482 Transactions. — Miscellaneous. 



in Maori " Return direct." Its course is the nearest road, via 

 Browning's Pass, to the east coast, and it plays an important 

 part in the history of the subject. 



It must be remembered that on the "West Coast shingly 

 river-beds are highways. In the prinjtive times the dense 

 forest between them was aln:ost tiackless. The greenstone 

 is found in boulders in the deposits of gravel in the two 

 valleys referred to ; and these boulders are also cast up on the 

 beach by the waves, having been formerly carried into the sea 

 by the rivers. I do not know whether the dyke, or vein, has 

 ever been found. In the early days the stone was rare and 

 expensive. Litigation about the ownership of a block reached 

 the Court of Appeal — an expensive matter in those days — and 

 disclosed the fact that the stone had a high pecuniary value. 

 It is now very cheap, as it is washed out of the great gravel- 

 beds in the valley of the Taramakau in the process of sluicing 

 for gold, and the gold-miners sell it to the storekeepers at a 

 very moderate rate. Picked stone is only worth Is. per pound, 

 but exceptionally fair pieces command a higher price. A great 

 deal is now thrown away owing to the want of a regular 

 market. It is not easy even now, however, to get a perfect 

 piece of laige size. When Professor Ulrich and I, at the 

 request of the Germans of Melbourne, chose the piece for 

 a presentation paper-weight for Prince Bismarck, we had a 

 difficulty in getting a perfect piece of the best quality as large 

 as an octavo volume, though we had some tons of stone to 

 choose from. The kind of stone known as tangiicai (tear- 

 water) is very inferior, and is easily scratched with a knife ; 

 but it is sometimes very beautiful. It is found at Piopiotahi, 

 or Milford Sound, and perhaps at other places. It is some- 

 times taken in slabs off serpentine boulders, and may be 

 obtained on the beach at Anita Bay, near the mouth of the 

 sound. Damoiir, of Lyons, has analysed it, and finds that it 

 is chemically quite a different stone from the younamu. 



Myths. 



Cook, living in the days when mere myths were unvalued 

 untruths, missed an opportunity. He thought, from the 

 description of the Maoris, that the greenstone-couutiy was 

 near at hand to his winter- station at Queen Charlotte Sound, 

 and regretted not being able to visit it, "as we were told 

 a hundred fabulous stories about this stone, not one of which 

 carried with it the least probability of truth, though some of 

 their most sensible men would have us believe them. One of 

 these stories is that this stone is originally a fish, which they 

 strike with a gig in the water, tie a rope to it, drag it to the 

 shore, to which they fasten it, and it afterwards becomes 

 stone." This was too much for a North Country sailor in the 



