32 Transactions. — Zoology. 



some accidental immigrants. ( 3G ) The examination of the 

 cooking-ovens, which are similar to those of the present 

 natives, and the remains of feasts containing moa-bones, 

 show him the contemporaneity of certain human beings and 

 these birds ; ( 5T ) but the first are in his eyes a population ab- 

 solutely savage, only knowing how to cut and not to polish 

 the stone. If there have been found polished adzes mixed 

 up in the ancient kitchen-middens, ( 58 ) it is, he affirms, be- 

 cause they have been lost or intentionally hidden in modern 

 times, long after the moa-hunters had disappeared. f 9 ) These, 

 he says repeatedly, have never had anything in common with 

 the Maoris who occupied New Zealand at the time of the 

 arrival of Europeans. 



I think I have sufficiently indicated the mode of reasoning 

 and the nature of the arguments employed by Haast. I will 

 not attempt to follow him here in the discussion of many sub- 

 jects which he touches upon, but which relate only in an in- 

 direct maimer to the principal question. Nevertheless I think 

 I ought to quote verbatim the conclusions which terminate his 

 third memoir :( 60 ) — 



" 1st. The different species of the Dinornis, or moa, began 

 to appear and flourish in the Post-pliocene period of New Zea- 

 land. 



" 2nd. They have been extinct for such a long time that no 

 reliable traditions as to their existence have been handed down 

 to us. 



"3rd. A race of autochthones, probably of Polynesian ori- 

 gin, ( C1 ) was cotemporaneous with the moa, by whom the 

 huge wingless birds were hunted and exterminated. 



" 4th. A species of wild dog was cotemporaneous with them, 

 which was also killed and eaten by the moa-hunters. 



" 5th. They did not possess a domesticated dog. 



" 6th. This branch of the Polynesian race possessed a very 

 low standard of civilisation, using only rudely-chipped stone 

 implements, whilst the Maoris, their direct descendants,^-) 



(5G.) P. 106. 

 (57.) P. 82. 



(58.) I quote the expression by which Haast evidently translates the 

 word kjcckkenmceddings , which has become classical since the works of 

 Danish scientists. We know that it means " kitchen remains." 



(59.) Pp. 85, 104. 



(60.) " Third Paper " (Trans., vol. iv., p. 106). 



(61.) " A race of Autochthones, probably of Polynesian origin." It is 

 difficult to understand the association of ideas which Dr. Haast wishes 

 to express here. 



(62.) " Their direct descendants." Here, again, it is no easy matter 

 to understand Dr. Haast's idea. Everywhere he carefully distinguishes 

 the actual Maoris from the moa-hunters. Here he seems to regard the 

 first as descendants of the latter. 



