Famous Maori Guide's Story

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 106, 7 May 1938, Page 12 (Supplement)

Famous Maori Guide's Story

Books In Review

MEW ZEALAND readers and writers, and particularly those. interested in Maori life, should he pleased to learn that the house of Victor Gollancz has considered the subject of the olden Maori sufficiently attractive for a new nook. From this eminent publisher comes an attractive book, produced in the firm's best style, devoted to an ever-attracLive subject. "Tho old-time Mnori" , i- the lufk of Makereti (Mm. Sμ :>:,■- :'..'ownci, onetime puidr ;,| ihe .-, i ... r m;: ,■-.. Wli ika ■ rewarewn. The ;..,.: ■,•,,.,.....■..., „ i-eol lecte.l and i-diti-1 ■~ Mr. I . K. I'.Miliii.'i.ni. P'mtpl ary \., ■ ;„■ i , ■ninil |. ■ f.. r Wil'ifJ'ology in tho I of dxf.n.!. The l' is the edilur e\plain-. : ■ ; ■<■■ life f-torv of M.i k.-i ■■! i her-.'if and I he s iila-e in winch she \^; born, nnd Die tribe in wind, .],,. «as ,t woman ~i ehicllv rank. Makereti. so widely km vvn ns Magpie I'apakiini, wnn born at vYhakatcwan-wa in IK7J and died in l-'.n.'u.d in I!>:!<). Her m<.tiier win I'ci !c N.■ iv,,i it, of the Tuhoura iil'i tribe: her ;';iil,.t was nn KnglUhmnn, W. A. 'I linn. When young f-he was geneialty called M.i —ie thorn, but took the name I'a pa I-. in a from one «'f the lively lil tli' geysers nt her birthplace. For many years she and her sister, Helia Wiiiri. were the nin»t popular guidon at Whakarewarewa. After she married a. well-off Englishman in 1911 she lived in Enpland, and in 10-2fi f-he became n sindent at Oxford L'nivcr-f-ity at the persuasion of ethnologists a\ ho were interested in her accounts of Maori life. She became a member of the School of Anthropology, and began to put notes together aid to read up all about her mother's race. In she was advised to present some of her material for the B.Se. depree, and it is this material, the tribal history, ■which was sent out to her relatives to be read and cheeked, that forms the principal part of the book. Aids Arawa History "The Old-Time Maori" ie very good in parts. There is too much that has been taken from other Trritera on the Maori, beginning with Grey. This could well have been omitted from the book because it adds nothing to our knowledpe of the race, and it has been copied without, the necessary background of knowledge for comment and correction. But when Makereti is herself, and gives •what is exactly within her own knowledge she is excellent, and makes a useful contribution to the history of the Arawa people. The most acceptable chapters in the book are those in which Makereti recounts the incidents of her childhood and the old village life, the customs observed at marriage, the birth and rearing of children, the cultivation of food and the social structure of the tribe as she knew it. Here her touch is firm; she is on the ground she knows. She describes how her childhood years were spent, between the permanent home in the valley of the geysers and the family's cultivation grounds at I'arekarangi, on the track to Horohoro. There are little pictures of those days of over r>o years ago, when the pakeha flood had not over-run the land. Makereti sighed for the days of her childhood. "How well I remember sitting on the taiimata, the brow of the hill over this Whakawhitinga (the ford of the Puarenga stream, on the track from Whakarewarewa to Parekarangi), looking down on that dear old kainga nnd on the fine old people who occupied it, that old generation who have nearly all passed away. 1 close my eyes and I am there again, sometimes alone, and ftometime* with my relatives and playmate Ataraiti, companion of my childhood. It was on this taumata that we concocted the haka song for Repora and Tnranaki, when we were about nine years old, songs which are sung to this day at meetings and tangis. When Repora heard us singing them she chased us but could not catch us."

Makereti griv-es the words of thie merry and mischievous lift of plainspoken childhood, teasing the lovers. She doee not give the translation; her Oxford friends might have balked at that. Tt may have been her private littie joke, by way of relief from those portentous studies for the B.Sc., for it is a quite refreshing ditty, an ec"io of old times in these days of synthetic Maori, to the tune of "Little Brown Jug." Makereti liked to revert in n»em«ry to those childhood days at secluded Parckarangi. There were the birds of the Maori bueh. "I could almost say that I lived with the birds, for they were in the forest all round me, singing and talking to» each other, and I used sometimes to think they epoke to me. Our kainga at Parekarangi -was close to the forest, and the only sound we heard was the singing of birds, which was a wonderful sound, and the Mangakara stream flowing over its pebbly bed." But the little girl had always been warned not to venture into the forest, for it -was "full of atua" (spirits), so ehe never went into beyond a few yarde on the edffe, gathering firewood. "The feelings 1 had as a chfld have never left me." she wrote, "and I still hear the voices of unseen beings in the sound of rushincr water, in whispering wings and in rustTng branches. I know and feel that witli all the education I have received, for which I am most grateful, I am at heart just the same as when I spent all those happy years of childhood with my kuia and koroua" (old people). Cultivation Record I The various place* where the Tuhourangi cultivated the soil, dug fevnroot, caught fish and snared and epeared birds are enumerated and de&cribed. So, too, are the places where the berries of the principal food trees, the tawa and others, were gathered and prepared for eating by drying and steeping and other methods. The kumara was the principal crop, all round the lakes and in the bush clearings. The page* on children and their gearing describe the affectionate relations in the Maori household and the great and loving welcome piven to children. The aroha, which began with the child, was carried into the family and intertribal relations. Love was the foundation and the watchword of the tribal life. No Maori ever went hungry or shelterless in the primitive days; the Maori was ever loyal to the claims of kinship, however distant, and to the tribal call. Makereti has a good deal to say about the matrimonial relations of pakeha and

