MAORI RACE

Evening Post, Volume CVI, Issue 56, 4 September 1923, Page 6

MAORI RACE

NUMBERS INCREASING

AETS, TEADITIONS, AND CDS. TOMS.

Ah, the outward lift and the dashing! The quick thrust in and the backward sweep! The swishing, the swirling eddies.' The boiling white wave and the spray Fly from my paddle.

.This fragment of a chant used by the Maoris as they paddled eastward from their, homeland, Hawaiki, to find and settle in New Zealand a thousand years ago was given by a MaorLin his Native tongue in the Assembly Hall at Melbourne. The occasion was a lecture by Dr. P. H. Buck (or Te Rangi Hiora), etymologist and anthropologist, and the engagement formed portion of the programme of the Pan-Pacific Science Congress. There, was a crowded audience Pr. Buck represents the New Zealand^ Government and the New Zealand Polynesian Society at the Congress, and his lecture, "The Maori Race," fascinated his hearers.

To-day, said Dr. Buck, the Maori race had passed : successfully : the dangerous transition stage between savagery • and civilisation. .When a railway line was first put through the Auckland peninsula the train sped at fully ten miles an hour. An old Maori livinff on the route had frequently heard of trains, but had never seen -one, and when the first journey was made he determined' to sample for Jiiiiiself the strange and wonderful thing. which the white man had brought to iis country. • He had learned that the son. stood still' while the earth revolved, on its axis, and now he was full of Iwonder. at the celerity with which trees and shrubs flashed past the windows. After a time the train dashed into a tunnel. In the darkness the old Maori fell : back in his seat, pulled his hat over his eyes, and exclaimed, "My golly ! To-night!" He composed himself for sleep, but in a few nunutas the train emerged from the tunnel. When the light dawned „,i the Maotrbe B at up, rubbed his eyes, and;after a moment was.heard to mutter, " Well; well! The wlyto man is wonderful. To-morrow!" (Laughter.) ■ x Ti? e E i.t? ty.had a General applicationto the Maori race, which had emerged from the tunnel of its ignorance into the full sunshine of enlightenment while ■other native races of th c Pacific still' slumbered. WHERE DID MAORIS COME FROM? In Hawaiki some time in the twelfthcentury (so the Maori history had it) a great regatta was held, and Poi, tha ancient chieftain, watched from a .hilltop. In the canoe race, Whatohga, Pois grandson, was carried away by excitement, and paddled out to eea, where a .strong wind sprang up and defeated his efforts to return and he disappeared. Poi sought him ia vain among the neighbouring islands, and finally announced his intention to make' for the land far in the. south-east which had been discovered some centuries before. After long journeying he reached the North Island, and settled in what is now called the Bay of Plenty. Meanwhile young-Whatonga had returned to Hawaiki, and, finding his grandfather gone in search of him,-set out again to look-for his relative. Eventually sue-" cess rewarded him, and he. too/settled •' m the new land. Every Maori to-day . could trace his genealogy back to Poi. Two centuries later, driven (according ■ to tradition) by shortage of food and ' over population in Hawaiki,, a fleet of canoes found its way to New Zealand with new settlers, who brought with them the paper, mulberry plant for.: clothing, edible roots for food, and dogs and rats. Each Maori tribe traced its origin to a particular canoe. Thus, when greeting visitors the chief of a tube would say, " Welcome to the so-and-so canoe." . ENCOURAGING RACE PRIDE. Following a display of lantern slides of Maori carving, matting, and weaving, Dr. Buck said that a few years ago the population was steadily decreasing, until it had reached a point) at which extinction appeared. to be probable That danger has passed, and the Census report in 1921 showed an increase to 51,731. Previously the total had been as low as 37,000. Since 1921 the popu-. lation had further increased. Tiio Wvage ritual has passed, and the communist system is being broken. More and more .'the Maori is adopting European culture, and the white man's method of life. Maoris have survived , because they are intensely emulative, and even anxious to take a share in what is going on. At Gallipoli . they were represented by 500 men, and before the war ended they, were maintaining a battalion on tho Western font. Both full-blooded Maoris and those of us with white blood are preaching and encouraging . race pride. (Applause.) The aim of the Maori people is to emulate, in the ■ opportunities which civilisation presents, the great achievements of their ancestors.

Dr. Buck concluded with ah earnest appeal for intelligent study of the native faces of the Pacific, which are in danger of extinction.