56 Transactions. 



man told me afterwards that it was a good job I had killed and burnt the 

 lizard and so stopped any evil coming to me because of my dream. Some 

 of the old Maori used to eat lizards. You could tame them for pets so 

 that they would come when their names were called, and thev would lie 

 and sleep alongside you. One such pet, Te Horo-mokai by name, was 

 kept at Motu-kai-puhuka (village near ICaitangata), but it was lost, and 

 although it was seen later eating tutti it was never caught again." 

 Another said, " Tuafara were down on Auckland Island, an^ Mrs. Cameron, 

 of Riverton, got two from there. They had fins on their heads and backs. 

 I reckon the Maori had been down there before the Europeans came, 

 and had a look round but thought it no good and never settled there." 

 My last informant on this subject stated that legend averred that at 

 Mason's Bay, Stewart Island, some people saw tnatara eggs and broke 

 them ; the tuatara came after them and they killed it. The names of two 

 small islets in Lake Wanaka commemorate lizards — viz., Taki-karara and 

 Te Pae-karara. " Only the big kind of lizard was called karara " (see 

 Trans. N.Z. Inst., vol. 7, p. 295). 



# 



The Maori Rat. 



Some people have expressed abhorrence of the idea of eating rats, but 

 my Maori friends were careful to explain that the Maori rat was an 

 altogether different creature from the filth-eating European rat. The 

 Maori rat was a fruit-'^ater and a cleanly animal. One old Maori told me 

 that once a party of white whalers was wrecked in the West Coast Sounds 

 and walked overland. They were glad to eat the Maori rats, which were then 

 feeding on the fruit of the kowhai, and were big and fat. " Long Harry," 

 one of the party, told my informant that the rats were " very good." My 

 informant added that some of these rats had hair like the' opossum, and 

 that the general name for the rats was kiore, but one kind was called 

 pouhawaiki. Another old man said the Maori rat was not found on 

 Stewart Island, although it was plentiful on the mainland. It was a 

 fruit-eater, and was snared. An old song mentioned that Tawera, near 

 Oxford, in Canterbury, was the best place to go if one wanted a feast 

 of More (rats). A well-informed kaumatua (elder) said that the Maori rat 

 was called kiore-tawai, and was once very plentiful. It was grey, but not 

 like the colour of our present rodents. It would not eat flesh, but only 

 fruit and berries. Pouhawaiki, he said,, was the name of the introduced, 

 or European, rat. 



Near the mouth of the Molyneux is a bank called Te Rua-koi, which 

 I was told meant " a hole made by the rats." When they were fat the 

 Maori would go and. dig them out. My informant was certain that was 

 the correct name of the locality, and that the getting of the rats out of 

 their lairs was why it was so named. Anothc^r Maori, well versed in 

 nature-lore, said he had never seen the Maori rat [kiore maori he called it), 

 although a very old white settler had told him of seeing it many years 

 ago in that district. According to what he had heard, this rat liked to live 

 in mossy places in swampy ground. It made holes in the moss, and the 

 nest was known as rua kiore. That this creature existed before the pakeha 

 canae he knew from tradition ; also the ancient name of a creek near 

 Otaraia was Tapiri-kiore, which meant " two rats walking together." In 

 fact, there were two creeks with this name. Leaving Poupoutmioa 

 (Clinton) and going through the Kuriwao Gorge you come to Tapiri-kiore- 

 tuatahi {tuatdhi = first), and then to Ta])iri-kiore-rahi {raid = big). Then 

 you cross Te Kauaka-o-Waipahi (the ford of the Waipahi), and go on to 

 Te Au-nui (Mataura Falls). 



