THE WIGWAM

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 859, 31 December 1929, Page 5

THE WIGWAM

Herr tee gather, here we meet in pow-wow friendly and discreet, To talk of earth, and sea, and sky, and watch the world of men go by.

THE OLD YEAR AND THE NEW

r-IE Old Year, a tired wayfarer, bent double under bis knapsack of yesterdays, is now setting out on his last journey to be gathered among his fellows in the counting-house of Time. On the stroke of twelve the iron-studded doors of the Past will clang behind him, and his kindly face will become a memory. The Old Year passing to his rest is always a touching picture. There is so much that Old Years must leave undone, so many tasks unfinished, so mqpy desires unfulfilled. The New Year is stirring in his swaddling clothes and opening drowsy eyes on an unknown world. As the Old Year must always appear to us a lioary-headed ancient, so must the Xew Year assume the guise of dimpled babyhood, lie appeals to our sense of protection. “Here I am.” he seems to say, “a little Xew Year for you to love and care for. lam part of the future. Open your hearts and take me in.” As the bells ring, 1929 will pass in brief review ere the iron-studded doors close upon him, leaving his younger brother in our charge. And his message to us is this: “A Happy New Year. I leave you .1930. He is yours to make of him what you will.” REDFEATHEE.

EXCUSE

Swept. I would bring thee gems, but that I know The morn’s dew diamonds and the evening s pearls dimmer more brightly in thy shinlng curls than rubied diadems that ki&gs bestow, Of. sweet, a mirror, spun by fay and •w elf : Wherein a queen has looked on Beauty’s face "Ut for the clear pool in that wooded Place ''here first I, wondering, saw thy slim, tall self. Sweet. I would bring thee flowers, unique and rare. B ut that I know the lowly fragrant briar butteri-up are nearer thy desire than asphodel that proud princesses And. sweet, when rhilomcl is singins elear. And all the stars are chiming, sweet and low, t would bring thee their songs, but that I know •"v simple, singing is to thee more dear. -"-Little Swift Canoe (Fitzie Morris).

GIRL GUIDES’ CORNER

Still Pool, of the First Whangarei Company, writes: "Our company has had a. very enjoyable month. On Friday, November 29, instead of the ordinary Guide routine, the patrols each dressed one of the Guides in a newspaper frock. Although the Red Rose patrol won this competition, Captain complimented the others on their pretty frocks. “On Thursday, December 12. the 2nd Whangarei Company held its birthday party. As our company was invited we made it our break-up night. There were about 120 Guides and committee women present, and we all had a splendid time. The tea was beautiful, and the programme the 2nd Companv put on later was thoroughly appreciated. After the Hikurangi and Onerahi Guides had left for home our company marched into horse-shoe formation.* and Captain gave out three Thrift and two Second Class Badges. The Lilv ratrol was presented with the Work, and Pansy with the Attendance Ribbon. The cup was won by the Red Rose patrol with the Forget-me-not coming second. After giving three cheers for Captain and our Commissioner we were dismissed. “We are to resume our Guide meetings in February.”

WIND FLOWERS “Blancliefleur, Blanchefleur,” whispered the wind. “What is it, what is it?” crooned the trees. “Blancliefleur is my dream. I have seen the iris flowers, dusk flowers you call them, and I have woven my wonderful blossoms of all that is beautiful. Listen, my comrades of the forest, while I breathe among the branches I will describe it. “Blancliefleur has petals soft as satin; outside they tire gold, gold as the sun in his summer glory, and inside they are silver, like the fragile new-moon curve that lies in the west. There is a drop of dew lying in the heart of it, shining, gleaming, and the slender stamens are like sentries, guarding it. The leaves are green, green as the depths of the sea, cool, clean. “At night, when the moon slides into the sky, my Blancliefleur open's gold petals, and the softest fragrance steals into the air. The tiniest breeze sets the flower a-quiver and, like a bell, the wee stamens chime against the silver. Afar in the forest they gleam, my dream flowers, but nobody knows save I. Like beacons they shine for me, these Blanchefleurs.” “Ho!” scoffed the trees. “You could not make a flower that has so many things—a luminous gleam, a scent surpassing all others, and bell-like stamens.” _ . Next night the wind nestled in the trees, saying—“l have learnt of my folly; dreams never come true. I have wrought a hardy flower to battle the spring rams and iaugli with me. Look at my result, Oh! trees of the forest. Tell me, do you think it is much like my romance? I have coloured it in many ways, I have given it a sturdy stem, and there is no elusive fragrance to charm a weary wind after a day’s work. Look at the offspring of a dream! Dreams —they never come true!” jeered the wind, flinging a host of anemones among the grasses, and swirling out to sea. Anemones wind-flowers flaunting their coloured faces in the spring, devoid of scent, the sarcasm of a wind with a romantic dream. At night when the moon weaves grotesque shadows among the trees, perhaps the wind will fancy it sees the dream-flowers gleaming afar. In the spring the realities come. They too, are beautiful, and the trees and the grass will greet them: “Anemones, anemones, flowers of the wind, flowers of the wind.” . , . . , Perhaps, too. when the wind is wistful and moaning round the garden, the whisper will come to us: “Blancliefleur, Blancliefleur.” —Flying Cloud (Lesley du Faur). FOR WISE HEADS "Word square: 1— Wan. 2 Old. 3To guide. 4 A whirlpool. Transpositions: Transpose an insect and leave part of a tree; transpose an outer covering and leave coloured fluids: transpose bread and leave a man’s name: transpose sin and leave to exist. Answer to word square, December 18: —Con£, Over, Near, Errs.

