awakening to light and life of the deep and solemn forests of Tane-mahuta, Pigeons, ku-ku-ing to each other, with blue necks and white breasts gleaming in the sun, went sweeping across the clearing on softly winnowing wings, and flapped from tree to tree and shrub to shrub in search of the tenderest leaves, for it was not yet the season of the choicest bush fruits, the big blue tawa berry, the sweet yellow koroi, and the aromatic miro.
Life went easily in the pa when the early harvesting was over. There was little to do but eat and sleep and lie about in the sun, or join in the daily prayers and the procession round the Niu pole, where the brightly coloured war-flags hung.[1] There was abundance of food in the camp—potatoes, maize, potted birds, pork, and dried fish sent as presents from the coast tribes. Early morning, and again in the warm, golden evenings, long, straight columns of pale blue smoke arose from the cooking-ovens of the village, and mingled with the thin vapours that crept about the tree-tops; then
- ↑ These flags, displayed on the war-poles in the Hauhau villages in 1865–70, carried many a strange device. The ground was white calico, on which red patterns and lettering were sewn or painted. Favourite designs were a red half-moon, like the crescent of Islam, a five-pointed star representing Tawera, "the bright and morning star," and what was called a Kororia, in shape; like the half of a méré-pounamu, or greenstone club, cut longitudinally. These colours had been made in the Waikato during the war, and had been sent round after the manner of the Highlanders' fiery cross to the various tribes in the Island.
