112 Transactions.—Miscellaneous. 
the last existence of common man. There were other spirits residing in 
our world ; if they had ever been men or not, is not clear; some of them, 
called atua* (the term is now used for God), would attach themselves to 
some men, and be their familiar spirits. But there were also cannibal 
spirits, called ngingongingo (or Rikoriko), who dwelt in the ruins of 
deserted houses and villages, and would creep into the living, when such 
came too near them, and eat up their insides, till their bodies wasted away 
and died. + 
We must now return to Tama in our tale. It appears that in the first 
stages of the Reinga, the ancestors could, in certain conditions, still be 
visited by the chiefs of their living descendants. Tama met on his way 
with a white heron (kotuku), and, borrowing his shape, he flew and 
alighted on the bank of the lake in the Reinga. Here he was observed by 
his ancestors, Tuwhenua and Tumaunga, and their daughter Te Kohiwai. 
They looked at the bird, which was going along the margin of the lake, 
stretching its long neck, and picking up food. They remarked, ‘‘ That is 
something new in our place. There are eight (or, as the Maoris generally 
counted by twos, sixteen) bends in its neck!” At last it struck 
them that it might be their descendant, Tama. Then they told Te Kohiwai 
to make a charm called a tamatane, used to find out the identity of a 
person, and go and throw it at the bird. She did so, and it fastened at 
once on its neck. Then she led the bird to Tama’s ancestors, and, on 
arriving there, he had regained his human shape. Looking at his 
ancestors, he was struck by their extraordinary beauty—they were tatooed. 
When the first greetings were over, the ancestors asked Tama, ‘* What 
has brought you here?’’ “The treasure of your ornaments,” he replied. 
*T wish to be made handsome.’’ They consented to his wish, and drew 
gracefully curved lines over his face and body. But not long after, when 
he went and bathed, it came all off, and he complained that it did not last 
like theirs, Again the lines were drawn upon him, but these, likewise, did 
not last. ‘* How is it,” said Tama, “that your tatoo lasts, and mine does 
not last?’ “Ah,” said they, ‘‘ we cannot make a lasting tatoo here; for 
that purpose you must go to your other ancestors, to Toka and Ha, at the 
place of Tuapiko and Tawhaitiri. There they have the proper instruments 
and pigments, and also the skill of performing the operation.” Then Tama 
went to that place. ‘‘ What brings you here?” asked those ancestors. 
‘Your ornament,” he replied. ‘I wish to be tatooed.” <‘‘ Ah,’’ said they, 
* The ancient sft sed were aig ins ati but they had the attributes of gods. 
Atua also mean , from a ghost to a work of machine 
+ Ican find no paper — a ‘Meow text of the foregoing description; I could Se! 
render it into Maori, but that would not be a text out of the mouth of an old M 
