A thorough attempt was made by Bishop Tepano Jaussen of Tahiti, with the help of Metoro Tauara, an Easter Islander working on Brander's plantation in Tahiti, to decipher the five tablets given to him by the missionaries of Easter Island. Metoro Tauara was said to have studied the art of chanting from tablets under three teachers ^__ Ngahu, Rei-miro and Paovaa. ... ...

     The texts of the purported chants recited by Metoro are preserved in the Museum at Papeete (Tahiti) and copies are in the convent of the Sacred Heart in Braine-le-Comte. A few lines of the text, corresponding to the beginning of the tablet called Aruku-kurenga, were published by C. de Harlez (105) with his translation which does not make sense. A tentative translation of the beginning of the same text is given by Ahnne (2, p. 190) but it is over imaginative. By comparing the text with the tablet, I discovered that most of the sentences chanted were merely explanatory. For instance, about the image of a bird, Metoro would say, "the bird is flying" or "the bird is resting"; about the image of a headdress, "to the headdress." Thus the long text is simply a descriptive catalog. It is rather surprising that Metoro chanted these simple explanatory sentences, since they were improvised by him. However, we must remember that chanting is easy, and Metoro knew that chanting was always associated with the tablets. To illustrate Metoro's method, I shall give part of the 21st row of signs in the tablet Aruku-kurenga with the native text and its translation (fig. 56).

FIGURE 56. ^__ Part of row 21 on tablet Aruku-kurenga.

1. Kua huki: He is pierced.
2. Ko te ariki: It is the king.
3. Tere ki te vai: He went to the water.
4. E tangata moe ra ki te huaga e: The man is sleeping against blossoming fruit.
5. Kua tuu ko te toga: The posts are set up.
6. Ma te tapa mea kua haga: The red yam is growing.
7. Kua haati ia te kava: The kava plant is broken.
8. Ma te tapa mea kua haga: The red yam growing.
9. Kua haati ia te kava: The kaya plant is broken.
10. E tangata rua kua oho, kua hua: Two men went, it was blossoming.
11. Ma to ihe: Like the needlefish.
12. E i raa: And the sun.
13. E i te haga (probably huaga) era: It is blossoming.
14. Ko te rei: It is a pectoral (rei-miro).
15. Kua oho ki te henua: He came to the land.
16. Kua tupu ia mua i te aro: It has grown in front of him.
17. E tangata oho era: The man left.
18. Ki to kava e: To your kava plant.
19. Ka oho te rei: Here comes the pectoral (rei-miro).
20. Tangata itiiti: Very little man.
21. Ma to kava: Like your kava plant.

     Comparison of the fragmentary sentences with the symbols makes it plain that they are hasty explanations of the drawings. The explanation becomes more obscure when the symbol is conventionalized and therefore less recognizable. Metoro's interpretation is nevertheless useful for it gives the meaning of designs, the significance of which might otherwise be a puzzle.

(Métraux 1940:396-397)