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Legends of the Maori

Mountain Magic

page 189

Mountain Magic

Ko Tongariro to maunga, Tongariro is the mountain,
Ko Taupo-nui-a-Tia te moana, Taupo-nui-a-Tia is the sea,
Ko Tuwharetoa te iwi, Tuwharetoa is the tribe,
Ko Te Heuheu te tangata. Te Heuheu is the man.
-Ngati-Tuwharctoa proverb.

Kaua e whakatoi ki nga tipua maunga, mehemea he wahine te také.” Do not annoy the mountains, especially if there is a woman in the case. Now listen to my tale of Mount Egmont and you will be able to judge for yourself.

The characters in this drama were:—

Taranaki the outraged husband.
Tongariro the trusted friend.
Ruapehu the faithless wife.
Pihanga the handmaiden.
Ngauruhoe the chief henchman.
Koputauaki a retainer secretly in love with Pihanga.

It was the age-old story. A woman, a man, and the other man. They were such friends and had such confidence in each other. Well, the unexpected happened—as it generally does happen. Flagrante delicto —at least, that is how my legal friends would have put it, and they ought to know.

Now Taranaki invoked the aid of his gods with the most potent karakia known. He turned his wife, friend and their servants into mountains, but in doing so he could not escape himself, for he had to pay the penalty for the potency of his incantation and thus likewise was turned into a mountain. Ngauruhoe and Pihanga complained that they had a grievance for being suddenly included in this terrible curse, but Taranaki had a different story to tell. They were aiding and abetting and so, too, had to pay the penalty. Having turned the characters of this drama into mountains, probably in the same way that Lot’s wife was converted into a pillar of salt—cum grano salis—he hied himself to a distance and on his descent to the Tasman Sea he gouged out the Whanganui River, and also the stony rivers on his ascent to his present position.

Ah! What satisfaction! For from afar through the centuries he has watched the terrific struggles and the volcanic throbs of passion which assailed the breast of Tongariro, always striving to clasp his paramour in page 190 his arms, but eternally checked by the chilling snows on her bosom, until he wore himself out in the struggle.

* * *

It happened in the days when a young Maori doctor first started to walk the bush paths of Maoriland in preference to the hospital wards of your more fashionable medico. Not then did the modern Chateau show its imposing face to the glistening snows. Occasional parties ascended Tongariro in fine weather, and the Ngati-Tuwharetoa chief, Te Heuheu, whose tribe lived in those parts, assumed the role of tourist agent to the extent of looking to the safety of such stupid pakeha folk as might assail the mountains in the time of snowstorms.

Now, my friend, it came to pass that one year, as winter approached, two pakeha men, doubtless on holiday from their wives, came to the mountain. The signs were for a heavy fall of snow, and under these conditions it did not necessarily mean that those who went up must come down— unless maybe on a stretcher, my pakeha. So Te Heuheu sent word to them not to attempt the mountain. Being tired business men, probably in the habit of bossing their typists, they replied in the vernacular. At any rate they made it quite clear that they knew what they were about without the aid of any Maori. Probably because he was used to the lord-like courtesy of the average city-dwelling pakeha of that date, Te Heuheu did not take umbrage. Rather he detailed one of his henchmen, Rau, to follow and keep them out of danger.

They were nearly half-way up the mountain when the Maori overtook them and make known his business.

“Go to hell,” said the first pakeha.

“All right,” replied Rau. “But I tell you Te Heuheu, the big chief, tell me to find you pakeha and make the warning not to go up the mountain to-day.”

“O! Go to hell!” This time it was a duet.

“That all right. We all go to hell by-and-bye,” continued the Maori, “but I tell you Te Heuheu say the snow come perhaps two hours, three hours, four hours—maybe six hours.”

The city men then turned their backs and started climbing the ridge. Again Rau tried to reason with them. After being well singed with epithets from Hades, he said, “Well, all right, if the snow come, don’t come down this ridge; it’s too steep and narrow. Come down that ridge” (pointing to a ridge a mile or so away), “ka pai that ridge if the snow’s bad. There’s a Maori whare half-way down it. I’ll wait for you there.”

With another parting expletive the climbers, lightly clad, staggered upwards. Excelsior! Excelsior!!

page 191
In the Snowstorm.

In the Snowstorm.

page break page 193

While the Maori was on his way to the old deserted hut his dog bailed up a pig. Quickly despatching the poaka, Rau looked at the sun and said to himself, “I must make haste. If anything happened to those silly pakeha the old chief will kill me.” After cleaning the pig and feeding his dog, he started up the spur that led to the old hunting hut. No sooner had he reached the old place when the first flakes of snow began to fall. He knew by the signs that there would be a severe snow storm, so he gathered as much firewood as he could and heaped it both inside and outside the little whare. He worked hard and gazed anxiously and often up the ridge. As some hours had passed and the climbers had not appeared he prepared to go out into the now heavily falling snow after them. First of all he made a fire and hastily cut up some of the pig and, putting it into his small billy, filled with water, hung it over the fire.

