Colenso. — History of a Block of Greenstone. 603 



appease its wrath, and to enable them to seize it without injury 

 to themselves ; but that suddenly it made the whole island, 

 and the surrounding sea, its cloaca maxima, covering every 

 place thickly with excrementitious substances, which still re* 

 main, and swam away to the Middle Island of New Zealand, 

 where it has ever since resided, and whence they have been 

 obliged to obtain it. I scarcely need add that those ' excre- 

 mentitious substances ' comprise the different volcanic matter 

 with which the Island of Tuhua is now covered. Perhaps 

 after-ages may verify the tradition related by the old priest, 

 and bring to light the soi-disant god in a buried stratum of 

 axe-stone" {I.e., p. 215). 



My second was written by an intelligent aged Maori of 

 Hawke's Bay several years ago, who had collected the in- 

 formation in answer to my inquiries ; and, as it is peculiar, 

 I shall also give the Maori verbatim, with my free English 

 translation : — 



" To Colenso : greetings. I now despatch [to you] the in- 

 formation respecting the pounamu. Te Akapikitia asserts that 

 this thing, the pounamu, is really a fish. (But I say, How did 

 it become petrified ?) Better, perhaps, is the statement made 

 by a certain man of the Ngatimarau family, who returned 

 from that place. His name was Hanita te Maero : but he is 

 dead. 



" Now, this is his relation : Whenever a man residing there 

 has a great desire to go [and take pounamii] , he first says to 

 his wife to pound some prepared fern-roots to carry with him 

 as food for the long journey thither [over lands with no in- 

 habitants] . In his sleep at night he dreams, and on awaking 

 at daylight he relates his dream. Then he says to his wife to 

 give to him the prepared lump of beaten fern-roots ; and this 

 is then carefully wrapped up in leaves of kaw T akawa and koko- 

 muka shrubs." He then starts on his journey, first placing a 

 succulent shoot of tutu ' in one ear, and of kokomuka in the 

 other ear. And he travels until he reaches Poutini;} there is 

 Arahua, the water in which the pounamu dwells. Then at 

 the fit time he dives, and, lo! there it is found lying. He 

 then fastens on to it a prepared noose rope, and it is forcibly 

 drasaed out by those waiting on the bank of the water, and it 

 lies on the ground. Then it is carried away to the village 

 and worked up at leisure. The pieces of greenstone that are 

 collected, cut up, and used by Europeans are not the same 

 kind as those found in the water, or below in the very bed or 

 bottom of the water. These [of theirs] are very common 



* Piper excelsum and Veronica salicifolia. 



t Coriaria rusci/oiia. 



J An old name for the greenstone. 



