Chapter V: Fire and Water (2)

The township of Roto-rua, with its side-shows Ohinemutu and Whaka-rewa-rewa, escaped in the great eruption scot free, or at any rate with a light powdering of dust. The place survived to become the social centre of the thermal country, and now offers no suggestion of ruin or devastation. It has been taken in hand by the Government, and is bright, pleasant, and, if anything, too thoroughly comfortable and modern. It is scientifically drained and lighted with electric light. Hotels and tidy lodging-houses look out upon avenues planted with exotic trees. The public gardens cover a peninsula jutting out into the lake, and their flowery winding paths lead to lawns and tennis-courts. Tea is served there by Maori waitresses whose caps and white aprons might befit Kensington Gardens; and a band plays. If the visitors to Roto-rua do not exactly “dance on the slopes of a volcano,” at least they chat and listen to music within sight of the vapour of fumaroles and the steam of hot springs. A steam launch will carry them from one lake to another, or coaches convey them to watch geysers made to spout for their diversion. They may picnic and eat sandwiches in spots where they can listen to muddy cauldrons of what looks like boiling porridge, sucking and gurgling in disagreeable fashion. Or they may watch gouts of dun-coloured mud fitfully issuing from cones like ant-hills--mud volcanoes, to wit.

For the country around is not dead or even sleeping, and within a circuit of ten miles from Roto-rua there is enough to be seen to interest an intelligent sight-seer for many days. Personally I do not think Roto-rua the finest spot in the thermal region. Taupo, with its lake, river, and great volcanoes, has, to my mind, higher claims. Much as Roto-rua has to show, I suspect that the Waiotapu valley offers a still better field to the man of science. However, the die has been cast, and Roto-rua, as the terminus of the railway and the seat of the Government sanatorium, has become a kind of thermal capital. There is no need to complain of this. Its attractions are many, and, when they are exhausted, you can go thence to any other point of the region. You may drive to Taupo by one coach-road and return by another, or may easily reach Waiotapu in a forenoon. Anglers start out from Roto-rua to fish in a lake and rivers where trout are more than usually abundant. You can believe if you like that the chief difficulty met with by Roto-rua fishermen is the labour of carrying home their enormous catches. But it is, I understand, true that the weight of trout caught by fly or minnow in a season exceeds forty tons. At any rate--to drop the style of auctioneers’ advertisements--the trout, chiefly of the rainbow kind, are very plentiful, and the sport very good. I would say no harder thing of the attractions of Roto-rua and its circuit than this,--those who have spent a week there must not imagine that they have seen the thermal region. They have not even “done” it, still less do they know it. Almost every part of it has much to interest, and Roto-rua is the beginning, not the end of it all. I know an energetic colonist who, when travelling through Italy, devoted one whole day to seeing Rome. Even he, however, agrees with me that a month is all too short a time for the New Zealand volcanic zone. Sociable or elderly tourists have a right to make themselves snug at Roto-rua or Wairakei. But there are other kinds of travellers; and holiday-makers and lovers of scenery, students of science, sportsmen, and workers seeking for the space and fresh air of the wilderness, will do well to go farther afield.

At Roto-rua, as at other spots in the zone, you are in a realm of sulphur. It is in the air as well as the water, tickles your throat, and blackens the silver in your pocket. Amongst many compensating returns it brightens patches of the landscape with brilliant streaks of many hues--not yellow or golden only, but orange, green, blue, blood-red, and even purple. Often where the volcanic mud would be most dismal the sulphur colours and glorifies it. Alum is found frequently alongside it, whitening banks and pool in a way that makes Englishmen think of their chalk downs. One mountain, Maunga Kakaramea (Mount Striped-Earth), has slopes that suggest an immense Scottish plaid.

