Newman. — On the Long Maori Trumpet. 137 



in war-time, to tell of threatening danger. They were also used 

 as announcements of the inarch of great chiefs, just like war- 

 lords and medieval heralds. They were used for the same 

 purpose as army bugle-calls are nowadays. When the ancient 

 Maori at night was scared of attacks by ghosts, he shouted and 

 played the conch-shell trumpet and this pukaea to frighten 

 away the spirits. In Samoa, and perhaps other islands, they 

 were used in the sacred marae in religious ceremonies. 



Tregear, in the " Aryan Maori," quoting from the Indian 

 Bhagavad-gita, gives a description of a fight by the Kurus : 

 " Then, in order to encourage him, the ardent old ancestor of the 

 Kurus blew a conch shell sounding loud as the roar of a lion. 

 He of dreadful deeds and wolfish entrails blew a great trumpet 

 called paundra." Our Maoris, having originally come from 

 India, doubtless derived their trumpets from their ancestors. 

 It is noteworthy that the conch shell and the long trumpet of 

 the Maori were both known thousands of years ago in India, 

 and the nasal flute of the Maori was brought from the ancestral 

 home in Asia, as we know it existed there and in Greece. The 

 conch trumpet and also the long trumpet were each named in 

 this story of India, and Maoris continued this custom, having 

 a name for each important mere or taiaha, or noteworthy canoe- 

 baler, or big trumpet. These long trumpets clearly did not ori- 

 ginate de novo among the Maoris, but were brought by them 

 from their far-off continental ancestral home. 



Darwin traced the descent of man by studying, amongst 

 other things, the rudimentary organs in the modern human 

 body. So to-day we, by studying the Maori, can see many 

 objects of Maori art which, like rudimentary organs, serve to 

 show the descent of the Maori. Among these are the three 

 fingers carved on the hands and three toes on each foot of a 

 Maori god or semi-deified ancestor, seen in India ; the little red 

 stones (whatakura) worshipped by the Maoris were worshipped 

 in India ; the double spiral in Maori carving, the double- 

 toothed earring of jade (both symbols of Buddha and of far 

 earlier deities), the lighting of sacred fires by rubbing sticks, and 

 the curious figures Mania and Marikihau, all are to be found in 

 India. 



This trumpet played to you by Mr. Warren is itself a direct 

 descendant of the paundra blown by the Indian chief. As the 

 trumpet has a limited range, the bugle-calls sounded by the 

 great Indian chief ("he of dreadful deeds and wolfish entrails") 

 were much the same, though blown thousands of years ago, as 

 those to-night played for you by Mr, Warren, who has done no 

 dreadful deeds, and certainly has not wolfish entrails. But the 

 old Indian chief, the Maori rangatira, and Mr. Warren are, after 



