THE ERUPTION RETOLD.

Hot Lakes Chronicle, Volume 3, Issue 154, 13 November 1895, Page 3

THE ERUPTION RETOLD.

Thk Colony's Noctks Thiste.s. The following is Sophia's story of the eruption as given by one of her Sydney interviewers : "Ah," she says, " many people used to conn; to me in those days and long before, for I was young then. I remember well before the burning rain swallowed up my Maoris and the white people how I felt. Something had happened- " and hero she breaks off abruptly and is reluctant to go on, whilst tears stand in her eyes. But she continues :

"We had seen a few days before the phantom war canoe. Maoris know what that means—death, or war, or sorrow. It was one evening on tho opposite side of the laku I saw far away the shadow of the canoe. At first it looked so small and tiny, with only one or two small figures in it (hai. we thought were foxes or monkeys—so small wero they. Two old Maori women who were watching said it was nothing, but the boat drew nearer and nearer and grew larger and larger, and the figures were not dogs or foxes, but our own people—all chiefs, and all with their weapons. And then we saw there were 1.*5 in the boat, and I knew what it was, and so did the old wives, for they ran away crying, ' Taipo, Tai]>o,' which means in white talk 'the devil.' The next the ground heaved my whare as the big sea tossed our ship the other night, and J knew what our Maori stoi-ies tell was to come true. And white folk, too, had seen the war canoe, so you may know whether I lie or not. "Then when the time came it was the middle of the night. I heard the cry of the hills as the fire tore through them, and I ran out, thinking the last hour had (tome. It was all pitch black overhead, and then a sheet like gold was spread all along the sky. I thought of my poor people in the village just below, and I ran towards it; but the blackness came again, and I could not see. Below I could see the air of flying bolts, and then there was no more darkness. Through the great funnel in the big mountain all the fire burst with a sound of a thousand guns, and the flame was in the heavens. My poor Maoris I found down below, and they were running here and there crying the last day of the world was come. I begged them to come with me to my whare, .and some followed, but others went to the house of the white people, saying they were stronger, and the fire could not come there. I went back and got some of these, and some whites, too, and got them all in my hut; but all night long, as the liquid fire fell on the roof and. windows, they were for going away. But I said, ' We can die here, if wo must; stay still,' and they kept with me till morning, when we all came out like bees from a hive, 00 of us altogether. The phantom canoe comes only for dreadful things like that. But it was lucky ; we might all have gone."