A RELIC OF BARBARISM.

Evening Post, Volume LXVIII, Issue 98, 22 October 1904, Page 13

A RELIC OF BARBARISM.

The following article on the tattooing practices of the Maori has been contributed to a Wanganui paper : — It is profitable to be a good tattooer, for he can make £3 in about four or five hours every day. While I was at Waitotara a few days ago I was told by some of the Maoris I saw at the township that there was a tattooing operation going on at a pah named Ihupuku, near the above railway station. Not seeing the like of it before, I thought I would go and have a look at it. In dompany with another gentleman, I went down to the pah, and when, we got there we went straight to the big meetinghouse they have there, called Kawarau. This house was full of Maori women with their jaws wrapped up with bandages. On making enquiries about the women having the bandages on, they told me they had all been under the tattooing operation. I asked them where the operating room was situated, and they took us to the back of the meeting-house. •There we saw a tent erected t and on looking into it we observed one woman under the operation. She was lying fiat on the ground, with her eyes blindfolded. The tohunga, as the tattooer is called, was sitting on the ground by the side of the woman's head, with his operating instruments in his hands at work tattooing this woman. The instrument he used for cutting into the woman's chin and lips is made from toroa bones, sharpened and fastened on to a stick for a handle. This instrument is called whi, and with the aid of another stick to take the- place of. a hammer, he drives this whi into the skin and flesh of the one under operation. The instrument cuts hi from one-eighth to a quarter of an inch deep along the lines drawn by a lead pencil to the shape or figure required by the woman. As the blood flowed out of the cut, soot was forced into it to take its place. It is a terrible sight to see, and I do not know how they could bear the pain of the operation. We were not there very long looking at the woman before her body was covered all over with blood, and she was trembling all over with the pain. At the time I was there I was told this tohunga has tattooed about twenty women, and he had another ten or twenty more to do at £2 and £3 each. He put through five every week, making about £10 or £15 a week, with everything found. I was surprised to see the Maoris of our day going backwards to the old customs, instead of going forward. Ido think from a humane point of view that this work of cruelty amongst Maori women should be stopped. These tattoo tohungas ought to be prevented from operating on them. I was also told that some of these women have been under the operation two or three times within a week or fortnight. The women must be very anxious to be tattooedA to endure the torture of the operation the second and third time. This tohunga will have a nice little bag to take away out of his claims of blood at Ihupuku, Waitotnra.