Harding. — Relics of the First Neio Zealand Press. 403 



the discarded English consonants as required from their lots 

 put up in paper parcels. Fortunately this occurred but rarely; 

 except at the time of the Treaty of Waitangi (1840), when I 

 had necessarily much printing-work to do for the Government 

 of the colony, and, having no extra cases, was obliged to 

 place the letters required in little lots on tables and on the 

 floor." 



At the auction of Mr. Colenso's sundries large quantities 

 of his old memoranda passed into private hands. Mr. H. 

 Hill, one of our members, is in possession of a mass of these 

 papers, aiid from him I have a copy of two interesting entries 

 from the old ofiice diary, bearing upon the subject of this 

 paper. They are as follow : — 



1836. July 19. — Gave R. Brown, carpenter, Kororareka, an order for 

 six pair cases, one imposing-frame and drawers. 



1837. March 8. — Brown's bill for cases, imposing frame, &c., £8 16s. 



So far as I can judge, Mr. Brown's charge was reasonable. 



Though it does not bear directly upon the first printing- 

 office, I may mention that Mr. Colenso did a great deal of 

 work on his little foolscap-folio Albion press at Waitangi, 

 Hawke's Bay. One book, in Maori, unfinished, was on the 

 lives and deaths of witnesses for the truth in the early Church, 

 written by himself. It was never completed ; but he had done 

 about two hundred pages, printed two pages at a time. The 

 amount of labour this represents, in the intervals of an excep- 

 tionally busy life, can only be realised by a practical printer. 

 T have the form of the last two completed pages, just as it 

 stood when he left it — either ready for press or printed off. 

 This, I think, is a relic that will be of interest to visitors to 

 the Museum in years to come, as it is set in the old small 

 pica of the first mission press. 



The type is of the early " modern " face, probably by 

 Caslon, and is, of course, hand-cast. It must have been cut 

 in the very early years of the century, soon after the abandon- 

 ment of the " old-face," and before the beauties of the modern 

 style had been developed. It is a heavy, legible, and inelegant 

 style, deficient in "character," and now quite out of vogue. 

 A box of types, small pica and minion, ordered for the office 

 at Waitangi, had never been opened since leaving the foundry 

 until I opened it at Napier, some fifty years after it had been 

 packed. There were indications that Mr. Colenso intended 

 it for an edition of the "Pilgrim's Progress" in Maori — the 

 minion for the notes. He had a manuscript translation which 

 he highly valued. I do not know by whom it was made, and 

 I fear it has been lost. He had also provided himself with 

 stereotype copies of engravings of the fight with Apollyon, 

 &c., to illustrate the book. 



