Part 7 (2/2)

According to the historian Ellis, who previous to 1830 spent eight years in the Society and Hawaiian Islands, this prophet Maui clearly prophesied the coming of an outriggerless canoe from some foreign land.

An outrigger is a log which so balances a canoe that it can ride safely through the treacherous surf.

The chiefs and prophets charged him with stating the impossible.

He took his wooden calabash and placed it in a pool of water as an ill.u.s.tration of the way such a boat should float.

Then with the floating bowl before him he uttered the second prophecy, that boats without line to tie the sails to the masts, or the masts to the s.h.i.+ps, should also come to Tahiti.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Hawaiian Bathing Pool.]

When English s.h.i.+ps under Captain Wallis and Captain Cook, in the latter part of the eighteenth century, visited these islands, the natives cried out, ”O the canoes of Maui--the outriggerless canoes.”

Pa.s.senger steams.h.i.+ps, and the men-of-war from the great nations, have taught the Tahitians that boats without sails and masts can cross the great ocean, and again they have recurred to the words of the prophet Maui, and have exclaimed, ”O the boats without sails and masts.” This rather remarkable prophecy could easily have occurred to Maui as he saw a wooden calabash floating over rough waters.

Maui's improvement upon nature's plan in regard to certain birds is also given in the legends as a proof of his supernatural powers.

White relates the story as follows: ”Maui requested some birds to go and fetch water for him. The first one would not obey, so he threw it into the water. He requested another bird to go--and it refused, so he threw it into the fire, and its feathers were burnt. But the next bird obeyed, but could not carry the water, and he rewarded it by making the feathers of the fore part of its head white. Then he asked another bird to go, and it filled its ears with water and brought it to Maui, who drank, and then pulled the bird's legs and made them long in payment for its act of kindness.”

Diffenbach says: ”Maui, the Adam of New Zealand, left the cat's cradle to the New Zealanders as an inheritance.” The name ”Whai” was given to the game. It exhibited the various steps of creation according to Maori mythology. Every change in the cradle shows some act in creation. Its various stages were called ”houses.” Diffenbach says again: ”In this game of Maui they are great proficients. It is a game like that called cat's cradle in Europe. It is intimately connected with their ancient traditions and in the different figures which the cord is made to a.s.sume whilst held on both hands, the outline of their different varieties of houses, canoes or figures of men and women are imagined to be represented.” One writer connects this game with witchcraft, and says it was brought from the under-world. Some parts of the puzzle show the adventures of Maui, especially his attempt to win immortality for men.

In New Zealand it was said Maui found a large, fine-grained stone block, broke it in pieces, and from the fragments learned how to fas.h.i.+on stone implements.

White also tells the New Zealand legend of Maui and the winds.

”Maui caught and held all the winds save the west wind. He put each wind into a cave, so that it might not blow. He sought in vain for the west wind, but could not find from whence it came. If he had found the cave in which it stayed he would have closed the entrance to that cave with rocks. When the west wind blows lightly it is because Maui has got near to it, and has nearly caught it, and it has gone into its home, the cave, to escape him. When the winds of the south, east, and north blow furiously it is because the rocks have been removed by the stupid people who could not learn the lessons taught by Maui. At other times Maui allows these winds to blow in hurricanes to punish that people, and also that he may ride on these furious winds in search of the west wind.”

In the Hawaiian legends Maui is represented as greatly interested in making and flying kites. His favorite place for the sport was by the boiling pools of the Wailuku river near Hilo. He had the winds under his control and would call for them to push his kites in the direction he wished. His incantation calling up the winds is given in this Maui proverb--

”Strong wind come, Soft wind come.”

White in his ”Ancient History of the Maoris,” relates some of Maui's experiences with the people whom he found on the islands brought up from the under-world. On one island he found a sand house with eight hundred G.o.ds living in it. Apparently Maui discovered islands with inhabitants, and was reported to have fished them up out of the depths of the ocean.

Fis.h.i.+ng was sailing over the ocean until distant lands were drawn near or ”fished up.”

Maui walked over the islands and found men living on them and fires burning near their homes. He evidently did not know much about fire, for he took it in his hands. He was badly burned and rushed into the sea.

Down he dived under the cooling waters and came up with one of the New Zealand islands on his shoulders. But his hands were still burning, so wherever he held the island it was set on fire.

These fires are still burning in the secret recesses of the volcanoes, and sometimes burst out in flowing lava. Then Maui paid attention to the people whom he had fished up. He tried to teach them, but they did not learn as he thought they should. He quickly became angry and said, ”It is a waste of light for the sun to s.h.i.+ne on such stupid people.” So he tried to hold his hands between them and the sun, but the rays of the sun were too many and too strong; therefore, he could not shut them out.

Then he tried the moon and managed to make it dark a part of the time each month. In this way he made a little trouble for the stupid people.

There are other hints in the legends concerning Maui's desire to be revenged upon any one who incurred his displeasure. It was said that Maui for a time lived in the heavens above the earth. Here he had a foster brother Maru. The two were cultivating the fields. Maru sent a snowstorm over Maui's field. (It would seem as if this might be a Polynesian memory of a cold land where their ancestors knew the cold winter, or a lesson learned from the snow-caps of high mountains.) At any rate, the snow blighted Maui's crops. Maui retaliated by praying for rain to destroy Maru's fields. But Maru managed to save a part of his crops. Other legends make Maui the aggressor. At the last, however, Maui became very angry. The foster parents tried to soothe the two men by saying, ”Live in peace with each other and do not destroy each other's food.” But Maui was implacable and lay in wait for his foster brother, who was in the habit of carrying fruit and gra.s.s as an offering to the G.o.ds of a temple situated on the summit of a hill. Here Maui killed Maru and then went away to the earth.

This legend is told by three or four different tribes of New Zealand and is very similar to the Hebrew story of Cain and Abel. At this late day it is difficult to say definitely whether or not it owes its origin to the early touch of Christianity upon New Zealand when white men first began to live with the natives. It is somewhat similar to stories found in the Tonga Islands and also in the Hawaiian group, where a son of the first G.o.ds, or rather of the first men, kills a brother. In each case there is the shadow of the Biblical idea. It seems safe to infer that such legends are not entirely drawn from contact with Christian civilization. The natives claim that these stories are very ancient, and that their fathers knew them before the white men sailed on the Pacific.

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