reverence, considered invulnerable to disease, and inviolate in battle unless they had offended the gods. I received from Ngawhare, the son of an old Priest, a curious account of his father, old Tawaki, chief priest of the Ngatimaniapoto tribes. Tawaki was an interesting looking old man, apparently about 80 years of age, with a long, flowing beard, white as snow, appearing as mysterious and singular in his movements as you might expect such a personage to be. Ngawhare said his father was the oldest man in the country, had outlived all his compeers, had been proof against disease, had directed the tribe on many wars, but no spear could pierce him, and no gun could. reach his sacred person, and no man could compute his age.s That the secret of all this was a whatu in his breast ; a sacred redstone given him by his predecessor, which acted as a charm, and while he retained it he could not dia "By and by," said Ngawhare, "When I see my father become so decripit that he Is sinking beneath the weight of years, and life has become a burden, I shall request him to give the whatu to me. Then he will die. I shall swallow it and become his successor in the Priesthood " The priests were supposed to know the mind of the gods, and had their oracles for ascertaining the incidents of war. They sometimes divined by Augury like the Druids, by observations made on the flying and voices of birds, the appearance of Jthe heavens, the thunder and lightning, and various other methods. When he wished to

consult the gods he proclaimed a fast and no fire could be lighted, and no person must so much as drink at a stream as they proceeded to battle if he prohibited. Any violation of his order would be expected to bring disaster and death. They were also Physicians, and had the sick committed to their care. They generally ascribed sickness and disease to the gods, and supposed the visitation was brought by witchcraft. .The belief in witchcraft was deeply rooted. The afflicted was taken to the mata kite— the priest who professed to be a face seer, one who could discover the witch or wizard that had caused the, suffering. He would go to the river side, perform his incantations, and profess to see the spirit of the witch in the water, and alone divulge the name — not very unlike the old English supersition of consulting the "wise man." In some cases the death of the witch was instantly sought, in others a system of counter bewitching was resorted to. I knew a man who strangled his own mother-in-law because he believed she had bewitched his children. I had missed her out of my congregation, and went to the village to enquire after her. The guilty son-in-law was mysterious, and said she had gone to visit her children. _ I had reason to suspect otherwise, and went out into the fern 10 search. I found the corpse in an old kumera pit, with the cord about the neck that had been the instrument of death. I learned that he had enticed her out one day on pretence of looking after his pigs, and by the side of an old kumera pit drawn a noose over her head, strangled her, and threw her in. The brute was unmoved when the murder was discovered— he rejoiced that he had despatched a witch, and was very angry that the corpse was put in a coffin and received Christian burial . The priest also professed to have power over the elements, and would speak with pretended authority to winds and waves. "If you and I were on the sea," said Te Heu Heu, the great priest of Taupo, "no harm could come to us, I would command the storm, and it would obey me." These priests performed the rite of baptism. They took the child to a stream and sprinkled it. If a boy, the prayer offered to the gods was, " Let him be strong to grasp The battle axe and the spear. Mighty in the strife, Foremost in the charge, First in the breach. Brave to grapple with the foe, To climb the lofty mountain. And contend with raging waves." If it were a girl the prayer was— " Let her be strong to weave garments And to cook food." These men were among the greatest opponents of the Gospel. Of course the craft was in danger ; wherever the Gospel was received, their influence declined. Another custom connected with their religion was the superatitiQus rite oftapu. It was a. law

of restriction that derived its sanction from their religion— it means something sacred, not in reference to any moral quality, but sacred in the sense of separation from common uses for some special design. The superstitions connected ■with this law were too numerous to have more than a brief notice. It was a sort of magic term with which a man could throw a kind of protection over his property ; could tapu his horse, fishing grounds, eel pas, just as might suit his whim or convenience, and felt satisfied in defending his tapu with his musket. A chiefs head and hair were the most sacred parts of his person. To touch it was a breach of the law requiring a propitiation to the gods. To burn a chief's hair at a fire where food was cooked was a capital offence ; implying a threat to cook him. Yeates, in his book on New Zealand, gives a curious illustration of this rite. "He says he one day found a chief with a fish bone stuck in his throat, in great agony, in a state of suffocation, yet no Maori dared to touch him, nor approach within certain distance. Yeates went to his aid and extracted the bone. Instead of being grateful the first words he uttered were orders to his people to take the instrument with which the bone had been extracted as utu for having made him bleed and for having touched his sacred head." It was often difficult to converse with them without running your head against this arbitrary law of Tapu. A person unacquainted with it easily got into difficulties. Bishop Selwyn, after he had been only a short time in the country, was travelling in the North Island, and, with two Wesleyan Missionaries, endeavored to mediate between two war parties. Reasoning with the Ngatiamaniapoto chief, the old man said " I can't hear; look, I have no kai for my pipe," meaning I have no tobacco to smoke. "Ah," returned the Bishop, " I suppose if I were to fill your ears with tobacco you would listen to me." This was a grave offence— equivalent, in Maori society, to saying, I will treat your ears like tobacco, burn and smoke them in a pipe. The chief was angry, and his friends threatened to throw the Bishop into the river, and he had to propitiate their wrath with a present In some of the dialects of the country, an improper use of a Maori proposition would be a violation. There are two forms of the proposition, we translate fot "ma and mo." He patu mau would be a weapon for you to strike with ; he patu mou, one with which to smite you. lliwai man would mean these potatoes are food for you ; riwai mou, these potatoes are to be eaten with your flesh. Formerly a great part of the land was tapii. A chief had bled, or a corpse had been rested, or some person was buried, or some event had transpired which had made all around sacred. The penalties for violation were annoying. They exposed the transgressor to be plundered of all he had, and sometimes to death. It was a great barrier to the introduction of Christianity. A more powerful system of religious despotism could not be conceived, and nothing was wanted to complete the bondage of superstition that enslaved the ( Maori. This law of tapu was a perfect network that entangled him at every step.

