ORIGIN OF THE MAORI.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 262, 15 March 1911, Page 2

ORIGIN OF THE MAORI.

To the Edtor. Sir—Although Mr. Percy-Smith and the consensus of opinion of the authorities pn Maori lore seem to agree in giving India as the birthplace of the Maori' people, I should myself be inclined to offer a random guess that either Egypt or Arabia was a more likely iplade for the original cradle of the Maori race. "Rji" is the old Egyptian name for the "sun," and so it is in Maori. Most Maori words with "ra" in them refer to "light" in some way, probably as "Oaku-ra" ("when the sunlight lingers"). "Rata," a forest tree or parasite, a name unquestionably descriptive of the scarlet brightness of its flowWords in other tongues are t® be noticed as similar to Maori, such as "kakou," signifying "bad" in ancient Greek, while "kakino" is "bad" in Maori. "Iyapai" (("very good") differs little from the English "capi-tal," the interpretation of the two being identical. Whether or not any similitude is to be found in the Hindu to the Maori language is perhaps dubious. The Maori would seem quite a different personality to the modern Hindoo, and would almost smile at a devotee of Juggernaut walking on spiked shoes to the worship of that diety, and exclaim, with 1 the Australian aborigine, "He plenty hig," A Maori would alsp live comparatively sumptuously on fi3h and game,| where a Hindoo vegeterian fawould perish, in time of famine. That the Maori race dates from some remote prehistoric time is, I think, indubitable, and to consider that-they have always been savage is probably Much of their poetry in dirges and laments, some music, a*d remains of arts, would seem like sparks from the "light" of ages flashing at intervals through a savage darkness, from a lost and past civilisation and condition of considerable culture. "See o'er the heights of dark Tuwliarra's peak the infant morning wakes." "The tides of ocean weep as they ebb and How." "Behold the lightning's glare; it seems to cut asunder Tuwliarra's rugged mountains." The aphorism of Te Whithewe, the daughter ef old Rangaraha, "Oh! who shall turn life's stream, or fetch its waters back?" aro lines all suggestive of something more than savage composition. "Iki," a famous chief and brave man, would never permit cannibalism, as if a time might have been when such ghastly barbarities were not practised by the warriors of "Toa, the brave." 1 The last act of cannibalism was that of Titokowaru, who, towards the conclusion of the late war, boasted ol having "boiled some corporal's head in a pot." When Haraki was killed, his sister said, "Oh that I could eat the Governor," he being the cause of all the trouble. The Maori children's toys, also whipping tops, kites made of dried raupo leaves, skilfully carved boxes with hinges, seem beyond savage inventions. They may have been conquered by some more powerful tribes, and driven off from the homes and possessions of their remote "aceheringa," or unknown past, becoming nomadic races and savages through thousands of years, wholly losing their identity.—l am, etc., C.W.W.