Lamentantion for the death of Topaya

Georg Forster reports that he heard this kind of funeral dirge from the same gentleman who gave him the other musical examples in the diary. The words and the way they are intoned are reported. Forster concludes with some general observations on New Zealand music. This event is narrated by Forster in continuity with what was reported in the previous event (event number 126).

The same gentleman likewise took notice of a kind of dirge-like melancholy song, relating to the death of Tupaya. This song was chiefly practised by the inhabitants round Tolaga Bay, on the northern island, where the people seem to have had a high regard for that Taheitian. There is an extreme simplicity in the words, though they seem to be metrically arranged, in such a manner, as to express the feelings of the mourners, by their flow movement. aghee, matte awhay Tupaya! Departed, dead, alas! Tupaya! The first effusions of grief are not loquacious; the only idea to which we can give utterance is that of our loss, which takes the form of a complaint. Whether the simplicity of the tune is equally agreeable, or well judged, is a question which I cannot pretend to determine. The connoisseurs in music must acquit or condemn the New Zeelanders. They descend at the close from c to the octave below in a fall, resembling the sliding of a finger along the finger-board on the violin. I shall now dismiss this subject with the following observation, that the taste for music of the New Zeelanders, and their superiority in this respect to other nations in the South Seas, are to me stronger proofs, in favour of their heart, than all the idle eloquence of philosophers in their cabinets can invalidate. They have violent passions; but it would be absurd to assert that these only lead them to inhuman excesses.

pp. 477-478

1774 11 06