Evening Tales.

It being dark after the evening meal had been eaten, the people retired into their houses, where they amused themselves in various ways. An old woman, a distant relation of Takaho, still sat in front of his hut, having with her a small kono¹ of cooked food. She again and again asked him to come out, and she would feed him. She received no answer save a low, moaning cry. There was no fire in his hut; as he was sacred, none could be lit there.

The largest house in the settlement had been cleaned out during the day; and the floor was covered with the swamp rush, over which were laid rough plaited flax mats. In this house were congregated the young people, young men and women, boys and girls, some sitting, while others reclined at full length on the mats. The house was lighted up by three kapara² torches, which were stuck up in the centre.

“What shall we play at to-night?” asked a young woman.

“Let us kaka,”¹ answered a young man, who had a scar over his eye, which made him stare as if his eye was in a fright.

“Yes,” answered a girl; “if you can teach your eye to look calm, I will join in the kaka, and sit opposite to you; but if you stare with one eye, and look calmly with the other, you will make me laugh in the midst of the play.”

Another young man answered her, “I will sit opposite you if you will teach your nose to look at the earth on which you tread, and not keep that everlasting turn-up. I should always be thinking of eels if I sat opposite to you, for your nose looks like eel-holes,”

“How fine your words are!” said another girl. “You can talk; but are you not the young man who, in his rage, tried to eat a stone, and broke his teeth? If I sat opposite to you, I should think of nothing but a waterfall, for the sound between your teeth would sound like nothing but a continued hiss.”

“You are a fine-looking young woman,” said another young man. “Let me sit opposite to you, and look into your eyes to see if you love me.”

“Oh, no! cried out another young man; “I am in love with her, and the next atahu meeting she shall be mine.”

“Did your mother teach you to talk?” asked the

¹ Previously described, p. 98.

page 312 same young woman. “How do you know that I can love any one? But I will tell you who I could love—a man with a fine face, fully tattooed, tall, brave, and silent. I have no ears to hear the words of smooth, pale-faced boys; the love of a boy who has not suffered the pain of tattooing is as unacceptable as a rough sea of waves without wind. I would not say yes to a man who has long finger-nails—they are a proof of idleness. A man who is brave is not idle; and a hand that works wears the nails short. A man of knowledge does not talk much.”

Said another young man, “What a god in knowledge must your father have been! Your mother must have been a great woman! I wish I was such a man as you have described, and I would take you for my wife. How I should be envied by all the world!”

An ugly, hump-backed boy, whose face was naturally dark, but through grovelling in the wood-ashes his face and head were now light, said, “I wonder where such as I am came from? I eat, laugh, cry, sleep, play, and enjoy my sport as much as any pretty boy; then why is ugliness laughed at, if it does not hurt me? I would not give my face for the prettiest face owned by a young woman.”

A young woman answered, “If an oyster could laugh as I do, and walk as I can, then we might say ugliness is worth having.”

“But who could make the best face at an enemy?” asked the humpback. “Who would escape in war; the face that repels by its horrors, or beauty that page 313 invites? Our men put on thick mats to save themselves from the pierce of a spear: my ugly face would save me by its horrible grimaces. Where is the difference? Could beauty be so useful?”

“You little lizard!” said a girl, “who told you to tell us your thoughts?”

“Did you never hear the proverb,” asked the humpback, “‘Poor food will never go to a pretty woman; but a pretty woman will go to poor food?’”

“You can talk, and that is all you can do,” answered the girl.

A number of voices said, “Tell us a tale, Humpy. You can tell us as good a tale as the prettiest woman here.”

“Yes,” answered Humpy. “I am not ashamed of my ugly face, because I did not make it so; but it was the act of a beautiful woman.”

“Tell us! tell us!” cried out a number of voices.

“Long before I was born,” said Humpy, “my mother lived with her sister, who loved no one, and admired but one face in the world, and that one she saw whenever she looked into a pool of water or a creek. She had been admiring her lover's face in the creek; on returning she passed under a tree, and a green lizard fell on her head. She rushed up to my mother, clasped her round the neck, and fell into a fit. Her face turned this way and that way; her mouth went one side and then to the other; she kicked, she screamed, she foamed at the mouth; then she lay quite still. I am as I am; but I think that the god page 314 who caused my mother's sister to make those ugly faces made my face to continue the resemblance of that fright. But my uncle was a very ugly man. Once he went to an island with a war party. When all were landed, his party saw that he was attacked; but he was so very ugly the enemy burst into a loud laugh at him. This so enraged him that he rushed up to them, and, being left-handed, he killed more that day than any other man.”

“Did he strike them on the face or back?” asked a girl; “for if he was not bigger than you are, he could not possibly kill a man who stood and looked at him; but your uncle's ugliness made them run, hence his success.”

“Then his ugliness gave him power,” said Humpy; “and beauty can do no more.”

“Tell us tales, tell us tales,” cried out all the young people, “now that you have allowed Humpy to give us a wish to talk.”

“I will tell the first tale,” said a young man; “and then one of the young women must tell one.”

“Yes, yes,” answered the young people.