These preparations finished, he called his dog, and together they started to clamber up the snow-clad mountain ridge. Night had fallen. Rau seemed to have been walking for hours in the darkness before he saw a black object sticking out of the snow. One of the city men had sprained his ankle, and fallen in the snow, and was just going to sleep when the Maori appeared. It didn’t take long for the old dog to find the other man, who was also buried in the snow.

Then commenced a terrible journey; the trials and tribulations of a mere savage doing the behest of his chief. Time after time the struggling Maori fell with his heavy burden. To make matters worse, the other man was now half unconscious. It meant carrying one of them a distance, leaving him in the care of the old dog, and going back for the other.

It was by pure chance that Rau at last discovered the old whare. As he was on the point of collapsing he saw a few sparks some distance down, and with one last effort managed to get both men into the hut. He soon had some of his soup, now hot over the fire, down the men’s throats. But they did not seem at all grateful. The nearest approach to credit for his achievement that old Rau got was after the two pakeha were recovering, when one of them said to the other, “Bloody strong nigger, eh, what!”

The snow kept coming down, and to add to Rau’s anxieties the elder of the pakeha began to have shivering fits. Upon making a cursory search in the hut the only thing he discovered was a tin of mustard. He immediately cut a piece of cloth from the lining of his coat and made a mustard plaster, which the pakeha was loath to put on. Rau explained that a young Maori medical student had shown him how to make cheap mustard plasters that were quite as efficacious as those you bought for a half-crown in the pakeha shops which had the red and blue bottles in the windows.

page 194

Rau noticed that the younger man of the two kept his hand always in his right-hand pocket, and he wondered at the peculiarities of the pakeha.

The long cold night drew on and the dying fire threw flickering shadows over a scene that suddenly became tense with drama. Outside the snow-flaked night wind beat unceasingly against the whare. The young pakeha lay sleepless, his eyes on Rau and his right hand always in his pocket. On the other side of the fire the elder man groaned and shivered in his sleep, and Rau cast a worried glance in his direction. He shook his head as if in deep thought and then silently drew off his coat. Fear struck to the heart of the young man who lay feigning sleep. Slowly and cautiously Rau crept forward with his coat flung over his shoulder. Thoughts of murder at the hands of the Maori chilled the young man, who carefully turned the revolver in his pocket until it covered Rau.

Tragedy was narrowly averted. Just as the fear-mad man was about to shoot, the fire flared up a little, and out of the corner of his eye he caught a glitter. Glancing up quickly he saw the pig suspended from the roof—and in it was Rau’s knife. Trembling with relief he turned again to his companion just in time to see the Maori carefully tuck the coat around him, and then creep back to crouch over the fire.

Early next morning Rau had his coat on again, and the sick pakeha was feeling better. The cheap mustard plaster had done its work.

The Maori made stew for breakfast and somehow from somewhere he produced a cold potato for each pakeha. When the men had finished they demanded more potatoes, but the old Maori was husbanding his resources and refused to give them any. Then they began to indulge in their usual pastime of abuse. They said a number of uncomplimentary things which, luckily for them perhaps, Rau didn’t understand. The fact of the matter in regard to the potatoes was that his wife had put into his kit about ten of them for his lunch. These were the potatoes he was giving out.

The second day passed uneventfully except for the continued ruddy abuse, which was growing stronger. However, the third day dawned beautifully bright and fine and before they had stirred far a rescue party met them. This consisted of an Armed Constabulary man, another pakeha and several Maori men. They had given the climbers up as lost, all except the old chief Te Heuheu, who had all confidence in his henchman, Rau. The pakeha did not even thank Rau or bid good-bye, but they left an old Waterbury watch for him with the constable.

They were in a great hurry to reach the telegraph office to send messages to their wives.

page 195

The replies to both their wires were significant. The elder man’s wife was suing for a divorce while the younger’s wife had cleared out to Sydney with another man.

* * *

“Yes,” said old Rau in recounting the story, when he heard of the way his pakeha companions had been treated by their wives. “That comes through trifling with those tipua mountains. Do you know,” he added, “When I came home my wife had run away with a man from Whakatane! Oh yes, she has had two other husbands since then. She all the same merry-go-round. Why, even the watch they left me went wrong. Aue! Ae pea!” (“Alas! Yes, perhaps!”).