SOCIAL CONDITIONS. Their social condition was degraded,' savage, barbarous, wretched iir the extreme. War was their principal employment, their greatest delight; they loved its excitement; it called forth all the devices and cruelty of a savage nature, and employed their vacant time. These wars were often very destructive of life, perhaps more so before they received firearms than after. In the days of Maori weapons, fighting must be in close conflict— hand to hand. Every man must kill his foeman or he killed. When muskets were obtained, they kept at respectful distance, and sometimes were in the field from morning till night without shooting a man. Of course when one party had guns and the other had to depend on the old weapons, the latter fought at great disadvantage. As in the case of Honghi, who returned from England with a supply of guns and shortly after attacked the tribes of Mercury 13ay, when he slew 1000 men and washed and eat 300 before leaving the battle field. Cannibalism was the constant companion of war, and the first missionaries had often to encounter the sight of a cannibal oven and a cannibal feast— scenes over which they sickened. Infanticide was common. Female children were frequently destroyed. "Ka raruraru taun i te kotiro nei," we shall be troubled with this girl, an unnatural mother would say. " Mepheame roaome," the savage father would reply — "strangle it." Domestic squabbles sometimes induced the mother to destroy the child as a punishment to an offending father. Polygamy was a fruitful cause of this horrible crime. The wife least loved was perhaps the mother, and illrequited affection led to the destruction of the offspring. Polygamy was general, and a great hindrance to the spread of Christianity. Woman was de-. graded, except in the case of rank. A chieftess of rank was Tapu and h d slaves to attend her; those of lower grade had the burdens to bear. A chief of rnnk had oue principal wife and a number of slave wives or concubines, these he loved to multiply, as they made his garments, nnd cultivated his food, and prepared his meals. I was once urging an old chief to become Christian, and among other things in the Avay of objection he said " Mephea aku raki raki ? "— What is to be done with my ducks ? You must keep one, and let the rest swim down the river nnd seek a home elsewhere. But I have ten, old Paroresaid: Kahore, kahore. Females were nos allowed to consult their own choice; they were generally betrothed in early life, and the betrothal was binding on the part of the female, though she had never been consulted; sometimes she would elope, then her friends and the man to whom she had been promised would go in a body to recover her. The favored suitor would endeavor to detain her, a struggle would ensue, each party dragging on the poor creature, perhaps a brother with his hand wrapped in her hair, till she was nearly torn to pieces, and the strongest bore her away. This kind of treatment often lead to much sin— to suicide, infanticide, murder, and war. ■ ' ■ Slavery, too, was practised. Prisoners taken in war were enslaved; their position became one

of degradation and insult, and their lives "were considered of little value. Much has been said and written on the happiness of savage life,— its freedom, simplicity, innocence, and generosity; but these pictures only exist in poems, and romances, and fiction. The liberty enjoyed by the savage consists in a freedom to oppress and plunder those weaker than himself; and in exposure to the same treatment from those who are stronger than he. This, then was the condition of the Maori when Christianity found him, and it may be conjectured what work had to be. done and what difficulties had to be encountered by its teachers. The present condition of the Maori presents no criterion by which to judge. The self-denial, the privation, the actual suffering were such as few think of. Their toils were great; they had to be their own builders, brick makers, bricklayers, boat-builders ; and doctors, physicians, magistrates, ministers, and schoolmasters general, for the entire community. Their personal suffering s and dom estic tr ia 1 s were often great. The Mission party at Whan-' garoa, comprising Messrs Turner and Hobbs, and Mrs Turner and children, were all driven out of their home, and had to fly for life through the forest, leaving a baby in the grave, whose remains were ungraved by the covetous Maoris to obtain the garments that shrouded it. But it is time we enquired into the results of their labors.