Mair. — On the Disappearance of the Moa. 71 



have been able to gather directly from the Maoris themselves. 

 I will say at once that I am a supporter of the belief that the 

 Maoris never had any p)ersonal knmoledge of the moa. I have 

 often thought of writing something about this question, and 

 should probably have gone on thinking about it for an indefi- 

 nite time but for reading in last year's proceedings of the 

 "Wellington Philosophical Society the discussion which took 

 place over Colonel McDonnell's paper on " The Ancient Moa- 

 hunters at Waingongoro." '*' The most marked thing about 

 that discussion was the way in which the advocates of what 

 may be called the prehistoric-extinction theory were "sat upon " 

 by the other side, not with weight of argument, but mere force of 

 assertion. I believe that the chief argument in favour of what 

 [ will call the recent-disappearance theory is the fact that on 

 the plains and hills of the South Island moa-bones were found 

 in large quantities by the first settlers on the surface of the 

 soil, and that the rapidity with which they decayed and disap- 

 peared was sufficient proof that the bones could not have been 

 long in that position. But this argument was not used in the 

 discussion to which I have referred ; and, further, I am only 

 dealing with the North Island and with the Maori evidence, 

 for Colonel McDonnell's paper was based upon an account of 

 moa-hunting related by tlae late Kawana Paipai, a well-known 

 Wanganui chief. I remember hearing the late Judge Gillies 

 say that Mr. John White had collected songs describing the 

 hunting and cooking of the moa, and that Apanui Hamaiwaho, 

 a Whakatane chief, had told him all about the killing of the 

 "last moa" by a famous hunter called Hape, near Mount 

 Edgecumbe. I do not know what other stories of the kind 

 may have been put on record, but it appears that on such 

 evidence we are expected to believe that down to recent times 

 the Maori hunted the moa. At the Wellington society's meet- 

 ing to which I have referred, it was explained that it was 

 owing to the moa being such a common object, and the killing 

 of it siich an everyday occurrence, that so little reference was 

 made to it in songs or legends ; but surely this is no argument, 

 for rats, pigeons, &e., were common enough, yet we have songs 

 and harakias about them, and long accounts — some of them of 

 great antiquity— describing their hunting or capture. If the 

 moa was ever hunted by man, it is reasonable to suppose that 

 the principal method of taking it would be by means of pits, 

 after the manner in which the ostrich was captured, but not 

 by running it down as described by Kawana Paipai. The Maoris 

 are not runners — in fact, none of the Polynesians are. But has 

 any one heard of a pit or trap for catching moas ? During the 

 present year I have seen in tlie Kmg-country pi^^V^^ kiore 



' " Trans. N.Z. Insfc.," vol. xxi., p. 438. 