A STORK STORY

One day, in the north of a German province, some children noticed a pair of storks nesting in the roof of their house. Their home was in a lonely part of the country, where friends were none too many, and the children’s delight was great when one of the storks allowed them to make a pet of her. But when autumn came the stork made ready to wing her way South, and the children, sorry to see her depart, wrote a little note and tied it with some ribbon round the bird’s neck. In their note they said the stork was a great pet of theirs, so would the people in whose country it spent the winter be very kind to it and send it back in the spring? The following day the stork set off on her long journey.

Then something wonderful happened, just like a fairy tale. On a warm day of early spring the stork returned to Germany, and to the nest of the year before. The children soon found her, and were delighted to find another note tied round her neck with a different-coloured ribbon. This was from a missionary m an outlying region of the Sudan, who had befriended the children’s pet. He had been very pleased to see the care they had for the bird, and he hoped the kindness they gave to the stork might be extended to the little native waifs under his care, who would be glad of a little help with clothing and food. It is beautiful to think that children in countries far apart can be brought together by the friendliness of a bird. FROM A HOLIDAY LETTER The most delightful feature of our frequent- rambles is the surprising way small sudden showers keep tumblingdown upon our unsuspecting heads. We plunge with neither grace nor elegance through bramble and briar to the nearest tree, or thfow ourselves into the bracken until the shower has passed over. And', after nesting in a rimu all through a hailstorm, T feel prepared for anything, and could face a flood with a calm front-

A NEW ZEALAND FAIRY TALE

A long, long time ago, when all the world was filled with fairies, when fairies dwelt in every fragrant flower and twinkling star, aiid even in the delicate fragile shells on the seashore—there lived a little brown - skinned maiden whose great wish was to become one of these little elfin creatures.

Kiri was a chieftain’s daughter, and she lived in a beautifully carved whare with her mother and the great chief and her sisters. Their home was in the mountains. Across the green valley and above the purple-shaded hills, snow-clad peaks raised their majestic heads to the sky, and there, Kiri knew, the little fairies climbed higher and higher until they reached the stars. So Kiri would gaze and gaze right up to the tips of the white-mantled peaks and wish she were a fairy so that she too could climb up to the stars. How she longed to float on gossamer wings right up the silver trail of the rnoonfairies, to Her Star that smiled and twinkled down at her from' the jewelled sky. “Are you lonely up there, beautiful star?” she would call, and then the wind would waft down a message from the star. “Oh, little maiden, 1 am so lonely far up here in the night.”

“Then X will sing to you, beautiful star,” she would cry, and she would sing the sweetest melodies that the forest fairies had taught her and perhaps, when the moonbeams gleamed in the forest glade, she would lightly dance in and out the softlyswaying ferns to the plaintive music of the little rippling bush stream. The star would smile and twinkle down at her and forget that it had been so lonely.

But sometimes the dark grey clouds would roll out of the west and bide the towering peaks and the moon and the stars. Then Kiri would sic with the people of-her tribe, round the flames of a glowing camp-fire and listen with wide eyes to the tales of the brave warriors.

One night, when the wind moaned in the trees and the gTeat clouds scur-

ried over an inky sky, when the flames leaped and danced in the wildness of the night, Kiri sat listening to the story of Naumai, the hunter.

“ . . . and I sped on,” said Naumai, “through the great forests and over the rushing streams, down the deep valleys and over mountain spurs, until, at length, I came to the foot of the mighty Mt. Pirongia. There was a land of plenty. The berries were ripe and luscious, and the streams were as though they flowed from the cup of the Gods and far above, mighty in strength, Pirongia guarded day and night. I thought that it watched, too, this garden of the Gods, and a fear came into my heart that I might anger the Gods if I entered their domain, so I sped on.” Then Naumai told them tales of good hunting in other lands, of fierce fights with other tribes, of hunger, hardships and despair, and then of his return to his beloved tribe in the mountains. As Kiri listened, she saw before her the land of the Gods. “Surely,” thought sh£, “there must be a track which led from this wonderful land, far up the mountain side to the stars. Perhaps the Queen of the fairies lived in mat oeau.uui garden which the hunter had seen.” As the days sped on, Kiri thought more and more of the beautiful garden, and in her heart there grew a longing to find it for herself.

