Is idleness infectious? One dallies with time in the midst of these strange phenomena, wandering among the native huts and their lazy, bronzed inhabitants, studying their gypsy life in all its phases. Everything is not quite agreeable, but all is quaint, novel, and interesting. We were shown some of the native carving which was executed a hundred years ago, mostly in the form of war-clubs and idols. There were images representing strange human beings of both sexes; but they were always grotesque, and often disgusting. There was not even an approach to excellence or a spirit of art observable in any of them. A certain consistency is discovered in the manners and customs of this people who live so nearly after the style and laws which governed their ancestors, and which have been carefully preserved for hundreds of years. Superstition is born in a Maori. He is a professed Christian,--that is, in most cases,--and accepts the Bible; but he is apt to give it his own interpretation: yet for that matter how many white religionists there are who do the same! These children of Nature follow their ancestral traditions modified by Christian influences. The original religion of the natives, if we can give it that name, consisted in a dim belief of a future state, quite undefined even in their own minds. It was largely a sort of ancestor worship, according to the missionaries, with a vague idea of some Being higher and better than anything human or finite. The sorcery which was universally practised among them filled up a certain measure of religious conviction and observance; nor is this by any means disused among them to-day. Many of the tribes can read and write, and educational facilities are freely offered to the rising generation by the English Government.
Whakarewarewa--we can write but not pronounce the name--forms another active volcano point, and is situated about four miles from the Lake House. For three days, whenever the eyes wandered in that direction, we had seen the hamlet, which occupies a side-hill, steaming away vigorously, and sometimes got a glimpse of the boiling water spouted high in air. The road thither lies over a perfectly level way in the midst of a plain which was doubtless overflowed by the lake in former times, and which is still so much under water as to be nearly navigable for a small boat. Here we found another tribe of Maoris surrounded by geysers, boiling pits, hot, spluttering, and unwholesome-looking mud-pools, with steam-holes innumerable. What a region of perpetual ferment it is! How busy must be the fiery agencies constantly operating in Nature's subterranean laboratory! Soon after entering the hamlet we passed a clear, blue boiling-pool of great depth, which is improved by the whole community for cooking purposes. In the sides of this out-of-doors stone and earthen cavity indentures had been made, where iron pots and wicker screens could be placed for boiling vegetables and other food.