he had really heard no such thing—it was a
dream—he had fallen asleep without knowing
it, and was asleep when he had fancied himself
awake. How should such music proceed
from the vile flute? It was not possible. He
would play again, as he walked homeward;
and following up this intent, his fingers dropt
mechanically upon the flute. But his hand
was instantly withdrawn, and his eyes stared
down at the instrument,—for the bone was in
a state of vibration from one end to the other.

Ta?nui gave a short cough,—deliberated a
moment—then, passing the thong over his
head, by which the flute was suspended, he
raised his hand behind his head, and flinging
it as far from him as possible, hastened homeward
with long strides.

Fifty or sixty paces—and he came to a
pause. Stamping on the earth with rage, he
turned about, and hurried back to the spot
where he had flung the flute—found it—
snatched it up in his grasp, and raising his
arm high in the air, he shook the flute at the
distant mountains with furious gesticulations
of menace and defiance. All the vibration in
the bone had now ceased, and hanging it
round his neck as before, he again turned
his steps towards his village, which he just
managed to reach before dark.

From this time Ta?nui did not lead a very
pleasant life. His mind was not at ease; he
scorned the whole thing, and yet he could not
dismiss it from his mind. He did not feel a
wish for some time to play his old tune again
upon the flute,—in fact, though nothing could
have made him own it to himself, he did not
exactly like to venture. Very soon this
thought presented itself to his mind. It was
unbearable; and he instantly took the flute,
and played as before. Nothing came of it.
Ah, but would he play in the evening, in some
distant place, near the echoes, and alone? Yes,
undoubtedly he would—not now, perhaps—
not this instant—but whenever he took it into
his head.

Meanwhile, he would not revoke nor relax
the punishment of exile and silence, to which
he had sentenced his favourite son, Waipata;
and as for Te?ra, though he did not again
order her to dance to the sound of the doleful
flute, he devised a new cruelty towards her,
by compelling her to live in a hut within
sight of the unburied remains of Te Pomar.

But, why not play the flute again in some
solitary spot, and in the evening, by way of
defiance to his dream, and setting the troublesome
recollection at rest, for ever? Why
not, indeed—why not, then, at once?

Ta?nui accordingly walked forth the next
evening to a remote, open space, which
had once been subject to volcanic eruptions,
and presented the strange appearance of
a number of small funnel-shaped craters.
The track was surrounded by russet-coloured
regiments of ferns, sow-thistles, swamps of
peat- bogs, with here and there a dragon-tree.
The only other object was the ruined tomb
of a great chief, visible at some three hundred
yards distance in the back-ground. It was half
overgrown with rank vegetation. Its form
was that of a log-hut without a door, and
having a huge projecting roof, supported with
heads of hideous figures, carved out of tree-
trunks, whose eyes were formed of pawa, or
pearl shells, which had a most grimly melancholy
effect in the distance. The intervals
in the wood-work of the tomb were filled up
with decorations of coloured stones, shells,
and the feathers of the green and golden
cuckoo and the albatross. To keep off the
sacrilegious, there had been a row of low
palings all round it, painted red—the New
Zealand colour for mourning; but as it is a
rule never to repair a tomb, they had nearly
all fallen to decay, and only presented here
and there a prong or fang of dingy red.

This mausoleum being tapu, or sacred,
Ta?nui had selected it, with a vague feeling,
that if the ghost of Te Pomar, or any devilish
spirit should come, in consequence of his
performance on the flute, it would be a good
thing to have a tomb in the background into
which he might thrust the devil, or retreat
himself, if the evil one was too strong for him.
He thought this a perfectly legitimate use of
the tomb, because all spirits understood one
another. The king defied all mortal men,
and spirits too—only he did not feel so secure
as to the results of a contest with the latter.

To this desolate track came the King of
Mokau, a number of wild hogs rushing gruffly
away at his approach, and taking his stand
among the volcanic remains, where great
stones of pumice and ledges of lava, half-
covered with rank moss, interspersed with
white violets and the New Zealand daisy, or
half hidden in brushwood, formed a sort of
centre to the uncouth region, he turned
himself on all sides, to ascertain that he was alone,
and that nothing could come upon him by
surprise. He then took up the doleful flute—
and commenced playing. Nothing came of
it for some time, except that the bone began
to vibrate under his fingers in a manner that
much disturbed him: still, he would not
desist, and concluded with a squealing flourish
of insult to the memory of Te Pomar.

The flute vibrated with electrical force, and
shot forth sparks at every pore. Ta?nui's
fingers had instinctively dropped it; and, after
a moment's pause, he distinctly heard the
same grand death-march as before, not by an
accumulation of modulating echoes, over
distant mountains, but appearing to issue from
the flute itself, though with a dim and
smothered sound, as if buried in the recesses of
the bone.

Ta?nui shuddered from head to foot, as well
he might, with such a flute hanging from his
neck. The music ceased. The king, in moveless
astonishment, continued staring down
at the flute for some minutes after it had
become silent. It was again a flute as before
—the leg-bone of his former enemy. He