The wielding of their weapons--the wooden spear, the club, the quaint _mere_[1] and the stone tomahawk--required strength and endurance as well as a skill only to be obtained by hard practice.

The very sports and dances of the Maori were such as only the active and vigorous could excel in.

Slaves were there, but not enough to relieve the freemen from the necessity for hard work.

Strange sacred customs, such as _tapu_ (vulgarly Anglicized as taboo) and _muru_, laughable as they seem to us, tended to preserve public health, to ensure respect for authority, and to prevent any undue accumulation of goods and chattels in the hands of one man.

Under the law of _muru_ a man smitten by sudden calamity was politely plundered of all his possessions.