MAORI MEMORIES

Wairarapa Times-Age, 12 March 1940, Page 4

MAORI MEMORIES

TAPUAE HARURU. (Recorded by J.H.S. for the “Times-Age.”) This name, meaning the t echo of footsteps, is taken from the . thermal hollow's of the thin crust of earth near the numerous hot springs, and the township of Taupo, a name which may mean a dozen tilings, probably “The dark night of departed spirits" In the very early days, Maori women were seen at Taupo with lines tattooed on the lower limbs, a most unusual | custom, probably some tribal or family ; fad not sanctioned by Maori custom (retenga), which unlike our fleeting “fashion,” is never changing.

Here is a vast inland sea 24 miles long by 14 miles wide, covering some SOO square miles in the centre of the North Island, at an elevation of 1200 feet. From it pours forth one great river—the Waikato. Whence comes its -plendid volume of pure water? Some day we will realise its use as an unlimited source of water and electric power. Toward the centre its great depth may mask the mystery of its main source, though the mountains on two sides show 17 stream pouring in from still higher elevations. Four are volcanic mountains, two of them active, Tongariro and Ketetahi; two seemingly extinct, Ruapehu, the largest, and Pihanga the smallest, on the western shores.

Lake Taupo is undoubtedly the crater of an extinct volcano, which probably exceeded in force and extent, that ol‘ any other in the world, for to its action we owe the North Island itself.