“Oh, beautiful star!” she would cry, stretching her arms toward that twinkling diamond so far away, “some day I will climb up to you and you will be lonely no more.”

Then came a day when all the tribe*, with the exception of the little children and the old warriors, went far into the forest to hunt for berries and wild animals for their food. When they had gone, Kiri ran into the bush and callied to the fairies of the forest to come and play with her, but though she called and called she could see none of her little friends. Only the sweet notes of the bellbird and the tui and the music of the flowing creek answered her. So she ran on and on until the forest grew dim and her little feet grew tired and weary. “Oh! fairies, where are you?” she cried, half afraid in the growing darkness, but it seemed as though all the fairies had gone away. Then a kindly old rata tree, seeing the little Maori maiden weeping sadly at his roots, said to her, “Don’t cry, little Kiri. I will tell you where the fairies have gone,” and he bowed his aged branches and whispered, “All the fairies have gone to the garden of the Queen to bring back fresh fragrance for the flowers, and new leaves for the trees, and sweeter music for the streams.” “But where is this garden?” asked Kiri. “At the foot of the mighty Pirongia,” replied the old Rata, and Kiri remembered the garden which Naumai, the hunter, had found.

“It must have been the Queen’s garden,” she whispered. That night, Kiri lay at the roots of the old Rata, and the wind crooned her to sleep while Her Star kept watch far above her. Next morning, Kiri set out to find the garden. With her eyes on the towering snow-peak, she sped on and on—down into green shadowy valleys and up to sunlit spurs, across pebbly creeks and fern-fringed mountain streams —and as she went she gathered berries and dug for fern roots to eat when she was hungry. So for many days Kiri travelled. The trees grew to love her, and the birds would alight on her shoulders and

twitter and chirp their friendly greetings. The mountain, however, seemed no nearer, and Kiri began to sigh, gazing longingly up at Her Star that ever gleamed brightly above her. The Maori mat she wore, grew old and torn, so she gathered the feathers of the birds and with some flax wove them into a new mat.

Then came a day when Kiri spied from the top of a high hill a beautiful green valley, nestling at the foot of the mighty mountain and she thought that she could hear the sweet tinkling of fairy bells and see the silver gossamer of fairy wings flitting among the trees. A sweet fragrance seemed to be wafted up to the hill where she stood and Kiri laughed and cried in the sunshine for she knew that at last she had found the Queen’s garden. Down she sped, swifter than the birds, faster than the wind, down, down, down to the graden. But, alas! Before she could reach the valley a cruel twining creeper caught her little brown*legs and she fell among the ferns. Her poor little legs were twisted beneath her, and her whole body was filled with pain. Her eyes smarted with tears, and she sobbed and sobbed as though her heart would break.

Slowly the sun sank, behind the purple hills and the light faded out of the sky. Little Kiri lay pale and shivering among the ferns. Her little body was cold and numb with pain. Suddenly, through the leafy foliage above there gleamed a silvery star. “Oh! my Star, my beautiful Star," she whispered with little sobbing breaths, and she stretched her brown arms piteously toward it. In the moonlight she lay cold and still, and the twinkling star so far away was filled with sorrow. They found her as she lay there —the good little fairies who were always so ready to help people—and they carried her into the beautiful garden. Then the beautiful Star sent down a message on the wind, and sail. “Oh! Queen of the Fairies, give me little Kiri to be my own dear fairy am so lonely far up here in the night.” '1 he good Queen knew her little Kiri loved the lonely Star so she granted the wish. Then gently, ever so gently, they bore her up. floating lightly on the moonbeams. The spirit of Kiri awoke —she was floating with wing of gossamer gently, dreamily, higher than the gleaming snows, higher than the last silver-tipped peak. “I am coming at last.” she cried and she floated happily into the arms of Her Star. —Eyes of the Morning (Ruby Blair). TWO AIRPLANES M. Louis Frank tells a pleasant tale of how, when he was Belgian Minister of the Colonies, he travelled through the Congo with two airplanes. One day he asked what the natives thought of the machines. He was told that they thought one airplane was a male bird and the other its mate. M. Frank said: “But the plumage of a female bird differs from that of the male. Both the planes are the same colour, size and shape, so how can the natives tell which is which?” “By watching the great birds alight,” came the reply. “This one descended first, while the other circled round till it saw that all was safe, and then it joined its mate on the ground.” . .