en a a et 
ee eee 
SE Re Oe a a ae ee ee ee a et ee ae a ae ee ee ee ee eT ee ee 
Sp ee ape ent eT ENE 
Cotenso.—Traditions of the Maoris. 13 
them was cooked and properly served up and eaten, and then they might 
depart, saying to them, ‘Do not fear anything; remain quietly; let the 
food which has been purposely prepared for you be well and properly 
cooked and served ; then eat it and depart.” Therefore they did so; and 
when their meal was over, they left the pa in silence, and dragged down 
their canoes to the sea. While doing this, Uenuku’s people were again very 
desirous to fall upon them and kill them, but Uenuku restrained them, and 
so they escaped without harm.* As, however, they were leaving the shore, 
Uenuknu called out to Tawheta,—‘‘ Depart peaceably, O Tawheta ! ere long, 
I, also, shall go thither to our children; thou art not.a warrior, but an 
evil-doer.” (Zit. Thou slayest not (thy foe) openly and manfully, but 
evilly and fraudulently). To this Tawheta replied,—‘‘ By what possible 
means indeed cans’t thou venture to go thither ; to the home of the many, 
of the multitude, of the numberless?”}+ On hearing this, Uenuku rejoined,— 
“Go away, depart; soon I shall be going thither ; thou wilt not escape me ; 
to-morrow thou shalt be devoured by grass-hoppers! thy bravery in battle 
is slippery; go away, depart!” These were the last parting words of 
Uenuku, and Tawheta and his party returned to their own place. 
After this, Uenuku stirred up all his people to get ready his fighting 
canoes ; so they were all newly caulked, and put together in order, and got 
ready, and launched to go to war. Then it was that one of his brave fighting 
* This highly chivalrous (?) conduct,—or, rather, the noble trait in their character, 
never to allow the open public rites of hospitality to be Seance A asaranen bes — 
loudly welcomed them into his village, or fort), xhibited. The 
Rey. S. Marsden, of Paramatta, informed me Gn 1834) of a notable siataeii which had 
taken place while some head New Zealand chiefs were staying there at his house. It 
happened that two of them had come to Sydney by different ships, one was from the 
Thames, and one from the Bay of Islands,—two tribes who were then at deadly feud in 
their own country, and so it would have been between those two chiefs on their suddenly 
and unexpectedly meeting there; but the one said to the other,—‘‘ Here, thou and I will 
dwell quietly, and eat, every day, at the same table together; but when we return to New 
Zealand I will attack thy fort, and will kill and eat thee: ” and all this was carried out to 
the very letter. It was from the utter want of this feeling on the part of the British (in 
the Maori estimation), that the early colonists were so greatly twitted by the Maoris 
during the war of 1860-6; notably by the chief Renata Te Kawepo, in his upbraiding letter 
to the first Superintendent of the Province of Hawke’s Bay. (See, also, ‘‘ Essay on the 
Maori Races,” “ Trans. N.Z. Inst.,” Vol. I. § 34, end. 
+ This sentence deserves to be more particularly noticed :—‘ Ki te kaainga o tini, o 
te mano.o te rororo, o tini o te hakuturi:” lit. to the dwelling place of (the) many, of the 
numberless of the ants, of (the) multitude of the imps (elves, or fairies). A curious 
figurative sentence, not however uncommon nor untruthful in the olden time, showing the 
very great number of his people. (See Howmea, (infra), p. 27, and note there). 
The same simile of ants, to express a great number, is also used by the Greek and Roman 
poets: ‘ Tuxoc. Ip. XV., 45. Vira. Ain. IV., 402. 
