TALES OF ROTORUA AND LEGENDS OF THE LAKES.

Auckland Star, Volume XLI, Issue 161, 9 July 1910, Page 13

TALES OF ROTORUA AND LEGENDS OF THE LAKES.

(Specially -written for the "Star," by J. COWAN.)

TALES OF OLD ROTORUA AND ' LEGENDS OF THE LAKES. (By J. COWAN.). NO. VTL A3f ENCHANTED VALLEY. IN fSE FOOTSTEPS OF IHENGA. Sailing along the shore of Lake Rotorua, westward and northward, from Ohineinutu. and passing the mouths of the Waiohiro and Waikuta streams, and ihe Ngongotaha River, Taua and I Reached our boat one morning at the mouth of the Waiteti ("Cabbage-tree gtream"), a beautifully clear little troutriver winding down from the fern hills on the western side of Mt. Ngongotaha. On a green: hill on the left (northern) iank of the river, close to the lake, is the site of one of tliQ most ancient yjl--2a.~i-- of -trtff Ara.wa ;pec*ple, tile old. ]3£L 9 z^ xemT \"W\ wl§ 1 w sfcremgly i orllned pa, m the ili'Oon jp si K)t, set up his stone altar, or W&ntt, S3 every ;picras 3la.ori si.ott2il, a-ncL buiJi: the great p3 3 whose massive maioro, or •palls, staad even to this day. The great trench which run across the land eide of "Werrsveri is wide and. deep, and lie top Of the earth wall, along ; which a row of pakeha pine-trees now grow, J3 fifteen feet or so above tne bottom of the fosse; it must" ha.ye been, more in ancient days, and it was also formerly crowned by a stout stockade. .Within ihe lines of the old pa is the little home of Matehaere and his wife, two- old folks who are mines of information for tie folk-lorist. It was Matehaere who • took mc to see the various places sacred ±o ihe memory of Ma ancestor Ihenga, and showed mc trie resting-place in a curious little .valley, the very tapu stone "Hine-tua-hoanga," on which ston« weapons and ornaments were shapen by rubbing, by the brink of the sacred stream Wai-oro-toki, of which, no Maori jnay drink and live.

This clear little Wal~te-ti stream winds down, like a silvery ribbon- through, the ferny Mils and manuka-clothed leveb. A small Maori village, known also as Waiteti, stands on its banks, a short distance up-stream, near the Eotorua-Tau-ranga coach road, from which a wheeled vehicle can be driven down to the village or right into the walled marae of iWeriweri The Waiteti is a magnificent irout-stream. It is an incredibly tempting eight for the angler to stand on the bank just above some still, clear pool, alive with beautiful fish, particularly if it be just "before the fishing season opens. In the spawning season the

upper parts of the stream are full of i the big fish.; you will see them lying there on tie bottom in the sun-wanned reaches, as still as so many rocks, until, perhaps, you are tempted to drop a stone into the stream for the fun of ; seeing , them scatter, like a shoal of mul- -"' j •lefbefore'a' shark. ' Tsp the valley of the Waiteti, turning , off sharp to the left from the coach road that leads towards the Mangaorewa forest and Tauranga, there are some picturesque little valleys, beautifully sintered nooks that held Maori hamlets in other days, tot now all deserted and overgrown, gone back to the wilds again, leaving the iockbelted "lightning-mountain" of Te feauae on the left, we can ride along old Maori track up to the main Bmrrce of the Waiteti, •where it springs up in a deep puna, or fountain, from nnder a cliffy wall.. These tracks twist in and out all over this JLohely country, through the high fern and the glossy green tirpakiM within its black clusters of elderberry-like fruit, and the thickets of manuka that in springtime are ' showered with delicate white blossom • till they look as if a snowfall: had powdered the face of the country, and diffuse an aromatic fragrance that is the most insistent of the grateful odours of the bush. Walking np this quiet valley, old Matehaere took mc to the old home of his hapn, where generations ago burned the home-fires of liw tribe, where their raupo huts dotted the river banks, and human voices livened, the now desolate places. Abont two miles up the valley from where the stream intersected the main road we came to a place where the little river took the character of a mountain-stream, and ran in rapids quite excitedly, whitening itself in cataracts and spray; on either side the ■banks were clothed with fern and flax, and here and-there with grov-es of the cabbage palms, from' which, the river ■ took its name. On a ferny knoll that commanded a good view of the stream, bending rounS in an arc below, and sending its water-music fax through . the etill summer-day air, my old guide halted . and said:. "Let us rest here awhile, and I will e&ow you the sacred place of my an- ' cestor Ihenga.^ - Pointing across the valley, he indicated an unusually large "ti-palm, or whanake, as it is more often called here, that grew on a tiny flat on the opposite or right bank of the stream. It was really a monster of the cordyline tribe, • palm with a. trunk of remarkable "eight and an immense bunchy head. X ,"See yonder whanake tree," he said, and the smaDer trees that grow arotmd it, in a clump? That spot is . wJlei Te Motu-tapu-a-Ihenga (tie -sacred grove of Ihenga). It was close °y there, by the foot of the palm, that ttenga once had his dwelling-place; and Jn that grove of trees-was his sacred Place, where he. as an Ariki and priest « his tribe, retired to invoke the. gods "ad to work divinements. That great - ■ pahn and tree is said to have been ■planted there by the hand of man; tnis ou* people frequently did, because the ™ai&ke gave a pleasant shade, and a ked of rough puern, or garment, was ""we from its long leaves. That tree ,» tapu to thp. Maori, because of Ihenga, i also .because the place was after- | Jfrds used a s a iburial place by Ihenga's / J JJ =>

