362 THE MAGIC OF JEWELS AND CHARMS
these
objects, treasured up as heirlooms, with the personality of some
renowned ancestor, the story that the special portraiture to be made
was sometimes communicated in a dream or vision, all this induces the
belief that in former times, though perhaps not at the present time,
the Maoris looked upon their hei-tikis as amulets, or possibly even as fetiches.25
The
Dowager Queen Alexandra is said to greatly value as a talisman a
pendant consisting of a nugget of massive gold surmounted by a figure
of a hunchback, executed in green enamel. The nugget is hollowed out
and opens when a secret spring is touched ; within appears a
heart-shaped ornament made of New Zealand jade. The story runs that
this jewel was given to his mother by the late Duke of Clarence, the
elder brother of the present King G-eorge V.26
The popularity in England of these queer hei-tiki amulets, made from the punamu or
"green-stone" (nephrite) of New Zealand, has been ascribed by many to
the wearing by Queen Alexandra of ornaments made of New Zealand jade,
and to the report that every member of the "All Blacks," an almost
invincible English foot-ball team, carried some little trinket made
from this material while he was engaged in play. The popular faith in
"lucky jade" was further corroborated by the story that Lord Rosebery
had on his person a jade amulet when his horse Cicero won the Derby and
that Lord Rothschild was wearing such an amulet as his horse St. Amand
carried his colors to victory.27 When we consider to how great an extent popular enthusiasm is excited in England by her great and classic horse-races, we
*
For further details concerning these strange ornaments, see the
writer*» "Curious Lore of Precious Stones," J. B. Lippincott Company,
Philadelphie and London, 1913, pp. 87-90.
"Fernie, "Precious Stones for Curative Wear," Bristol, 1907, p. 39.
"
A. E. Wright and E. Lovett, " Specimens of Modern Mascots and Ancient
Amulets of the British Isles," Folk Lore, vol. xix, 1908, p. 293.