Maori. Many Knglishmen, Scots and Irishmen of good family married rangatira women. '•The Maori woman was A most affectionate and faithful wife. and generally lived for her husband and children." There were, and are, many of these pakehas of the better type devotedly attached to their wives lor a lifetime.

The author is justly indignant at writers who make fun of the Maori's errors in speaking English. ''These people," she says, "forget that the Maori did much bettor in trying to speak Kng)i*h than many Knplishmen who tried to ppoik tlie Maori tongue; only we don't J n11 >lis 11 these things nor make fun of tho pakeha. Kangatini i)Oojilc don't do this sort of tiling.' , Some, of our tellers of comic anecdotes at the expense of t ho Maori should lay those remark.'! to heart.

In a note (page 110) Makereti toll* a stinging little story herself. It is a Maori theory as to the origin of the word "pakeha." One has hoard this version in the Ngapuhi country also. It is calculated to take a little, of the racial conceit out of the palefaces who are accustomed to talk of the "savage" Maori and the refining influence of contact with the pakeha. A useful feature of the book is the genealogical section, in which practically all the members' of the Tuhourangi are mentioned and in which every member of the tribe is able to the family line back to the original immigrants who came from Tahiti in the canoe Arawa six centuries ago. These "wliakapapaka" and the accompanying explanations made clear the manner in which descendants of common ancestors arc able to understand exactly their degrees of relationship. This portion of the book will be of special interest to all members of the Arawa tribe. Makereti'e knowledge of Maori lore did not extend much below the surface; it was superficial except in such matters as pertained to her sex and to social relationships. Nevertheless, with her aspirations given direction and shape by her scientific friende in Kngland, she made an effort deserving of praise to produce a picture of the olden

Maori life. Tt was a mistake to bring into the book so much copied from other sources, such as karakia or prayers from (Irey which (irey did not attempt to translate, and which Makereti naturally excused herself from attempting to explain. The book would have been the better for the excision by sonic qualified Xew Zealander of all borrowed matter, much of which is familiar from its frequent repetition. Sonic quotations are ill the Mature of historical literary cliches. Captain Cook's description (really not (Hok's own) of the tiellliirrf morning limbic in Queen Charlotte Sound should surely be given a rost now. Mukereti repeats some of the popular errors about origins of words, such as [he supposed pakeha-Maori origin of the word "kiilnia" , for the iron cooking pot. Her veivion (p. 217-218) exactly reverses t he facts. Spelling Inaccuracies There are rat her too many mis-spel-lings of Maori words and names. Even the pnkeko lias its name twice misspelled. Mr. IVnniman"-: preface refers, aumiiir other authorities, "to Mr. \V. B. To Kniti," giving Che readers the impression that Te Knit i was the name ot' the author referred to. The index has it: ■■ Knit i Mr. W. B. te." Apparently the editor did not know that the author of "Where the White Man Treads" was the late William Baucke, old King Country identity. There are mistranslations," tMieh as that of pou-toko-inanawa, the principal post supporting the ridgepole of a house. This is given as ''the post which supports the heart." The exact reverse is the meaning of the term, which originated in the ancient custom of placing a human sacrifice at the bottom of the hole dug for the big post of an important house, so that the poet rested upon the body. There are some curious misconceptions, obviously the result of nonacquaintance with the Maori people, such the statements that various garments and taniko decoration are "worn onlv bv chiefK." The definition of a greenstone tiki ie misleading. Mita Taupopoki's •"well-known head-dress of flax and feathers is described ae the, exclusive wear of a chief. Good old Mita would never have made speh a claim. Of course, in Maoridom anyone can attire himself as he pleases, provided he can pay for or otherwise acquire the decorations. As for head fillets of taniko-patterned flax, so popular among the Maori girls on dancing parade, they are a modern notion. In former days such displays were only made as a sign of mourning, when the chief mourners would often wear feather "pares" around their heads, and other wreaths of greeu leaves or ferns. There are some pood illustrations, particularly Makereti's own photographs. One is of her uncle, Mita Taupopoki, another is the tohunga, Tutanekai Haerehukaj both of these wise old men died a few years ago.