CoLENSo. — 0)1 the Moa. 85 



This is often said on seeing the hissing sap-like exudation issuing from 

 the branches of the Koromiko shrub when fired, green or wet ; which sap 

 is also said to be the fat, or oil, of the Moa. 



Note, here, the mode of cooking, as shown by the verb (tao), is that of 

 the earth-oven or liaangi ; but the koromiko shrub is never used for such a 

 purpose, the wood being much too small. 



[I may here mention that the late Sir Donald McLean, who had kindly 

 endeavoured in former years to glean some information for me relative to 

 the Moa, in his travelling in his official capacity and meeting with the old 

 Maori chiefs, told me that this common saying was all he had met with.] 



But then a similar proverb, or saying, is also used concerning this very 

 same shrub when burnt green, connecting it with Tutunui, the pet whale 

 of Tinirau (which whale was killed and roasted and eaten by Kae, as fully 

 related in their myths) ;* namely — " Tena te kakara o Tutunui I == Excellent 

 is the nice smell of (the whale) Tutunui (roasting) ! 



2. He mihiau te kowhatu i taona ai te Moa. 



Mihiau was the (kind of) stone with which the Moa was cooked, or 

 baked. 



This apparently simple saying has given me a world of trouble. During 

 several years I have been enquiring the kind of stone called mihiau, but 

 with little or no success. One intelligent old chief only, seemed to know 

 something about it ; according to his statement, a mihiau was one of three 

 sorts of stone anciently used for cutting and lacerating their flesh in times 

 of grief, and death of relatives — waiapu, j^aretao, and mihiau — and all three 

 were, I think, of a volcanic nature (Waiapu- obsidian), and therefore could 

 not be used for common baking purposes ; besides, their own highly super- 

 stitious fears as to any desecration of the tapu would have prevented their 

 so using them. Has this any hidden, or obsolete, reference to the " fire of 

 Tamatea " (supra) ? which is said to have originated from the country near 

 the burning mountain Tongariro. 



Further , the name itself is a strange one. Etymologically it means — 

 thy expressed grief after something dead, or gone ; mihi = grief, or affection 

 shown after something absent ;t au = thy, or thine ; and as such the name 

 would be a highly poetical one for a cutting bit of sharp stone used only for 

 lacerating purposes on account of the departed. 



3. Ko te huna i te Moa ! 



All have been destroyed as com^^letely as the Moa ! 



Said of a tribe — of a fighting party — of the people of a village — or of a 

 family, when all have been surprised and killed — or carried off by death. 



* Vide " Polynesian Mythology," p. 92. 

 t See Tangaroa-mihi, " Trans. N. Z. Inst.," Vol. XI., p. 100, 



