The garments of an ariki, or high chief, were tapu, as well as everything relating to him; they could not be worn by any one else lest they should kill him. “An old chief in my company,” says Mr. Williams, “threw away a very good mat because it was too heavy to carry; he cast it down a precipice. When I inquired why he did not leave it suspended on a tree, that any future traveller wanting a garment might take it, he gravely told me that it was the fear of its being worn by another which had caused him to throw it where he did, for if it were worn by another his tapu would kill the person. In the same way the tinder-box of a great chief killed several persons who were so unfortunate as to find it, and light their pipes from it without knowing it belonged to so sacred an owner; they actually died from fright. If the blood of a high chief flows (though it be a single drop) on anything, it renders that tapu. A party of natives came to see Te Hewhew, the great chief of Taupo, in a fine large new canoe. Te Hewhew got into it to go a short distance; in doing so he struck a splinter into his foot, the blood flowed from the wound into the canoe, which at once tapued it to him. The owner immediately jumped out and dragged it on shore opposite the chief’s house, and there left it. A gentleman entering my house, struck his head against the beam and made the blood flow; the natives present said that in former times the house would have belonged to that individual. To draw blood, even from a scratch, was a very serious matter, and often was attended with fatal consequence.” A chief’s house was tapu; no person could eat therein, or even light his pipe from the fire, and until a certain service had been gone through, even a woman could not enter. The chief being sacred had his food to himself, generally in his verandah, or apart from the rest. No chief could carry food, lest it should occasion his death by destroying his tapu, or lest a slave should eat of it, and so cause him to die. A chief would not pass under a stage or wata (a food store). The head of the chief was the most sacred part; if he only touched it with his fingers, he was obliged immediately to apply them to his nose, and snuff up the sanctity which they had acquired by the touch, and thus restore it to the part from whence it was taken. For the same reason a chief could not blow the fire with his mouth, for the breath being sacred communicated his sanctity with the fire, and a brand might be taken from it by a slave, or a man of another tribe, or the fire might be used for other purposes, such as cooking, and so cause his death. The chief power, however, of this institution was principally seen in its effects on the multitude.