A MAORI STORY

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 121, 22 May 1926, Page 10

A MAORI STORY

TAU RIKARIKA COMES HOME

TOLD TO ENGLISH READERS

BY" A NEW ZEALAND WRITER.

The following story of the death of Tau Rikarika was told in a recent issue of the "Manchester Guardian" by Aotea-Roa." As it contains details of a tangi, it is here reproduced.

Tau Eikarika was dead. He had died while on a visit to friends who lived a hundred miles or more from his own settlement. But neither distance nor expense was an obstacle to the fulfilment of the Maori tribal custom which decreed that the body should be taken home- for burial. So a mortuary van was ordered from the railway authorities and dispatched on its southward journey accompanied by a consignment note marked "Freight forward."

Now Tau Eikarika was a person of some importance among his own people, and it was, therefore, only fitting that he should bo given a great tangi before being committed to the grave. The Maori loves a tangi as an Irishman loves a wake, and hasty but ample preparations for a great feast were made in Eikarika'a village. Eelatives and friends came from far and near, and each party added a contribution to the larder. Some brought potatoes, others kumeras, others fish. And there were a few who came with pieces of dried smirk and eels. They were easily distinguishable from the others. Soon the patakas, storehouses set high on poles, were full of materials for many appetising dishes, Maori and European. Trenches were made in the ground in which large stones were laid; after these had been made red-hot by fire, food would be placed in close proximity for roasting.

From out the windows and doorway of the meeting-house came intermittently ■ the wails of Eikarlka's woman, of her children, and of the family's close female relatives—wails •so pitiful and eerie that their authors might well have been the grotesquely carved figures with huge heads and protruding tongues that ornamented the front of the building. A magnificent pohutukawa tree grew in the middle of the open space, a great globe of scarlet blossom that radiated colour and fragrance in the brilliant sunlight. Beneath its shady branches sat a group of women from a. neighbouring village who felt their connection with the dead was too distant to warrant their joining in the wailing before the body arrived. Their black hair fell in two plaits over their shoulders, and most of them were peacefully smoking short, black pipes. One or two yore shoes, most of them wore barefooted; all of them were gaudily dressed in ill-fitting European clothes. Over the shoulders of several peeped the little brown luads of babies whose bodies were held 'to their mothers' backs by a blanket fastened across the breast. Occasionally one of the women would take her pipe from her mouth to reprimand a child playing near. It was a sleepy day, and it was pleasant quieMy to contemplate the feast to come. It was too hot to talk. Evidently the men had similar views, for r.iost of t" m lay i- the.shade and smoked or slept, clad merely in a singlet and a pair of trousers. A few played cards, and a few more —the young and dashing—amused the girls with their jokes or joined them in wonderfully timed and • lodious part-songs. These young people differed in many ways from their elders. They were very modern. The glossy, thick black hair of the girls had been either "bustered" or "shingled." The faces of more than a few had been liberally powdered in' an endeavour to whiten the naturallight brown. But the efforts of fashion to spoil the native beauty were checked when it came to the eyes. All the girls had those striking, large, brown, expressive eyes, with long lashes under well-marked eyebrows, which are characteristic of the Maori belle. • Silk stockings, highheeled shoes, and much-abbreviated i frocks completed a toilet which, if ' "flash," certainly was up to date. The young men, too, were well groomed, ' some of them in flannels and others in i Tather ornate suits. Both 'girls and I boys' were smoking cigarettes. ,'' Ugh!'' exclaimed an old, grey- ' headed man who had been sitting in i the shade, of the pohutukawa tree ! quietly smoking an old briar. "They whiten their faces and powder their bodies. They forget the traditions of their fathers, and some even do not know the language." "Ah, but they will' learn wisdom soon," said a younger companion. "Not they," rejoined the old man. His face was shaven,' wrinkled, and tattooed with blue lines which reached even across his high forehead. He was a chief, and in the ninety odd years of his life had been through many strenuous times. In the 'sixties he had fought against the whito folk. His bitterness had long since passed into admiration -for their reforms, but now that he was old it hurt him to watch 1 the younger generations adopt increasingly the softening 'luxuries of Western civilisation. "Now the girls and men like to jazz," ho said. "They do not know the delights of rhythmic poi dance or the stirring haka. The men cannot paddle a canoe as of old. they cannot hunt like their fathers, and they do not like to wear the mats which most of the women have forgotten how to make1 " 'Time for the train," shouted one oc the ultra-modern maidens in English as she looked atVher wristlet watch. There was a scamper for the railway station. "You got R-ikarika on this train?" asked a Native of the man in charge of the station. "Yes," was the reply. "He's shunted off, but he will cost you £6 10s." "Six pound ten!" said the Native, in amazement. Then, as an afterthought, "Oh, that's all right; we pay you to-morrow." "Oh, no, you don't," replied the official, who had dealt with Maoris before. "Cash up or no body." Faced with this 'problem the Maorisheld a hurried conference, but all they could scrape together between them was £4. This was offered in payment of the freight but was refused. "Go and have another conference," advised the railway official. As a result of the next conference the Maoris agreed to offer £4 in cagh, an 1.0. U. for 30s, and a couple of sacks of kumeras. "No good to the railway," said the official. "Very good," said the Maori spokesman, without a moment's hesitation, "you keep him." The Natives turned round with one accord as though to leave the station. They were hurriedly recalled by the railwayman. Such a possibility had never occurred to him. A telephone message was put through to higher authorities and the awful possibilities wore explained. After some delay satisfactory arrangements were made, and a sad little funeral jwocession-left the station, followed by the eyes of a much relieved and wiser railwayman.