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Show FIRST TO USE WATER WINGS Lovesick Maori Warden Credited With Devising Those Valuable Aids to Weak Swimmers. Water wings were invented by a Maori Ma-ori maiden hundreds of years before the British conquered these New Zealand Zeal-and natives. She used some gourds which she lashed together with st rands of flax, putting the lashing under her chest, with a gourd behind each arm. Thus equipped, she swam four miles to meet her loer, who was not In fav-oi fav-oi with her father. The romantic story Is a pretty one. Tutanekai's mother was the beautiful beauti-ful Rangi-uru, wife of Whakane-kai-papa, the great chief of the Ngati-whakane Ngati-whakane tribe. His father was a home wrecker, the soft-spoken glib-longued glib-longued Tu-whare-toa, who had persuaded per-suaded Rangi-uru to run away with him. Later she repented and returned to her husband, who forgave her. He took her child into the family and moveil to Etiother neighborhood, so that the family would escape gossip. In this district Tutanekai grew into an Apollo of manhood and a regular Solomon in wisdom, but. the stigma of his birth followed him. He fell In love with Hine-Moa, but her father refused re-fused his consent to the marriage. The -lovers were kept apart, while the girl's father remained obdurate. Finally, in desperation, Hine-Moa planned to make the four-mile swim to his island! from Rotorua, and just before plunging plung-ing into the water decided to rnakb the water wings as an extra safety-precaution, safety-precaution, although she was an expert ex-pert swimmer. |