TE TAU O TE ATE.

Otago Witness, Issue 2130, 20 December 1894, Page 6

TE TAU O TE ATE.

(Specialty written for the Witness Christmas

Number of ISO f.)

By OSWALD HUGO.

I wonder shall I ever see her again? Pejv haps 'twere better I should not. A meeting with one who has been dear to us after 4 lengthy separation means often the blotting out of all poetry of memory — and is not thafj the chief poetry of life 7 Half-castes, though refined-looking when young, grow often very coarse in a few years. No, I should rather not see her again. I shall rather think o£ her as she wa3 when we were Bitting together by the still sea when the pohutukawas were in bloom, talking about birds, trees, and inBeets, and tho ancient mythology.

How distinctly I can see her, as I write, in her crimson blouse, and with that broadbrimmed, careless-looking straw hat with the two flaming poppies 1

Oae day she told me this story :

" Rrtka was the plainest girl in the village indeed she was positively hideous. An accident in infancy had deformed her features, and had also deprived her of full use of speech. But she was the kindest and the most sweet-tempered creature imaginable. Whenever any dieagreaable work had to be done Roka took it in hand unasked Many nights she sat up nursing sick children.

" And yet the Maoris did not love her as they ought to have done. Somehow they looked upon her presence as a di«gr*ce to the village. The Maoris are often like the rate, vines, which crush the stems they lean on."

" Yes," I interrupted, " and Earopeans too. I read once in a classical writtr of Zeus giving a banquet on Olympus, to which all the virtues were invited. When Gratitude and Benevolence were introduced to each other, they expressed themaelves greatly pleased, and said that they had never met before."

She continued:

" Once an old tohunga oame to visit the tribe. He was a man deeply learned in the old legends and incantations. He could see right into tb« hearts of men, and he 6aw how Reka was yearning for someone to love her —longing for a true love cvi we long in wintei for the first chirps of the pipi-wharauroa. He treated her with much kindness. He was an old man, and therefore he valued a beautiful soul more than a bomtiful face. For hours he would sit and tell her stories of the ancient daye, about the power of spells and charms, about ghosts and tha terrible Potlkie. One night he told her about the Turehus. The dictionary dafinqS them as ghosts; but they are not ghoate, neither are they men— they are a race betweea the two. We must not confuse them witb the Patupaiarehes, as some Maoria do ; tha latter are hideous monsters, while the Tarohus aro noble beings. Sometimes Maori women have Turehu lovers whom they rne«6 in the bush unknown to their own poopl©. Some tohungas know a *p<?ll by which they can make Turehus appear. " Reka declared she would like to see one, and the old man said that he knew such * epell, which ho would make uae of if she would accompany him out in the bush one night when the moon was full. " She did so. The tohunga took her to a cluster of karaka trees, and with bis hand on Reka's head he mumbled an incantation. The moon went behind a oloud. When it emerged Reka saw a noble-looking men before her, paler in oolour than a Maori, and with very large eyes— just as the Turehug had been described to her.

"A strange drowsy and happy feeling had come over her, and she did not feel surprised when the Btrar.ger took her in his arras and caressed her tenderly. Silently and full of happiness Bhe stood, leaning her head on hi* shoulder, until the tohm.ga came up and said : 'It is time now to go home.' At tho sound of these words her lover disappeared as mysteriously as he had come. " But the next day Reka'a eyes shone with a great joy. Love Is to the Maori the earn© as it is to the European. It is as if we were to go to sleep in a desert and wake up in a lovely garden with fragrant flowers, stately trees, and Binging birds. For love changes completely our conceptions of things. What before seemed dreary and barren becomes beautiful and bright. " • Neit full moon,' said the tohunga to her, ' I will go with you agftin to bring your Turehu lover to you, and then another time, and after that he will como witbcub my presence if you go to the same place and repeat the incantation which I will give you.' " But the next full moon shone upon the old tohunga's grave. He died very suddenly. He was a very old man. 11 In vain did Itdka go to the bush in tha full moon calling on her Turehu lover. Ha never aopeared. Then she pined away and died too. She had lost 'te tau o teate' (the loop of her heart)." Many other quaint stories and legends she told me in those sunny days by the still sea when the pohutukawa3 were in bloom.

* M * At this Beason of the year it usually happens to a good many of as either to remember or to be reminded of the existence of what are commonly called old friends. We use the phrase " commonly called old friends," because whether there is or is noe such a thing as friendship at all has always been, and, so far aa we can see, will always be, more or less of an open question.

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