Legends Of Ma-ui-a Demi God Of Polynesia, And Of His Mother Hina Part 14

Up a little higher and the clouds no longer gave her even the least shadow. The heat from the sun was so great that she began to feel the fire shriveling and torturing her. Quickly she slipped down into the storms around her rainbow and then back to earth. As the day pa.s.sed her strength came back, and when the full moon rose through the shadows of the night she said, "I will climb to the moon and there find rest."

But when Hina began to go upward her husband saw her and called to her: "Do not go into the heavens." She answered him: "My mind is fixed; I will go to my new husband, the moon." And she climbed up higher and higher. Her husband ran toward her. She was almost out of reach, but he leaped and caught her foot. This did not deter Hina from her purpose.

She shook off her husband, but as he fell he broke her leg so that the lower part came off in his hands. Hina went up through the stars, crying out the strongest incantations she could use. The powers of the night aided her. The mysterious hands of darkness lifted her, until she stood at the door of the moon. She had packed her calabash with her most priceless possessions and had carried it with her even when injured by her cruel husband. With her calabash she limped into the moon and found her abiding home. When the moon is full, the Hawaiians of the long ago, aye and even today, look into the quiet, silvery light and see the G.o.ddess in her celestial home, her calabash by her side.

The natives call her now Lono-moku, "the crippled Lono." From this watch tower in the heavens she pointed out to Kahai, one of her descendents, the way to rise up into the skies. The ancient chant thus describes his ascent:

"The rainbow is the path of Kahai.

Kahai rose. Kahai bestirred himself.

Kahai pa.s.sed on the floating cloud of Kane.

Perplexed were the eyes of Alihi.

Kahai pa.s.sed on on the glancing light.

The glancing light on men and canoes.

Above was Hanaiakamalama." (Hina).

Thus under the care of his ancestress Hina, Kahai, the great sea-rover, made his ascent in quest of adventures among the immortals.

In the Tongan Islands the legends say that Hina remains in the moon watching over the "fire-walkers" as their great protecting G.o.ddess.

The Hervey Island traditions say that the Moon (Marama) had often seen Hina and admired her, and at last had come down and caught her up to live with himself. The moonlight in its glory is called Ina-motea, "the brightness of Ina."

The story as told on Atiu Island (one of the Society group) is that Hina took her human husband with her to the moon, where they dwelt happily for a time, but as he grew old she prepared a rainbow, down which he descended to the earth to die, leaving Hina forevermore as "the woman in the moon." The Savage Islanders wors.h.i.+ped the spirits of their ancestors, saying that many of them went up to the land of Sina, the always bright land in the skies. To the natives of Niue Island, Hina has been the G.o.ddess ruling over all tapa making. They say that her home is "Motu a Hina," "the island of Hina," the home of the dead in the skies.

The Samoans said that the Moon received Hina and a child, and also her tapa board and mallet and material for the manufacture of tapa cloth.

Therefore, when the moon is s.h.i.+ning in full splendor, they shade their eyes and look for the G.o.ddess and the tools with which she fas.h.i.+ons the tapa clouds in the heavens.

The New Zealand legend says that the woman went after water in the night. As she pa.s.sed down the path to the spring the bright light of the full moon made the way easy for her quick footsteps, but when she had filled her calabash and started homeward, suddenly the bright light was hidden by a pa.s.sing cloud and she stumbled against a stone in the path and fell to the ground, spilling the water she was carrying. Then she became very angry and cursed the moon heartily. Then the moon became angry and swiftly swept down upon her from the skies, grasping her and lifting her up. In her terrible fight she caught a small tree with one hand and her calabash with the other. But oh! the strong moon pulled her up with the tree and the calabash and there in the full moon they can all be traced when the nights are clear.

Pleasant or Nauru Island, in which a missionary from Central Union Church, Honolulu, is laboring, tells the story of Gigu, a beautiful young woman, who has many of the experiences of Hina. She opened the eyes of the Mother of the Moon as Hina, in some of the Polynesian legends, is represented to have opened the eyes of one of the great G.o.ddesses, and in reward is married to Maraman, the Moon, with whom she lives ever after, and in whose embrace she can always be seen when the moon is full. Gigu is Hina under another and more guttural form of speech. Maraman is the same as Malama, one of the Polynesian names for the moon.