But more beautiful than the sulphur stripes or the coloured pools, and startling and uncommon in a way that neither lakes nor mountains can be, are the geysers. Since the Pink and White Terraces were blown up, they are, perhaps, the most striking and uncommon feature of the region, which, if it had nothing else to display, would still be well worth a visit. They rival those of the Yellowstone and surpass those of Iceland. New Zealanders have made a study of geysers, and know that they are a capricious race. They burst into sudden activity, and as unexpectedly go to sleep again. The steam-jet of Orakei-Korako, which shot out of the bank of the Waikato at such an odd angle and astonished all beholders for a few years, died down inexplicably. So did the wonderful Waimangu, which threw a column of mud, stones, steam, and boiling water at least 1500 feet into mid-air. The Waikité Geyser, after a long rest, began to play again at the time of the Tarawera eruption. That was natural enough. But why did it suddenly cease to move after the opening of the railway to Roto-rua, two miles away? Mr. Ruskin might have sympathised with it for so resenting the intrusion of commercialism; but tourists did not. Great was the rejoicing when, in 1907, Waikité awoke after a sleep of thirteen years. Curiously enough, another geyser, Pohutu, seems likewise attentive to public events, for on the day upon which the Colony became a Dominion it spouted for no less than fourteen hours, fairly eclipsing the numerous outpourings of oratory from human rivals which graced the occasion. There are geysers enough and to spare in the volcanic zone, to say nothing of the chances of a new performer gushing out at any moment. Some are large enough to be terrific, others small enough to be playful or even amusing. The hydrodynamics of Nature are well understood at Roto-rua, where Mr. Malfroy’s ingenious toy, the artificial geyser, is an exact imitation of their structure and action. The curious may examine this, or they may visit the extinct geyser, Te Waro, down the empty pipe of which a man may be lowered. At fifteen feet below the surface he will find himself in a vaulted chamber twice as roomy as a ship’s cabin and paved and plastered with silica. From the floor another pipe leads to lower subterranean depths. In the days of Te Waro’s activity steam rushing up into this cavern from below would from time to time force the water there violently upward: so the geyser played. To-day there are geysers irritable enough to be set in motion by slices of soap, just as there are solfataras which a lighted match can make to roar, and excitable pools which a handful of earth will stir into effervescence. More impressive are the geysers which spout often, but whose precise time for showing energy cannot be counted on--which are, in fact, the unexpected which is always happening. Very beautiful are the larger geysers, as, after their first roaring outburst and ascent, they stand, apparently climbing up, their effort to overcome the force of gravity seeming to grow greater and greater as they climb. Every part of the huge column seems to be alive; and, indeed, all is in motion within it. Innumerable little fountains gush up on its sides, to curl back and fall earthwards. The sunlight penetrates the mass of water, foam, and steam, catching the crystal drops and painting rainbows which quiver and dance in the wind. Bravely the column holds up, till, its strength spent, it falters and sways, and at last falls or sinks slowly down, subsiding into a seething whirlpool. Brief, as a rule, is the spectacle, but while the fountain is striving to mount skyward it is “all a wonder and a wild desire.”

Two Maori villages, one at Ohinemutu, the other at Whaka-rewa-rewa, are disordered collections of irregular huts. Among them the brown natives of the thermal district live and move with a gravity and dignity that even their half-gaudy, half-dingy European garb cannot wholly spoil. Passing their lives as they do on the edge of the cold lake, and surrounded by hot pools and steam-jets, they seem a more or less amphibious race, quite untroubled by anxiety about subterranean action. They make all the use they can of Nature’s forces, employing the steam and hot water for various daily wants. Of course they bathe incessantly and wash clothes in the pools. They will sit up to their necks in the warm fluid, and smoke luxuriously in a bath that does not turn cold. But more interesting to watch is their cooking. Here the steam of the blow-holes is their servant; or they will lay their food in baskets of flax in some clean boiling spring, choosing, of course, water that is tasteless. Cooking food by steam was and still is the favourite method of the Maori. Where Nature does not provide the steam, they dig ovens in the earth called _hangi_, and, wrapping their food in leaves, place it therein on red-hot stones. Then they spread more leaves over them, pour water upon these, and cover the hole with earth. When the oven is opened the food is found thoroughly cooked, and in this respect much more palatable than some of the cookery of the colonists. In their culinary work the Maoris have always been neat and clean. This makes their passion for those two terrible delicacies, putrid maize and dried shark, something of a puzzle.

