NGATAUEWARU

Wairarapa Times-Age, 25 June 1938, Page 9

NGATAUEWARU

TE ORE ORE MEETING HOUSE. (To the Editor.) Sir, —It is not generally known that the even yet remotely-picturesque Maori meeting-house of above name, and situated so close to Masterton, was originally designed and used for ceremonial purposes by local Natives 'as far back as the year 1840, in which the first invasion of European settlement at Port Nicholson began. Its present and third place of location will certainly be its last as far as our local younger-generation Natives are concerned. To them it must ever remain a sacred tradition to make use of the meeting-house for all major historic occasions, at least whensoever opportunity calls this now time-and-weather decayed edifice into prominent display. For that reason they are at present making noble efforts to renovate this venerable meeting-house of their long-deceased but not triballyforgotten ancestors. The more recently built and otherwise—to European way of thinking—■ more imposing Maori meeting-houses, such as the one erected to memory of the “Prophet” Rua, in the wilds of the Urewera, and the palatial one just opened and dedicated to the political-ly-illustrious memory of Sir James Carroll, at Wairoa; and, the big threestoried one at Papawai, raised by tribal kinsmen of the popular chieftain Tamihana Mahapuka, near Greytown; pre most certainly wonderful and picturesque edifices in every way but, notwithstanding, each pale into tribal insignificance as compared with Ngatauewaru, so near to our own town. Let it also be said, it is the only genuinely all-Maori built and decorated meeting-house, of its kind, anywhere to be found in the long stretch of East Coast territory between Cape Palliser, in the southern extremity of same, and East Cape itself, to the far north of Mahia Peninsula, and from whence sprang to arms, so many brave warriors of the great Ngati-Kahungunu tribe engaged in internecine affrays with their enemies, in day of yore. Where more fitted, therefore, than at Te Ore Ore, for our local and Wairarapa Natives generally to pay ceremonial homage—as they did last Sunday forenoon —to their Premier, Mr Savage, who, also, holds the Ministerial portfolio of Minister for Native Affairs. Under the safe and capable leadership of Mr Peter Paku, as master of ceremonies and chief spokesman for the said Natives, the welcome of Mr Savage and Mr Webb and accompanying party, was indeed a real old-time Maori and spectacular affair. The cere-monially-dressed platoon of hakadancing braves, and their accompanying lissome-limbed bevy of poi-danc-ing, sweet-singing enchantresses, made a deep and lasting impression upon all beholders who were privileged to be there. The old-time halting of the visitors while credentials were exchanged on the marae facing the sacred portals of Ngatauewaru, and the loud shouts of defiance associated therewith, were typically-effective reminders. to all unofficial pakehas, at least, to approach warily before intruding in these parts—and they watched the then seductive inveigling of the passported visitors to draw hither their canoe a little nearer its sacred precincts, by means of soft and enchanting melodies and outbursts of eloquent oratory at the hands of those double-gifted exponents of these and other arts for which Maori people everywhere in New Zealand are the subjects of prose-writing, verse and song, with admiring calm. Welcomed and farewelled, the Ministerial party, after the customary tribal feast-partaking, moved on; but the memory of .their reception will doubtless, in their individual and collective memories, live on —all of which blings under our closer public notice the dire need of helping our Te Ore Ore Pah Natives to achieve the early renovation of Ngatauewaru at kind and helping hands, for are not they and the Hamua Glee'-Party helping to raise funds for European aims and institutions out of the patrimony of their own good-heartedness, seeing wealth and mana disappeared, almost together, when their tribal lands, for the most part, were being sold, as the saying goes, “for a song. They, at least, still remain possessed with the gift of song. —I am, etc., N.J.B. Masterton, June 21.