1921 .] 
Best.—Polynesian Mnemonics. 
71 
arranged in groups, the meaning apparently depending on the number of 
notches in a group. It was not made clear as to whether these notches 
were merely mnemonic aids or possessed some symbolical significance. 
No confirmatory evidence has been collected anent this contrivance, and 
1 am inclined to view it with suspicion. In the case of the genealogical 
staves (rakau whakapapa) of the Maori we know that the knob-like pro¬ 
tuberances between the notches served as memory-aids. 
The tohunga (priestly experts) of Maoriland are said to have used a 
knotted cord sometimes to denote a tapu spot or area. Thus, in order to 
close to traffic a path leading to a cultivation-ground, they would stretch 
a cord across such path, and in the cord knots were tied at irregular dis¬ 
tances. Possibly the knots possessed some meaning, but, if so, it has never 
been explained to us. The late John White described a curious form of 
love-token formerly employed among the Maori folk. A young man who 
desired to know a young woman’s feelings towards him would so manipulate 
a cord that, by pulling the ends thereof, two knots came together. This 
he would send to the woman, who would, if she approved of him, so pull 
the cord and return it to the sender. 
The use of the quipu cord has been traced back to remote times in China, 
where cords with sliding knots seem to have preceded the more modern 
abacus with its movable beads. This use of knotted cords in calculation 
has certainly been practised far and wide, and may have been introduced 
into Polynesia from Asia. Any further use of the quipu cord must have 
been confined to arbitrary or conventional meanings assigned to arrange¬ 
ments of knots, and possibly to different colours, &c., of cords employed. 
Finally, we have no evidence showing that the practice was followed in 
New Zealand. 
Introduction of the Art of Writing. 
We have seen that, if ever the Polynesian had been acquainted with 
the art of writing, he had long forgotten it when Europeans arrived in the 
Pacific area. The introduction of written language had a remarkable effect 
on the Polynesian mind. That effect was one of amazement and excite¬ 
ment, the art appealing strongly to the intelligent natives. Evidence 
obtainable as to such effect is, naturally, principally local, but it illustrates 
the feeling that existed throughout Polynesia. 
In Carleton’s Life of Henry Williams we find an illustration of the 
admiration of the Maori for the utility of our script. The following refers 
to Maori lads receiving letters from friends in 1833 : “ Our boys seemed to 
look for, and read over, their letters with as much pleasure as we did ours. 
. They repeated them aloud, to the admiration of their auditors, 
who were struck with wonder at hearing, as they described it, a book speak, 
for though they expect that a European can perform any extraordinary 
thing, yet they cannot understand how it is that a New Zealand youth can 
possess the same power.” 
In the account of Cook’s third voyage we are told that the Sandwich 
Island women described European writing by the same term as that used 
to denote the delineation of designs on their tapa cloth : “ The young women 
would often take the pen out of our hands, and show us that they knew 
the use of it as well as we did, at the same time telling us that our pens 
were not so good as theirs. They looked upon a sheet of written paper as 
a piece of cloth striped after the fashion of our country, and it was not 
without the utmost difficulty that we could make them understand that 
our figures had a meaning in them which theirs had not.” 
