Best. — Food Products of Tulioeland. 49 



daughter, or the performance of the tua rite over a new- 

 born child. 



The diet of the Tuhoe Tribe was ever largely vegetable, 

 and we will commence with those plants or trees of which 

 the roots or subterranean parts were eaten. 



Aeuhe (Fern-root). 



This is the root of Ptcns aquilina var. esculenta, the 

 plant being known as rarauhe, and the young shoots or fronds 

 thereof as mokehu. It is the common fern seen almost every- 

 where in unimproved open country. 



Among various peoples, more especially those living in 

 the more primitive culture stages, a feeling akin to reverence 

 is evinced for staple foods. Mahomet said to the Arabs, 

 "Honour the date palm, for it is your mother." In like 

 manner the Maori should honour the fern -root, for it has 

 ever been a most important article of food m these isles, 

 more especially among those tribes who had no access to 

 the coast, and with whom the kumara and taro did not 

 nourish or thrive without much labour and care. 



However, the Maori has honoured the aruhe by assign- 

 ing to it a celestial origin, thus placing it on a level with 

 man : for the origin, personification, or parent of the aruhe 

 is Haumia, one of the offspring of Rangi and Papa, the Sky 

 Parent and the Earth Mother, and brother to Kongo, the 

 origin of the kumara, or sweet potato. For Maori myth- 

 ology teems with such allegories or personifications, and 

 with many singular metaphorical terms. 



Hence fern-root is often termed the peka o Haumia, and 

 was often spoken of as the salvation of man, it being a 

 great and ever-obtainable stand-by when other food-supplies 

 ran short. x\n old native once said to me, " Let me ex- 

 plain to you. The ancestor who ever provides for his de- 

 scendants is Haumia. The food he provides for man is 

 seen on hill and plain and in the valleys between. That 

 is the good work of Haumia, the supplying of his descend- 

 ants with food. For Haumia is the origin of the mokehu 

 (fern), and the children of the mokehu are the ivaeroa (mos- 

 quitos), who, with their companions the namu (sandfly), 

 ever wage war against man. And haumia-roa (a term for 

 fern-root) was the principal food of the ancient people of 

 this land before the kumnra and taro were brought hither 

 from Hawaiki." 



This Haumia must not be confused with his descendant 

 Haumia-nui, who was a female, and who married Tiwaka- 

 waka, the earliest human resident in Aotearoa (New Zea- 

 land) of whom tradition tells us. We give below the de- 

 scent of Haumia from Rangi and Papa : — 



4 



