The Voyage to New Zealand, Part 1, [Arawa]

len.george (63)in #history • 5 years ago

When the canoes were built and ready for sea, they were dragged and sailed to the lading point for each canoe where they were loaded, with the crews.

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Tama-te-kaua then remembered that he had no skilful priest on board his canoe, and he thought that the best thing he could do was to outwit Ngatoro-I-rangi, the chief who had command of the Tainui canoe.

So, just as his canoe shoved off. He called out to Ngatoro, “I say, Ngatoro, just come on board my canoe, and perform the necessary religious rites for me”.

When Ngatoro was on board Tama-te-kupua said to him, “You had better call also call your wife, Kearoa, on board, that she may make the canoe clean or common, with an offering of sea-weed to be laid in the canoe, instead of an offering of fish”.

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For you know the second fish caught in a canoe, or seaweed, or some substitute, ought to be offered for the females, that first for the males, then my canoe will be quite common, for all the ceremonies will have been observed, which should be followed with canoes made by priests”.

Ngatoro assented to all this and called his wife, and they both went into Tama’s canoe.

The very moment they were on board, Tama called out to the men in his canoe, Heave up the anchors, and make sail”, and he carried off with him Ngatoro and his wife,

This was so he might have a priest and a wise man on board his canoe.

Then they set the foresail, the mainsail, and the mizzen, and away shot the canoe.

Then, up came Ngatoro from below, and said, “Shorten sail, that we might go more slowly, lest I miss my own canoe”.

Tama replied, Oh, no, no, wait for a little, and your canoe will follow after us”.

For a short time it kept near them, but soon dropped more and more astern, and when darkness overtook them, they sailed on, each canoe proceeding on its own course.

Two thefts were upon this occasion perpetrated by Tama-te-kapua, he carried off the wife of Ruaeo, and Ngatoro and his wife, on board the Arawa.

He made a fool of Ruaeo too, for he said to him, “Oh, Rua, you, like a good fellow, just run back to the village and fetch my axe ‘Tutauru’, I pushed it under the sill of the window of my house”.

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Rua was foolish enough to run back to the house.

Then, off went Tama with the canoe, and when Rua came back again, the canoe was so far away that its sails did not look much bigger than little flies.

So he fell to weeping for all his goods on board the canoe, and for his wife, Whakaoti-rangi, whom Tama had carried off as a wife for himself.

Tama-te-kapua committed these two great thefts when he sailed for these islands.

Hence this proverb: “A descendant of Tama-te-kapua will steal anything he can”.

When evening came on, Rua threw himself into the water, as a preparation for his incantations to recover his wife, and he changed the stars of the evening into the stars of the morning, and those of the morning into the stars of the evening, and this was accomplished.

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In the meantime, the Arawa scudded away far out on the ocean, and Ngatoro thought to himself, “What a rate this canoe goes at, - what a vast space we traversed already.”

“I know what I will do, I’ll climb up on the roof of the house which is built on the platform joining the two canoes, and try to get a glimpse of the land in the horizon, and ascertain whether we are near it, or very far off”.

But in the first place, he felt some suspicions about his wife, lest Tama should steal her too, for he had found out what a treacherous person he was.

So, he took a piece of string and tied one end of the string to his wife’s hair, the other end he kept in his hand, and then he climbed up on the roof.

He had hardly got on top of the roof when Tama laid hold of his wife, and he cunningly untied the end of the string which Ngatoro had fastened to her hair, and made it fast to one of the beams of the canoe.

Ngatoro, feeling that it was tight, thought that his wife had not moved and that it was still fast to her.

At last Ngatoro came down again, and Tama heard the noise of his steps as he was coming, but he did not have time to get the string tied fast to the hair of Kearoa’s head again,

He jumped as fast as he could into his own berth, which was next to Ngatoro.

Ngatoro, to his surprise, found one end of the string tied fast to the beam of the canoe.

Then he knew that his wife had been disturbed by Tama, and he asked her, saying, “Oh, wife, has not someone disturbed you?”

Then his wife replied to him, “Cannot you tell that from the string being fastened to the beam of the canoe?”

When he asked her, “Who was it?”

She said, “Who was it, indeed? Could it be anybody else but Tama-te-kapua?”

Then her husband said to her, “You are a noblewoman indeed thus to confess this, you have gladdened my heart by this confession”.

“I thought after Tama had carried us both off in this way, that he would have acted generously, and not loosely in this manner, but, since he has dealt in this way, I will now have my revenge on him”.

Then that priest again went forth upon the roof of the house and stood there, and he called aloud to the heavens, in the same way that Rua did, and he changed the stars of the evening into those of the morning.

He also raised the winds that they should blow upon the prow of the canoe, and drive it astern, and the crew of the canoe were at their wit's end, and quite forgot their skill as seamen.

The canoe drew straight into the whirlpool, called “The Throat of Te Parata”, and dashed right into that whirlpool.

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The canoe became engulfed by the whirlpool, and the prow disappeared in it.

In a moment the waters reached the first bailing place in the bows, in another second they reached the second bailing place in the centre, and the canoe now appeared to be going down into the whirlpool head first.

Then up started Hei, but before he could rise they had already sunk far into the whirlpool.

Next, the rush of waters was heard by Ihenga, who slept forward, and he shouted out, “Oh, Ngatoro, Oh, we are settling down head first”.

“The pillow of your wife, Kearoa, has already fallen from under her head”.

Ngatoro sat astern listening, the same cries of distress reached him a second time.

Then up sprung Tama, and he, in despair, shouted out, “Oh, Ngatoro, Ngatoro, aloft there”, “Do you hear?” “The canoe is gone down so much by the bow, that Kearoa’s pillow has rolled from under her head”.

The priest heard them, but neither moved nor answered until he heard the goods rolling from the decks and splashing into the water.

The crew, meanwhile held on to the canoe with their hands with great difficulty, some of them having already fallen into the sea.

When these things all took place, the heart of Ngatoro was moved with pity, for he heard, too, the cries and shrieks of the men, and the weeping of the women and children.

Then, up stood that mighty man again, and by his incantations changed the aspect of the heavens, so that the storm ceased, and he repeated another incantation to draw the canoe back out of the whirlpool, that is, to lift it up again.

The canoe rose up from the whirlpool, floating rightly again, but, although the canoe itself thus floated out of the whirlpool, a great part of its lading had been thrown out into the water, a few things only were saved, and remained in the canoe.

A great part of their provisions were lost as the canoe was sinking into the whirlpool.

Thence came the proverb, if they can give a stranger but little food, or only make a present of a small basket of food, “Oh, it is the half-filled basket of Whakaoti-rangi, for she only managed to save a very small part of her provisions”.

Then they sailed on, and landed at Whanga Paraoa,

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As they drew near to the land they saw with surprise some Pohutukawa trees of the sea coast, covered with beautiful red flowers, and the still water reflected back the redness of the trees.