500 
MAORI AND OTHER ABORIGINAL MANUFACTURES AND 
IMPLEMENTS. 
BY W. H. HARRISON. 
(Concluded from p. 494.) 
The poenamu is a vein stone, like quartz or felspar, and traverses rock 
of primitive formation. The river Arahura, nine miles from Taramakau, 
appears to cut through some veins of this stone, and to bring down 
fragments of it in the floods. On the subsidence of the water, the 
natives wade about searching for it in the river bed, and the heightened 
colour of the stone in the water soon reveals it to them. 
Of poenamu there are the following kinds, viz — 
" 1. the inanga ; 2. the kauairangi ; 3. the kawa-kawa ; and 4 
maka tangi wai. 
" The inanga is the most valued by the Maoris ; it is rather opaque 
in appearance, and is traversed with creamy-coloured veins. The best 
meres are usually made of this stone. 
" The kauairangi is of bright green colour, with darker shades, or 
mottled, and is the most translucent ; it is a brittle material, and not 
easily worked — ear pendants are frequently made of it. 
" The kawa-kawa is of a dark olive green, and has rather a dull and 
opaque appearance ; hei-tiki (little images), and ear pendants are com- 
posed of it. 
" The maka tangi wai is the least esteemed by the Maoris, but by 
far the most beautiful of all. It is of clear pale green, and is very trans- 
lucent. The natives will drill a hole through a pebble of it and hang 
it to a child's ear, but do not care to fashion it into any shape. It is 
the only kind of poenamu that would be esteemed for purposes of 
ornament by Europeans. 
" In order to make a Mere, a stone is sought of a flat, shingly shape 
—say of the size, and roughly of the shape, of a large octavo book. Among 
the primitive rocks of the Middle Island stones are not wanting of suffi- 
cient hardness to cut even the poenamu, and the Arahura natives lay in 
a large stock of thin pieces of a sharp quartzose slate, with the edge of 
which, worked saw fashion, and with plenty of water, they contrive to 
cut a furrow in the stone, first on one side and then on the other, until 
the piece may be broken at the thin place. The fragments that come 
off are again sawn by children and women into ear pendants. With 
pretty constant work — that is, when not talking, eating, doing nothing, 
and sleeping — a man will get a slab into a rough triangular shape, and 
about an inch and a half thick in a month, and with the aid of some 
blocks of sharp sanded gritted limestone will work down the faces and 
edges of it into proper shape in six weeks more. The most difficult part 
of the work is to drill the hole for the thong in the handle. For this, 
pieces of sharp flint are obtained from the Pahutani cliff, forty miles to 
