MAORI MEMORIES

Wairarapa Times-Age, 24 February 1939, Page 2

MAORI MEMORIES

TAMIHANA PEACEMAKER. (Recorded by J.H.S. for ’'Times-Age.") For months after Wetini Chief of the Ngatiawa tribe was killed by General Pratt’s men, parties of his followers riding through the plain or forest would suddenly dismount as by common instinct and hold an hour's tangi weeping and wailing for the dead chief. This appeared to invoke the sympathies of tribes, who had hitherto held aloof from the war against the Pakehas in Taranaki. Not only from Waikato., but from Rotorua and Tauranga other Maoris rushed the British positions in Taranaki, generally with disaster to themselves. Then the sudden intervention of Wiremu Tamihana stopped the fighting in 1861. Tamihana had succeed his father Te Waharoa (the long mouth), whose ferocious cunning in tribal wars had raised the Ngatihauas to renown. This son was courageous and determined, but far less savage than the father. He had embraced many of the principles of the old Old Testament, which he had learned by heart, and frequently quoted, to the utter confusion of our orthodox churches. One fa.vourite theme of his was polygamy, “according to the plan of nature in flocks and herds, whereby we should raise armies to defend our homes, and to support the women and children in peace.” Tamihana taking other chiefs to Taranaki obtained a truce with the military and proposed a conference, he being sole arbiter for all native tribes. The Native Department invited him to go in the Government ship to consult the Governor at Auckland. “Oh yes,” said, Tamihana, “and be kidnapped on board and converted to enmity just as you served Rauparahara and Pomarc by similar treachery.”