FROM TREE TO CANOE

Te Awamutu Courier, Volume 54, Issue 3894, 26 April 1937, Page 8

FROM TREE TO CANOE

KING COUNTRY GIFT. TO NGARUAWAHIA MAORIS. When friends in the King Country gave Princess Te Puea Herangi a totara tree that was growing in the tush, for the purpose of making a great canoe, careful provision was made for the felling of the monarch of the forest with due ceremony. Men expert at the work then commenced to shape the immense trunk, and when that had been done the task of removing it to the railway proved to be exceptionally difficult. The main section was so long that it spanned some of the gullies. Ultimately the three sections were safely delivered and on Friday they -were removed from the railway yards at Ngaruawahla and taken to the banks of the Waikato where it flows past the pa. The canoe was welcomed by an elderly Maori with an old karakia and the many men employed in getting it to the pa. were glad when the arduous task was ended. The centre section is said to be 52 fet in length, and the bow and stern sections are about 20 feet each. The canoe when finished will be one of the greatest ever to float on the Waikato. The work of excavating the hull must have been heavy, but it has been done with skill. The shaping of Une hull exhibits a mastery in the use of the adze that will surprise the most expert workmen.