A FAMOUS MAORI WIZARD.

Temuka Leader, Issue 1532, 15 July 1886, Page 3

A FAMOUS MAORI WIZARD.

The New Zealand Herald gives an interesting account of Tuhoto, the Maori priest who was dug out alive at Wairoa after being buried for IQ4 hours, but who subleqnently died in the Rotorua Hospital. From the faet that Tuhoto survived an imprisonment of this length of time, without food or water, beneath a mass of cold mud, his case is e remarkable one enough, but he has other claims to celebrity and fame. He wae said to b s over IQO years of pge, and certainly be ©onld not be much younger, because Natives whp are old say ha was an old man when they were young, But Tuhoto’s greatest Claim to renown has not yet been put forward, although there has been a good deal paid about him since he was dug out. He wai the last of the ancient Maori prieeit or .feohqngaSf who, before the advent of ChrisIfan missionaries, had charge of all the religions concerns of the Maori race. There men have passed away, and have left no ■ueeessors: Since the death of Ta Ao Kafcoa, in Waikato, about a year ago, Tuhoto has beep alone. In ancient tinges, the tohunga was the most important man amongst tho Maori people. These priests were specially educated from an early ege. Several young men of the tribes would be selected, of good birth and of intelligence, and they attended a kind of college, under case of some venerable priest, who acted as professor. Those young men who displayed ability, and who took a deep intrreit in their studies, WIN carried an from the lower to the

higher grades, while others who did not give so much promise were dropped out, and were never entrusted with the profoundest saorets or the mo* 1 awful iiioantationa. What might bo called to sdopti Masonic phraseology, reguh* “ lodge* of instruction ” were held. The tohunga had enormous power, and had life and death in his hand. He it was who oast the omen* when a war party went out, and reed whether the warriors would be successful or not, He it was who imposed the mys--1 terious power of tapu, and he alone could remove it. He performed the ceremonies when a new house was opened ; he pronounced the necessary incantations when the kumara or taro wore planted. The Maoris, while still heathens, had baptismal ceremonies whan a child wai a few days or weeks old, and these were directed by the tohunga. The introduction of Christianity made a confiderable change in the power and influence of the tohunga. But still, after the lapse of fifty years, the Maoris have not got >ld of their old ideas. The tohunga was a man having *'uncanny” powers, and ho alone could do certain things. The Natives believed in tapu, and when, only a year or tao ago, the Ohinemutu Natives decided to give a piece of land at Rotorua on which »o bnild St, Faith’s Church, they sent for Tuhoto to the Wairoa, and he, by certain ceremonials, removed the tapu. It might have been interesting to have got from Tuhoto his early recollections. He has lived through mighty changes. He knew the days before Christianity prevailed, he •ould repeat the ancient incantations to the gods, and had much knowledge which im a philological point of view, would have been greatly valued by European savants. He remembered the old Maori wars, and the time vhea the Tuhourangi, their land then unvisited by tourists, was a great and powerful tribe. And he lived to see the event of a million years—the great explosion of Tampers and Eotomahona, an event such as those of which geologists tell ue. Oue wonders what Tuhoto thought of it all! That the belief in tapu and the dread of its power are still strong amongst the Maoris was shown when Tuhoto was dug out. The natives would not touch him or give any assistance, not because of any hatred towards him, but because they dreaded thty might do something which might bring upon them the anger of the unseen powers. So Tuhoto had to be brought into the Hospital at Rotorua entirely by Europeans, the natives even would not feed him while there. He appeared to be wonderfully hale and healthy when la the hospital at Rotorua and good for some years to oeme. Possibly his prolonged burial had had a greater effect than appeared. Possibly that, and the entire change of surroundings, were too much for the old man. The natives will say that when he got amongst the pakehas, and ate the food prepared by them, and administered by them, all his powers of tapu and magic passed away, and so he died.