THE MAORI CANOE.

Thames Star, Volume X, Issue 3424, 12 December 1879, Page 3

THE MAORI CANOE.

The following interesting particulars respecting Maori canoes are from a paper on the subject by Mr R. C. Barstow in the last volume of the. " Transactions of the New Zealand Institute:"—" When a tree h«d been selected, either by an individual rangatira or a hapu who had determined to build a war canoe, it was necessary that a sufficient stock of Food to supply the workmen employed upon it should be available. If the tree grew in a place distant from the p:t, a special col* tivation as near as possible to the locus ojierandi might.be made for the purpose, otherwise a particular patch of kumsns, or other esculent, was planted and set aside. Then the future canoe had to be draughted; certain naval architects where the SymoJiS and lieeds of their day, and were fetched from a distance to design a craft which was required to possess extra, speed, and many a deliberation of the elders took place over the prepared model, ere «he shape was finally settled. When stone axes and fire were the only means of felling the tree, the task.of bringing down a totaru four or five feet through must hare been tedious. The first iron hatchets used were those procured from Captain Cook, and those obtained a century" ago when Marion's crew were ashore and slaughtered while getting out a Rpar. Probably it was not till thirty years later that iron axes became sufficiently abundant to supersede those of stone entirely. Some care was needed that the tree in falling should not be broken oi shaken. An accident of this kind is by no means uncommon, and many fine spars are now lost in this way. The destruction of a specially large tree after the labor of felling it had been incurred, must have been a calamity. When an outlaying tree ot sufficient scantling could be found, it was preferred to one forest grown, as British shipwrights consider hedgegrown better than plantation oak ; yet in most instances the totara or kauri tree stood in the forest miles from the seashore, and so far from cultivation that relays of women were needed to carry up provisions for the workpeople; a road for hauling out by would also need preparing; secrecy, too, was often needed, for a hostile tribe : would be only too glad either to attack the pa weakened by the absence of many its men, or to surround and cut off the party while engaged at work. At last, however, incessant labor has felled the tree, crosscut the log, and dubbed down, the outside to somewhat near its destined shape, and fire and adze have partially hollowed out the hold, dry rewarewa wood being used for charring ; the amount of charring done at this staje depending upon the distance to which the canoe has to be hauled and the danger of its splitting in its journey. In peaceable times there is a great feast, and all the friendly neighboring pas contribute bands to haul out, by dint of vines over rollers or skids, the weighty mass. The workmen poll together over the sleepers to the songs of the women. It is not always fated to reach, the water. At the foot of the Wairere Hill, in Whaogaroa _ Harbor, there lay some years ago, two.sides of a mighty canoe, which bad been fashioned on the elevated plateau above the bay. Whilst a party of some thirty slaves were engaged in lowering it down the steep incline, a vine broke, the canoe ruahed headlong to the bottom, and split from end to end. A cry of despair from the awe-stricken slaves brought the rangatirai to the spot, and instant death was the punishment meted out to the unlucky slaves for their neglect or misfortune.