464 Transactions. — Miscellaneous. 



So that what they may have lost on the one hand through 

 not having the vahiable wild edible fruits of other South Sea 

 islands (as the cocoauut, bread-fruit, plantain, &c.) they more 

 than merely gained in their flax plant, which is also common, 

 and almost endemic, being only found outside New Zealand in 

 Norfolk Island. 



And here I may briefly mention an anecdote of the flax 

 plant. On my arrival in this country the Maoris (who knew 

 nothing, or verv little, of any other land) would often inquire 

 after bhe vegetable productions of England ; and nothing 

 astonished them more than to be told there was no harakeke 

 growing there. On more than one occasion I have heard 

 chiefs say, " How is it possible to live there without it?" also, 

 " I would not dwell in such a land as that."' This serves to 

 show how higlily they valued it. Moreover, at first and for 

 many years the principal export from New Zealand prepared 

 by the' Maoris was the fibre of this plant — all, too, scraped 

 with a broken shell, leaf by leaf. 



1. Of their Woven Articles {or Garments). — I do not intend 

 to say much of them in this paper. Many of them are well 

 known, and still to be found in use among the Maoris, but their 

 manufacture has for many years sadly deteriorated : indeed, I 

 have not seen a newly-made first-quality clothing-mat for the 

 last twenty to thirty years, and I very much doubt if such 

 can now be made at all. Not that the art of weaving them 

 has been entirely lost, but the requisite taste, skill, and 

 patience in seeking and carefully preparing and using the 

 several parts (including their dyes) are no longer to be found 

 among the Maoris. I'sometimes indulge in a contemplating 

 reminiscence — an idea — a pleasing reverie of the long past — of 

 great gatherings of Maoris, tribes and chiefs ; and at such 

 times the figures of some head men I have known, clothed in 

 their handsome, clean, and lustrous dress-mats {kaitaka and 

 aromii), would stand forth in pleasing high relief. The close 

 and regular weaving of such flax dresses, having their silky 

 threads carefully selected as to fineness and uniformity of 

 colour, and their smooth, almost satiny, appearance, as if 

 ironed or calendered when worn new, was to me a matter of 

 great satisfaction— a thing to be remembered— " a joy for 



ever." 



Those best dress-mats were always highly prized, both 

 by Maoris and Europeans, and brought a high price. I well 

 recollect a young lady, daughter of very respectable early 

 English settlers in the Bay of Islands, who, when she came 

 across the inner harbour in a boat with her parents to attend 

 the English Church service on Sunday mornings in the Mission 

 chapel at Paihia, often wore one of them folded as a shawl, 

 and to me it seemed a neat and graceful article of dress. 



I 



