File:Transactions and proceedings of the New Zealand Institute (1871) (14565700598).jpg

Identifier: transactionsproc41871newz (find matches)
Title: Transactions and proceedings of the New Zealand Institute
Year: 1868 (1860s)
Authors: New Zealand Institute (Wellington, N.Z
Subjects: Science Birds
Publisher: Wellington : J. Hughes, Printer
Contributing Library: Smithsonian Institution Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: Biodiversity Heritage Library

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ve is on the west side of the North Island, in the limestone formation whichextends along the coast. The country around is wild, and there are manysimilar caves, which, we were told, also contained bones. The popular opinionis, that the country has been set on fire by an eruption of Tongariro, and thatall the Moas fled to the caves for refuge, and there perished. From ti-aditionsand other circumstances it is supposed that the present natives of New Zealandcame to these islands not more than 600 years ago. However this may be,that the Moa was alive when the first settlers came, is evident from the nameof this bird being mixed up with their songs and stories. One of the bones Iobtained bore marks of having been cu.t or choj^ped, perhaps to get at themarrow. It is evident that the statements of such observant scientific men as Messrs.Mantell and Thompson deserve all attention and credence, the more so as bothhad such favourable opportunities to collect native traditions, and consequently
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Haast.—Moots and Moa Hunters. 75 it was generally considered an undeniable fact tHat the Maoris had not onlybeen cotemporaneous with the Dinoinis, but had hunted it, and had alsoreliable traditions about it. When I first observed the geological position of the moa bones in situ Ibegan to doiibt the accuracy of such statements, because it became clear to methat the huge birds were the representatives of the gigantic quadrupeds of thenorthern hemisphere in the post-pliocene period. I mean to say that theyhave lived as far back from the present as the mammoth, the rhinoceros, thecave lion, and cave bear, the bones of which are found in similar deposits inEurope. And as even the highest civilized nations in Europe have no tradi-tions of the occurrence of these huge animals, it seemed to me highlyimprobtable that a far inferior race, having advanced only to the state of thosepeople representing the neolithic period in Europe, could have retainedtraditions extending over such an immeasura

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