# Te Tohunga/Te Aroha O Hinemoa

Layout 2
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igh above the sandhills Rangi the mighty spreads his Garment of Day. It is adorned with a border of snow-white clouds, which is resting on the distant hills of Papa, Papa, the happy.
Ah, she is sending white cloud-messengers of her love up to Rangi, to Rangi, the smiling, the beloved of Papa.
His golden Eye of Day caresses Papa, and looks down upon her with tenderness, and her blood mounts blushing into her cheeks of snow-white cliffs, and higher into the crimson glory of the flowering Pohutukawa-trees which crown the cliffs. The crimson flowers flutter down on the beach, of which Tangaroa, the unresting, takes possession again with long-rolling lines of froth borne on transparent waves and thrown ashore with majestic laughter and thundering songs to Papa, the beautiful mother.
"See, how Rangi's Eye of Day looks down, my good friend, filling the heart with longing. Ah, longing for happiness enters the heart of man, and Hine-nui-te-po is forgotten."
"Tell me, Ngawai, my good friend, what you have heard of the people who have wandered before us on the path to the Mother of Rest. Tell me what you have heard listening by the fires of the whare."
"Listen then, while we wander along the border of the sea to the love that has been, the love of both, the two, of Hinemoa and Tutanekai."
"The clear waters of the Waitemala never gave back such a beautiful image, nor did the flowing water of the Waikato nor the bottomless depth of Taupo-moana, as did the lake Rotorua on the evenings when the world was calm and Hinemoa looked down into the depths and was full of gladness."
Ngawai commences her narrative while the sun paints a blue halo in the black hair around her head. The light plays in the sunburnt face, the lips quiver, and the large eyes, full of light, see in the distance what the lips utter.
"Oh, Hinemoa was full of gladness and was smiling at her image for joy, for over the sea sweetly sounds the music of the flute and the horn played by Tutanekai and his friend Tiki, far off in the middle of the lake on the island of Mokoia, Tutanekai's home."
​And she sat and listened murmuring: to the water: "Oh, Tutanekai, how sweet is thy music to my heart! On many a calm night has Hinemoa listened, and her joy grew always greater, and her heart happier within her. Sometimes there were great gatherings of the people on the mainland, in the pa (village) of Amukaria, Hinemoa's father, and Tutanekai came over, but he felt sorrowful amidst the feasting and frolic. He stole quick glances at the beautiful maiden, but bis band was trembling and he was ashamed; and he glanced over where Hinemoa was sitting like a beautiful white heron among a flock of Kiwi, and his heart was frightened. He was frightened and ill, and was full of wrath over it, as over a lizard that ate away his heart. Therefore he longed for powerful enemies, to fight away his trembling, and thus to forget his fear.
So he collected his war-friends and went away like a dark cloud to the tribe of his enemies, challenging them to battle; and great was the fighting, and many were slain, but Tutanekai was victorious, so that he took many slaves and made great offerings to the God of War.
The great battle and the many offerings to the War God gladdened his heart again, and he was frightened no more.
But again, when he was home with his friend Tiki, his music wandered over the water, and took his heart away to Hinemoa, and it brought back her image, as she listened on the shore, and sorrow again grew within him. So he sent Tiki, his friend, to Hinemoa, to tell her of his great sorrow in being away from her, and to ask her to come to him and to his heart, that it might lose its fright and be full of gladness.
Watchful was Amukaria, but Tiki gave his message, and full of gladness answered Hinemoa; "Eh-hu, is then each of us growing in the heart of the other?"—and she promised to come to Tutanekai in a canoe, late on a black night, when he would play his sweetest music to call for her and to guide her in the darkness.
Amukaria, a great Ariki, was only willing to give Hinemoa as wife to a Rangatira of a very high mana, for her beauty was like the Morning Sun over the lake, and he, knowing the power and danger of such beauty, gave order that all the canoes should be taken off the lake. Thus, when the sweet music of Tutanekai called for Hinemoa, she wandered boatless on the shore, her heart full of tears, for she could not answer Tutanekai's calling."
