526 Proceedings. 



surveyors, explorers, and others — knew how comforting it was to feel that, 

 when provisions had run short, there was always an eel for supper. To the 

 Maoris, whose sources of food-supply were always more or less uncertain, 

 the eels were simply invaluable. When the terms of the celebrated Treaty 

 of Waitangi were being arranged in 1840, the first idea of the Maori 

 tribes was the conservation of their fisheries ; and at the present day 

 there was nothing that gave a negotiator for native lands so much trouble 

 as this ever-recurring claim as to fishing-rights. Eel-preserves were often 

 a very important element in the determination of tribal title to land ; and 

 as long as the Maori race lasted eels would continue to be a valuable pos- 

 session. The Chairman concluded his remarks with a quotation from a 

 speech by Sir William Pox, as counsel for the Crown in the famous 

 Kangitikei-Manawatu case, in the Native Land Court at Otaki, in the 

 course of which, in describing the title of the Ngatiapa, he said, " They 

 had sole and undisputed possession of the eel-ponds, and constantly re- 

 sorted to thern for food. Many persons — perhaps even some of the mem- 

 bers of this Court — may not appreciate the importance of this. It has a 

 parallel in English history. It is a fact that not only the name, but a 

 great part of the revenue of one of the richest abbeys and cathedral 

 churches in England, were derived from eel-ponds. The eel-fed monks 

 led a jolly life. An old Saxon song says, ' Merry sang the monks in Ely, 

 as King Canute went sailing by.' And in the primitive state of life 

 which existed on this coast in 1840, the eel-ponds between Manawatu 

 and Eangitikei were worth more than a gold-mine to the natives resident 

 there. Kereopa said truly — at that time the eel-preserves were the great 

 property in that part of the country, and he, a Ngatiraukawa, adds, 

 ' They were all held by the Ngatiapa, and they have retained possession 

 of them to the present day.' To European rninds, cultivation may seem 

 a more important exercise of ownership than habitual fishing in eel-ponds ; 

 but in New Zealand it is just the reverse. The preserves in question swarm 

 with millions of them. On one visit paid by the Superintendent of Wel- 

 lington [the late Dr. Featherston] to that district, he was presented with 

 a dish of twenty thousand eels for dinner. You may grow potatoes or 

 feed sheep anywhere, but eels can only be got where Nature causes them 

 to be. A great eel-fishery like that between Manawatu and Eangitikei is 

 of as much value to the natives as the banks of Newfoundland or the 

 Bay of Fundy to those who deal in codfish. I contend that, if the Nga- 

 tiraukawa had been as thick over that land as the eels are in its ponds, 

 the undisputed exercise of the right of fishery in the hands of the Nga- 

 tiapa would have been proof that the mana of the district was still with 

 them. To enjoy the right of fishing, the right to the adjacent land is 

 essential ; and there is no ingredient of so much weight in all this case to 

 prove the continuance of the Ngatiapa mana in the disputed block as 

 their holding on to the eel-ponds." 



2. " Notes on New Zealand Birds," by Sir W. Buller 



(with specimens in illustration). {Transactions, p. 53.) 



Before proceeding to his notes, the author bore testimony to the great 

 service rendered by the late Governor, Lord Onslow, in his memorandum 

 for Ministers recommending the setting-apart of the Little Barrier at 

 the North, and Resolution Island in the South, as perpetual reserves for 

 the conservation of the indigenous fauna and flora ; and he said that the 

 Hon. Mr. Ballance had earned the hearty thanks of every ornithologist 

 by the prompt action he had taken in order to give effect to the Governor's 

 proposals. The President quoted from the papers on the subject now 

 before both Houses of the General Assembly, and explained shortly how 

 the scheme would be carried out. The specimens exhibited were a 

 creamy-yellow-coloured Anthomis melanura, and aparrakeet (Platyccrcus 

 novce-zealandicc) largely marked with canary-yellow. 



