De Quateefages. — On Moas and Moa-hunters. 45 



flesh and skin, &c. Moreover, the information collected by 

 Mr. Hamilton seemed to relate to the same period. Hauma- 

 tangi, the old Maori of whom he speaks, was one of the oldest 

 of his race in 1844. He said he had seen Cook.( 11G ) We 

 know that this illustrious sailor rediscovered New Zealand — 

 which had been almost forgotten since Tasman's discovery — on 

 the 6th October, 1769. Haumatangi was consequently more 

 than seventy-five years old when Mr. Hamilton questioned 

 him, and not seventy only, as some printer's error makes it 

 appear. Supposing that he was twelve years old when he 

 observed the large bird which he remembers so well, New 

 Zealand would still have possessed living moas towards 1770 

 or 17S0. 



IX. 



I regret having been compelled up to this point to contro- 

 vert Dr. Haast's theory. I am only too glad now to acknow- 

 ledge the incontestable services which he has rendered to 

 science in solving some of the most interesting questions which 

 the history of the moas has given rise to. The result of his 

 persevering and successful researches is that all the large and 

 small brevipennates which have inhabited, and still inhabit, 

 New Zealand were found to have been cotemporary. In ex- 

 ploring the alluvial deposits and the swamps at Glenmark the 

 learned geologist found side by side bones of Apteryx, as well 

 as the remains of larger and more singular species of moa, 

 just as we find in Europe bones of mammoths and rhinoceri 

 intermingled with those of the reindeer and chamois. ( U7 ) 



In our country also the disappearance of now extinct 

 species did not occur at the same time. If there were some 

 that survived until the end of the eighteenth century, others 

 had perished at an epoch more or less remote. New re- 

 searches, of a kind up to this time too much neglected by New 

 Zealand scientists, will be necessary to give a precise idea of 

 these successive disappearances. In order to solve the nume- 

 rous questions raised by this problem archaeology and geology 

 should help each other. Dr. Haast seems to me to be the 



(11G.) Dr. Haast quotes, in favour of his opinion, Cook's silence with 

 regard to rnoas ; but it is evident that at that time they were very nearly 

 extinct. Now, as all the coasts were inhabited, the last of these birds 

 would no longer have been found except in the interior, and it is very 

 natural that the great English navigator should have heard nothing of 

 them. The same remark applies a fortiori to the explorers who came after 

 Cook, and whose silence is likewise adduced by Dr. Haast in support of 

 his theory ("Geology," &c, ch. xvi.). 



(117.) " Geology," Glenmark, ch. xvi. (d), p. 442. Dr. Haast estimates 

 at more than a thousand the number of moas whose remains had been 

 found in this locality. It is from there had come the greater part of the 

 specimens which enrich museums in all parts of the world. 



