her robe and was ashamed. This
was not often, as she generally had managed to
ascertain (either by her own inquiry or by sending a
girl friend) if the proposal was acceptable. On the
other hand, sometimes a mother would attend and say 'I
want So-and-so for my son.' If not acceptable there was
general mocking, and she was told to let the young
people have their house (the wooing-house) to
themselves. Sometimes, if the unbetrothed pair had not
secured the consent of the parents, a late suitor would
appear on the scene, and the poor girl got almost
hauled to death between them all. One would get a leg,
another an arm, another the hair, etc. Girls have been
injured for life in these disputes, or even murdered by
the losing party."

LIBERTY OF CHOICE AND RESPECT FOR WOMEN

The assertion that "the girl generally began the courting" must not
mislead us into supposing that Maori women were free, as a rule, to
marry the husbands of their choice. As Tregear's own remarks indicate,
the advances were either of an improper character, or the girl had
made sure beforehand that there was no impediment in the way of her
proposal. The Maori proverb that as the fastidious Kahawai fish
selects the hook which pleases it best, so a woman chooses a man out
of many (on the strength of which alone Westermarck, 217, claims
liberty of choice for Maori women) must also refer to such liaisons
before marriage, for all the facts indicate that the original Maori
customs allowed women no choice whatever in regard to marriage. Here
the brother's consent had to be obtained, as Shortland remarks (118).
Many of the girls were betrothed in infancy, and many others married
at an age--twelve to thirteen--when the word choice could have had no
rational meaning. Tregear informs us that if a couple had not been
betrothed as children, everyone in the tribe claimed a right to
interfere, and the only way the couple could get their own way was by
eloping. Darwin was informed by Mantell "that until recently almost
every girl in New Zealand who was pretty or promised to be pretty was
tapu to some chief;" and we further read that

"when a chief desires to take to himself a wife, he fixes
his attention upon her, and takes her, if need be, by force,
without consulting her feelings and wishes or those of
anyone else."

This is confirmed by William Brown, in his book on the a