Her eyes full of tears, Ngawai wandered along the rolling waves, telling herself in low tones, in Maori, of all the sorrows of Hinemoa, her ancestress. Ngawai accompanies her mutterings with movements which express despair; presses her hands against her heart; stretches her arms longingly over the ocean and presses them again to her bosom; then she speaks with a different voice and rapidly:
"One evening Hinemoa sat listening upon the rock Iri-iri-kapua, and suddenly the longing to go shook her as an earthquake. The trembling of love overtook ber, and the courage of love overflowed her heart.
She went to the store-house, and took six dry and empty gourds, and tied them together with flax for floats, and she went to the edge of the water, called Wai-rere-wai, threw off her mat of kiwi feathers, and cast herself to swim the long, long way with the help of the floating gourds. Oh, my friend, behold Hinemoa like a beautiful flying star casting herself into the water!
Ob, Hinemoa, the brave!"
Silent is Ngawai: her lips are murmuring incantations to Tangaroa; her hands tremble; her eyes are fixed far away in the distance.
"Ah, there, behold, she is there where the stump of the sunken tree stands in the lake——
Oh, Hinemoa!
Her arms are weary and her bosom is panting as she holds on to the branches of the tree.
Ah, now has darkness swallowed her!—oh her heart is brave!——
On she goes, on, on, weary ber limbs, her breast panting, darkness around; but nearer and nearer comes the sweet music, nearer, nearer, and at last, with all her strength gone, her hands ​reach the rocks of Mokoia, where the hot spring: is in the cave Wai-ki-miha. In this cave she took shelter, for she was cold, and trembling like a dead leaf. Trembling were her hands, but her heart was full of joy! Weary were her limbs, but her lore was great and happy!"
Ngawai is striding with quick steps forward, heaving is her bosom, but in her eyes is fire and she is murmuring to herself. Her heart and thoughts are far away among the waves of the lake Rotorua, battling there with the water, as Hinemoa did, her ancestress.
"Long, long was the way over the water—oh, great was the love of Hinemoa!—
Whilst she was warming herself in the cave, there appeared at the narrow edge a slave, sent by Tutanekai, to fetch some water; and when he had filled his calabash Hinemoa called out to him: 'Slave, for whom is that water?'—and the frightened slave answered: 'For Tutanekai, my ariki.' Hinemoa spoke: 'If it is for Tutanekai, then give it to me,'—and the frightened slave reached her the calabash, and she drank and broke it on the rocks. The slave called out: 'Why did you break Tutanekai's calabash?' But Hinemoa never answered.
Again did Tutanekai send the slave, and again spoke Hinemoa: 'Give me Tutanekai's calabash'—and again the frightened slave reached it to her into the darkness, and she drank and broke it again.
When Tutanekai heard the words of the slave, he reached full of wrath for his war-weapon of whalebone, calling, so that it sounded all over the island: 'Woe be to the man, woe be to the bad spirit, woe be to him who broke my calabashes! I will make a calabash out of his skull!'"
Harsh come the words from Ngawai's lips, but full of laughter are her eyes, and she wanders a while, smiling to herself.
"Tutanekai, in the dark cave, his powerful weapon lifted for a deadly blow cried fiercely: 'Who is that enemy, that I may give his name to my cup which I will make out of his skull?'
A voice answered softly out the darkness: 'It is I'—and the beautiful Rangatira, dressed in her flowing hair, stretched longingly her arms towards Tutanekai: 'O, Tutanekai, my ariki, kill me, kill Hinemoa.'
Ha! the powerful weapon fell to the ground like a useless stick; forgotten was the God of War; forgotten the lizards: sorrow and fear and full of love sounds the voice out of the cave: 'Hinemoa!'
And from the rocks it echoed over the lake: 'Hinemoa!'"
Long is Ngawai staring in her hands, squatting down on the beach, then form her lips one word: "Hinemoa."