.Then, turning to the right, Matehaere .•. Pointed down into a little valley that . .nipped .abruptly at otu feet, a palm- ;■ netted dell through -which a tiny stream crept down and searched its way to the ; ''■"&[•" The -was! shaped" very a shallow cup; one side opened to .:. »vow the creeHet to reach the river. 1 «f lttHe stream, said the old man, was HSf sacred river Wai-oro-toki. On the ■■-"•''fcni • side TOSe a stee P fern-covered 1 % ™i; its name was Te Whakaeke-tahnna; «, Was toe first fortified hold which ""soga, ibaat in itana and was;

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occupied by him for some time before he went to live at Weriweri and con.scructed liis waterside fortress there.

"Now, friend," Matehaere continued, "Ihenga the chief had three treasures. One was his god. Utupawa, a stone carved in the semblance of a human being; it was 'brought to this country from ilawaiiki. Hither Ihenga brought his god, and he sought for it a resting-place, and he set it up on yon ferny Mil above the VA 7 aiteti, not far away from his home. ELis second treasure was 'his mokai or pet, called Kataore, which was a creature in the form of a taniwha or ilizard like monster. He fed and cherished this strange creature, and it lived in a foun-tain-well which you will see in the bed of the Waiteti. Long afterwards it was killed at Lake Tikitapu. And his third treasure was the sacred rubbing-stone, Hine-tua-hoanga, which I will show you lying by the brink of that very ,'tapu stream in the valley below us. And Ihenga's friends and neighbours here ■were the fairies, the Patupaiarehe. They belonged to the toy tribe of Mount

siiHiiiiiiii'i a. tangle oi slirul>l>ery to tlie bottom tke little.'ffltHfllley, till we.reached the Wai-oro-toki. The name means "_Axesharpening Water." It was a rivulet of coolest, clearest water that welled up —dike most other streams in this district from a little gushing fountain, spring under The side of tlie liiH, "where a tnidcet of native 'shrubs almost hid it from view, ami invested it with a mystery and. gloom. tna"t to tlie ilaoris lieiglitened its mana-tapu, its sacred character. Tall whanake palms rose over all, and gently svSshed itheir ttong ©wtord-leaves, and now and then a soft air stirred the grey and dried dead leaves that drooped in bunches below the crown of green. The stream, only a few feet wide, but deep and still, flowed very silently, just moving the cresses and \vaterweed3 tiiat fringed it: it was so clear that -you. -could see every stone and pebble on its sandy floor. It was a slumbrous spot; and old Matehaere, as he stood on the bank, seemed ihalf-afraid to break the .supernatural quiet of the sacred valley. "No Maori will drink of this stream," said he, after a while. "Its waters are tapu, for two reasons. One is that the sacred of "Whakaue, one of our great ancestors, from whom the NgatiWhakaue tribe takes its name, were buried in its source, dropped down into> the puna, the river-well there under the ihfll. The other Teason is that the very sacred axe-rubbing stone Hine-tua-hoanga lies by tli'e river brink. It ds death, to drink of this water, though it looks so clear. The tapu would kill any Maori. Once two men drank of it unwitting of its history, and they quickly died when they discovered what they had done. You Pakehas would say it is fear, I suppose, but we know it is the tapu. And see, yonder ds the axe-sharpening stone of our ancestor Ihenga. You are the first white man to look upon it."

