Explore "The Art of Netting Learned by Kāhukura from the Fairies" by George Grey on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Once upon a time, a man of the name of Kāhukura wished to pay a visit to Rangiaowhia, a place lying far to the northward, near the country of the tribe called Te Rarawa. Whilst he lived at his own village, he was continually haunted by a desire to visit that place. At length he started on his journey, and reached Rangiaowhia, and as he was on his road, he passed a place where some people had been cleaning mackerel, and he saw the inside of the fish lying all about the sand on the seashore: surprised at this, he looked about at the marks, and said to himself, "Oh, this must have been done by some of the people of the district. " But when he came to look a little more narrowly at the footmarks, he saw that the people who had been fishing had made them in the nighttime, not that morning, nor in the day; and he said to himself. "These are no mortals who have been fishing here -- spirits must have done this; had they been men, some of the reeds and grass which they sat on in their canoe would have been lying about. " He felt quite sure from several circumstances, that spirits or fairies had been there; and after observing everything well, he returned to the house where he was stopping. He, however, held fast in his heart what he had seen, as something very striking to tell all his friends in every direction, and as likely to be the means of gaining knowledge which might enable him to find out something new.
So that night he returned to the place where he had observed all these things, and just as he reached the spot, back had come the fairies too, to haul their net for mackerel; and some of them were shouting out, "The net here! the net here! " Then a canoe paddled off to fetch the other one in which the net was laid, and as they dropped the net into the water, they began to cry out, "Drop the net in the sea at Rangiaowhia, and haul it at Mamaku. " These words were sung out by the fairies, as an encouragement in their work, and from the joy of their hearts at their sport in fishing.