Life at Roto-rua is not all sight-seeing; there is a serious side to it. Invalids resort thither, as they do to Taupo, in ever-increasing numbers. The State sanatorium, with its brand-new bath-house, is as well equipped now as good medical bathing-places are in Europe, and is directed by a physician who was in former years a doctor of repute at Bath. Amid the _embarras des richesses_ offered by the thermal springs of the zone, Roto-rua has been selected as his headquarters, because there two chief and distinct kinds of hot healing waters are found in close neighbourhood, and can be used in the same establishment. The two are acid-sulphur and alkaline-sulphur, and both are heavily loaded with silica. Unlike European springs they gush out at boiling-point, and their potency is undoubted. Sufferers tormented with gout or crippled with rheumatism seek the acid waters; the alkaline act as a nervous sedative and cure various skin diseases. There are swimming baths for holiday-makers who have nothing the matter with them, and massage and the douche for the serious patients. Persons without money are cared for by the servants of the Government. Wonderful cures are reported, and as the fame of the healing waters becomes better and better established the number of successful cases steadily increases. For the curable come confidently expecting to be benefited, and this, of course, is no small factor in the efficacy of the baths, indisputable as their strength is. Apart, too, from its springs, Roto-rua is a sunny place, a thousand feet above the sea. The air is light even in midsummer, and the drainage through the porous pumice and silica is complete. In such a climate, amid such healing influences and such varied and interesting surroundings, the sufferer who cannot gain health at Roto-rua must be in a bad way indeed.

In the middle of Roto-rua Lake, a green hill in the broad blue surface, rises the isle of Mokoia. There is nothing extraordinary in the way of beauty there. Still, it is high and shapely, with enough foliage to feather the rocks and soften the outlines. Botanists know it as one of the few spots away from the sea-beach where the crimson-flowering pohutu-kawa has deigned to grow. In any case, the scene of the legend of Hinemoa is sure of a warm corner in all New Zealand hearts. The story of the chief’s daughter, and her swim by night across the lake to join her lover on the island, has about it that quality of grace with which most Maori tales are but scantily draped. How many versions of it are to be found in print I do not dare to guess, and shall not venture to add another to their number. For two of New Zealand’s Prime Ministers have told the story well, and I can refer my readers to the prose of Grey and the verse of Domett. Only do I wish that I had heard Maning, the Pakeha Maori, repeat the tale, standing on the shore of Mokoia, as he repeated it there to Dr. Moore. In passing I may, however, do homage to one of the few bits of sweet romance to be found in New Zealand literature. Long may my countrymen steadfastly refuse to disbelieve a word of it! For myself, as one who has bathed in Hinemoa’s bath, I hold by every sentence of the tradition, and am fully persuaded that Hinemoa’s love-sick heart was soothed, as she sat on her flat-topped rock on the mainshore, by the soft music of the native trumpet blown by her hero on the island. After all, the intervening water was some miles broad, and even that terrific instrument, a native trumpet, might be softened by such a distance.

Long after the happy union of its lovers, Mokoia saw another sight when Hongi, “eater of men,” marched down with his Ngapuhi musketeers from the north to exterminate the Arawa of the lake country. To the Roto-rua people Mokoia had in times past been a sure refuge. In camp there, they commanded the lake with their canoes; no invader could reach them, for no invader could bring a fleet overland. So it had always been, and the Mokoians trusting thereto, paddled about the lake defying and insulting Hongi and his men in their camp on the farther shore. Yet so sure of victory were the Ngapuhi chiefs that each of the leaders selected as his own booty the war-canoe that seemed handsomest in his eyes. Hongi had never heard of the device by which Mahomet II. captured Constantinople, but he was a man of original methods, and he decided that canoes could be dragged twenty miles or more from the sea-coast to Lake Roto-iti. It is said that an Arawa slave or renegade in his camp suggested the expedient and pointed out the easiest road. At any rate the long haul was successfully achieved, and the canoes of the Plumed Ones--Ngapuhi--paddled from Roto-iti into Roto-rua. Then all was over except the slaughter, for the Mokoians had but half-a-dozen guns, and Hongi’s musketeers from their canoes could pick them off without landing.