Tlie old man pointed ouir , the historic stone, one of the; most venerated relics of ancient Maoridom in the Lakeland district. I examined it. It was a flat block of grey stone, apparently a kind of sandstone, about three feet in diameter, lying on the creek edge, half in and half out of the water; In its smoothly-polished upper surface were three deep grooves, worn by generation after generation of men in their works of "orooro-toki" or axe-rubbing. It was a whetstone, used by the natives of the stone age for the polishing and sharpening of their azes, adzes, and chisels. Many such whetstone or "hoanga" were in use, but this one is regarded by the Maoris as ■exceptional because of its antiquity, and because many generations of high chiefs and priests had used it for tika polishing and sharpening of their stone It is "Tino Eongonui," farfamed indeed, amongst the Arawas. Said Matehaere, as lie stood at a safe distance from "Hine-tua-hoanga":

"My forefathers, it is said, brought that axe-sharpening stone hither in the canoe Arawa from the distant islands of Hawaiiki, away in the land where they say it is always summer. What though it be very heavy as you say? The explanation is easy; it was very light when first it was brought to this place, but through continual resting there, and through the tapu, it has become heavy, as it, no doubt, is, though I will not touch it to try its weight. True, pakeha! Though you don't look as if you believed it! It is not a stone of this land, and it bears the name of wonderful mana, for Hine-tua-Hoanga, the Woman of the Whetstone, after whom it is named, was a goddess of our remote ancestors; she was a stone, and it. was upon her sacred jback that the gods and our great ancestors did grind sharp the edges of .their stone axes. And' we have a very ancient and sacred karakia chant which is used when sharpening axes in this way; it' was first used for the sharpening of the stone tools with ■ which the trees were felled in far Hawaiiki for. the building of the caaioe Arawa to convey my ancestors across the Great-Ocean-of-Kiwa to this country. But I .care not to repeat that chant here in the sacred valley, for fear the stone Hine-tua-hoanga should hear mc. It is so long since the priests last used it here. Let us climb to the hill above."

So we crossed the sacred river—the Maoris evidently consider the tapu 13 ■well diluted when its waters mingle with the main river, for the Waiteti is under no ban as to drinking—and breasted our ■way up through the manuka and fern to the' dear hill-side above. And there, dose by the tutu and. fern-covered earthworks of the ancient pa, Whakaeke: tahuna, Matehaere, the last" _ chief of 2fgati-Bienga, recitad his Estrange pld chant, the song of Ihenga, for this very tapu relic of neolithic man. ■ The kaiakia dates back about six centuries; it was composed in Hawaiiki and recited by the priests over the. stone axes; every step in the process of felling the forest-trees and working the timber was sanctified by the Polynesians "with appropriate ritual, for the propitiation of the spirits of the forests of which Tane was the father and the guardian..

This is "a translation of the chant as repeated by Ma-tehaere:

There Is no road,-O friend," no. way to the far South JJanci, save-by the. will of the gods, save by thce,'o "\yhakarewa-in-the-sky, our guide to the distant places. Thou-it wert who hither brought Poutlni and Wharaua, axes made of the sacred "reen jade stone; brought them o'er the ocean far. There, in that- distant land, we'll see, flashing and shining in the waters the sacred treasure-stone of Tangaroa; the lightning-flashing stone, the bright and glistening stone. Banished be the; tapu's spell, ere I place the sacred stone on Hine-tua-Hoanga, the goddess of. the whetstone, that the axe-blade may tte sharp to fell the great totara tree. Oh come, ancestral shades! Come hither, ancient spirits, spirits orthe .distant come sharpen mc my; etone^

axe-blade to hew mc down the woods of' Tane,. to make fly the chips of Tu-kehu, the sod of Mumuwhango, the forest child for whom we sought, to cross the flowing waters. - , .... .:., .: .

This ancient rune requires an explanatory note or two. Tangaroa, mentioned in the chant, is- the god of the ocean, and of fish and all other creatures the sea. The greenstone is spoken of as the sacred stone of Tangaroa because it was in Maori legend originally a fish, turned to stone 15y some magical power. Tv Kehu is apparently a name for the totara pine, which in Maori mythology was the offspring of Mumuwhango, who was one of the wives of TaneMa- :- huta, the creator and guardian of the forests, and of all that dwell therein. Tane is often used in Maori song as an emblematical term for a canoe; "the narrow path by which the ocean is crossed" is a canoe made from Tane's forest-child. Our totara pine does not grow in the South Sea Islands; the word totara may possibly have been an an-: cient name for some Hawaiikdan tree of another kind, such as the tamanu, one of the best of the South Sea timbers, or else it has been introduced into : the karakia since the Maoris came to New Zealand.