sailed north, and after visiting Tauranga, went direct to Hawaiki, taking with him the block of greenstone.
On his arrival he found his people were at war, but after he had reported that he had found in the sea a land where there were moa and pounamu in great abundance, many of them, tired of strife, decided to migrate thereto. So from the block of greenstone, which was known as “the fish of Ngahue,” two sharp axes were made. These were called Tutauru and Hau-hau-te-rangi, and with them seven huge totara trees were felled and hewn into canoes, which were named Arawa, Tainui, Matatua, Takitumu, Kura-hau-po, Toko-maru, and Matuwhaorua, and they comprised the first fleet of canoes which reached these shores, the cause of whose arrival, and of the arrival of the canoes which came afterwards, being the fact that Ngahue discovered greenstone in Old Westland.
It is worthy of note that Maori mythology, as propounded by the various tribes, does not agree in all respects, but reference to Sir George Grey’s interesting work, entitled “Polynesian Mythology, and Ancient Traditional History of the New Zealanders,” will show that the principal points in the foregoing legend, and the traditional account of the discovery of Aotea-roa agree. Further, that the statement that the Maori migration to New Zealand was
