Hill. — The Moa — Legendary, Historical, and Geological. 339 



then current among the elder Natives related how atuas covered with hair, 

 in the form of birds, dwelt in the forest wilds, and killed and devoured 

 human beings whenever the opportunity arose. Here fact and legend meet. 

 The bones have been proved to be those of birds, and the information had 

 come in the long past from Natives who " received the tradition of the 

 former existence of birds." The fact that atuas and birds are mixed in 

 the legendary lore is very noticeable ; but one would suppose that had the 

 bird been generally known to the Natives of either Island the same name 

 would have been applied to it. Polack makes no mention of the name of 

 the legendary bird. The Rev. Mr. Taylor termed it " tarepo." In London 

 Mr. Rule gave the name of the supposed bird as " movie," and Mr. Colenso, 

 in his paper that appeared in the " Tasmanian Journal of Science " in 1843, 

 states that when at Waiapu (near East Cape of the North Island) during 

 the summer of 1838 along with the Rev. William Williams he first heard 

 of a certain monstrous animal. Some said a bird, some a person ; all 

 agreed it was a moa — a domestic cock that had the face of a man and 

 dwelt in a cavern in the precipitous side of a mountain ; that it lived on 

 air, and that it was guarded by two immense tuatara, which watched 

 whilst the moa slept. Again, in vol. 11 of the Transactions, page 83, 

 Colenso writes, " Yet not a single vestige of any osteological remains of 

 any animal of the saurian kind has ever yet been discovered ! While, on 

 the other hand, the fossil remains of many large and extinct struthious 

 birds of several genera and species, and commonly known in the lump as 

 * moa,' are to be met with in great abundance ; and yet of these realities 

 there are neither creditable history, nor curious legendary tale, nor myth 

 nor fable that I have ever been able to lay hold of ! ' 



Whakapunake, a bold scarp of limestone due south of Poverty Bay, 

 was spoken of as the residence of the creature. The Natives were afraid 

 of the moa. Colenso endeavoured to find out more about the moa on his 

 second visit to the East Coast in 1841-42, but although he passed round 

 Whakapunake and proceeded to the interior of the Island he was unable 

 to gather any information, either legendary or other, about the moa. 



It will be noticed that there is a general agreement between Colenso 

 and Polack in their description of the atuas in the shape of birds that at 

 one time existed in the country. The fact that such traditions alone 

 remained suffice to show that the moa had disappeared from the North 

 Island at least anterior to the arrival of any settlers, missionaries, or 

 traders. 



Bishop L. Williams refers to the legendary footsteps of a celebrated 

 ancestor of the Maori — Rongokako ; but I prefer to accept the evidence 

 of Panopa Waihopi, the principal chief residing at Te Karaka, whose illu- 

 minating letter (when read in the light of Colenso's reference below) appeared 

 in the Poverty Bay Herald of the 30th May, 1912. This letter was written 

 after the alleged discovery — rediscovery, it should have been (see Trans- 

 actions, &c.) — of moa-footprints at the mouth of the Waikanae Stream as 

 you enter between the pier-heads into the Turanganui River, Gisborne. 

 The following is a copy of the letter : — 



Sir, — 



I wish to inform you for the benefit of those who discredit the discovery of the 

 moa-footniarks on the Waikanae. I am now approaching my eightieth birthday. In 

 the year 1850 I was shown the very same footprints by Kahutia te Rangi, Lady Carroll's 

 grandfather, and was told they were the footprints of Rongokako, of Maori historical 

 fame. Kahutia's people before that knew of the same footprints. The footprints are 

 therefore not moas', but Rongokako's. 



