home > books by FWB > 1927, The Nest of Spears

By Way Of Introduction

FOR a hundred moons—so a Maori myth declares—there was no war between natives who dwelt on the Bay of Islands and the neighbouring tribes of Tippahee. Again and again, everything was in readiness for an encounter; and the tattooed warriors, fully armed, took up their positions in anticipation of a deadly combat. But, during the night before the fray, the spears of the chiefs mysteriously vanished; and the tribesmen, baffled returned to their pas.

It was Whakatuni, the beautiful but frail daughter of the great war-lord of Tippahee, who solved this mystery. Whakatuni was not like other Maori maidens. She loved to wander in solitude among the silent hills and listen to the bell-birds in the wooded valleys of her lonely land.

And one day, on an immense ledge or rock jutting out from the moutainside, she found the nest of the great white manumaire—the peace-bird. And lo, it was entirely constructed of the spears that had vanished from the camps!

In this volume, and in its predecessors, I have touched upon a thousands questions about which, if we were so disposed, controversy would be easy. But I have endeavoured to remove those glittering spearpoints from the realm of strife, and to transfer them to an atmosphere in which the peace-bird can fold her snowy pinions and gentle souls, like Whakatuni feel perfectly at home.  

Frank W. Boreham.
Armadale, Melbourne, Australia,
Easter 1927.

PART I

PART II

Part III —
I. The Giant-killer —
II. A Philosophy of Window-Panes —
III. The Chapel of Hate —
IV. Ian Melville’s Will —
V. An Interrupted Honeymood —
VI. The Silent Curfew —
VII. Chrissy —
VIII. “Only a Servant!” —
IX. The Weather.