BrAck.— Traditional History of the South Island Maoris. 78 
Te Kane managed to keep the enemy from coming to close quarters by 
the help of his nephew, who, acting upon his instructions, watched his 
opportunity whenever they came close enough to seize the man nearest to 
him, jerk him on board his own canoe, and kill him by cleaving open his 
skull ; and as his blood spirted out over his comrades, they drew back with . 
horror, and gave Te Kane a slight advantage in therace. This was repeated 
again and again till they got quite close to the shore, when the fog rose and 
discovered the combatants to the people of the pa, who were wondering what 
it could be that was causing such a din. Manawa and others ran down to 
the landing place, where they saw Tau hiku, their tohunga, lying bound in 
the bottom of the Ngatimamoe canoe, which had pursued Te Kane to 
within a few yards of the beach. The Ngai Tahu were overwhelmed with 
grief and alarm, and wailed forth their last farewell to the old priest doomed 
to fill the enemy’s oven; in acknowledgment of their parting cries, he held 
up two fingers. 
Ngai Tahu were paralyzed by the loss of their wisest tohunga, for there 
was no one to take his place—no one who could read the omens and tell 
the propitious time for attack, or forewarn them of approaching danger. 
The chiefs assembled and continued long in anxious consultation. ‘Have 
we no one," they asked, ‘‘ of the race of Tau hiku who can enlighten us— 
one with whom he has left his knowledge ?" They called his daughter and 
questioned her. She advised them to summon Tau hiku’s son Pohatu, 
but they ridiculed the idea; he had never displayed any talent, and had 
from boyhood consorted with slaves in preference to persons of his own 
rank. ‘Can such a one as Pohatu enlighten and direct us ? His place is 
in the kitchen beside the cooking fire; what can the defiled know about 
sacred things!" Still his sister urged that he might be sent for and 
questioned; so at last they took Pohatu, and, having stripped him of his 
clothes, they took him to the water and cleansed him, and then performed 
certain incantations over him to consecrate him and make him “ tapu.” 
When the ceremonies were completed they asked him what Tau hiku meant 
by holding up two fingers. ** Two years," he replied. ** You must wait for 
that time before you attempt to avenge his death, in order that the grass 
may hide the oven in which he was cooked.” 
During this period of forced inaction, the Ngai Tahu were particularly 
anxious to know what their enemies were doing, and in this they were 
greatly assisted by a man named Kiti, who was related to both tribes, and 
who by common consent acted as spy for both. Kiti alarmed the Ngai Tahu 
with the reports he brought to them of the formidable preparations being 
made by Ngatimamoe for the coming struggle. Besides the ordinary 
weapons, they had prepared spears pointed with the barbed and poisonous 
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