Fifteen hundred men, women, and children are said to have perished in the final massacre. Whether these figures were “official” I cannot say. The numbers of the slain computed in the Maori stories of their wars between 1816 and 1836 are sometimes staggering; but scant mercy was shown, and all tradition concurs in rating the death-roll far higher than anything known before or after. And Mokoia was crowded with refugees when it fell before Hongi’s warriors. Of course, many of the islanders escaped. Among them a strong swimmer, Hori (George) Haupapa, took to the lake and managed to swim to the farther shore. The life he thus saved on that day of death proved to be long, for Haupapa was reputed to be a hundred years old when he died in peace.

The famous Hongi was certainly a savage of uncommon quickness of perception, as his circumventing of the Mokoians in their lake-stronghold shows. He had shrewdness enough to perceive that the Maori tribe which should first secure firearms would hold New Zealand at its mercy; and he was sufficient of a man of business to act upon this theory with success and utter ruthlessness. He probably did more to destroy his race than any white or score of whites; yet his memory is not, so far as I know, held in special detestation by the Maori. Two or three better qualities this destructive cannibal seems to have had, for he protected the missionaries and advised his children to do so likewise. Then he had a soft voice and courteous manner, and, though not great of stature, must have been tough, for the bullet-wound in his chest which finally killed him took two years in doing so. Moreover, his dying exhortation to his sons, “Be strong, be brave!” was quite in the right spirit for the last words of a Maori warrior.

Hongi would seem to be an easy name enough to pronounce. Yet none has suffered more from “the taste and fancy of the speller” in books, whether written by Englishmen or Colonists. Polack calls him E’Ongi, and other early travellers, Shongee, Shongi, and Shungie. Finally Mr. J. A. Froude, not to be outdone in inaccuracy, pleasantly disposes of him, in _Oceana_, as “Hangi.”

“Old Colonial,” in an article written in the _Pall Mall Gazette_, gives Mokoia as the scene of a notable encounter between Bishop Selwyn and Tukoto, a Maori tohunga or wizard. To Selwyn, who claimed to be the servant of an all-powerful God, the tohunga is reported to have said, as he held out a brown withered leaf, “Can you, then, by invoking your God, make this dead leaf green again?” The Bishop answered that no man could do that. Thereupon Tukoto, after chanting certain incantations, threw the leaf into the air, and, lo! its colour changed, and it fluttered to earth fresh and green once more.

Among many odd stories told of the juggling feats of the vanishing race of tohungas this is one of the most curious. More than one version of it is to be found. For example, my friend Edward Tregear, in his book _The Maori Race_, relates it as an episode of a meeting between Selwyn and Te Heu Heu, where the trick was the _riposte_ of the chief to an appeal by the Bishop to him to change his faith. In that case the place of the encounter could scarcely have been Mokoia, or the tohunga have been Tukoto.

Whatever may be said--and a great deal may be said--against the tohunga as the foe of healing and knowledge, the religious prophets who from time to time rise among the Maori are not always entirely bad influences. A certain Rua, who just now commands belief among his countrymen, has managed to induce a following to found a well-built village on a hill-side among the forests of the Uriwera country. There, attended by several wives, he inhabits a comfortable house. Hard by rises a large circular temple, a wonderful effort of his native workmen. He has power enough to prohibit tobacco and alcohol in his settlement, to enforce sanitary rules, and to make his disciples clear and cultivate a large farm. Except that he forbids children from going to school, he does not appear to set himself against the Government. He poses, I understand, as a successor of Christ, and is supposed to be able to walk on the surface of water. His followers were anxious for ocular proof of this, and a hint of their desire was conveyed to the prophet. He assembled them on a river’s bank and gravely inquired, “Do you all from your hearts believe that I can walk on that water?” “We do,” was the response. “Then it is not necessary for me to do it,” said he, and walked composedly back to his hut.