Wellington Philosophical Society. 563 



He said he remembered his own surprise in the early sixties, when 

 first exploring such caves, at finding, as Mr. McLeod had done, bones of 

 sheep and cattle mixed with fossils of a period generally supposed to be 

 remote. The animals had fallen into the cave, and flowing water had 

 carried the bones into strange company. The caves at Martinborough 

 were geologically recent ; others, notably at Takaka, in Nelson, were 

 of far more ancient date. Hundreds of these caves had never been 

 properly examined, and they were full of valuable material for the scien- 

 tific investigator. He was glad that one of our members had devoted 

 serious attention to the subject. Some of the secret caves of the 

 Maoris in the North Island in particular would hereafter be mines of 

 treasure for the archfeologist. For ages the natives had be^n in the 

 habit not only of depositing therein the bones of their great chiefs, 

 priests, and warriors, but their most treasured heirlooms, in the way of 

 greenstone ornaments, &c, which were practically imperishable, and 

 were the sole remaining relics of native art of prehistoric times. 



Sir James Hector exhibited the skeleton of a young female 

 whale of a rare species — Mesoplodon hectori, Van Beneden 

 — which, with its mother, was captured last March at Titahi 

 Bay. 



Only four specimens of this species had, he said, been met with. 'The 

 first two were fragments only. The adult specimen on this occasion the 

 Museum, unfortunately, had not been able to secure, and this was, there- 

 fore, the only perfect skeleton available. Strangely enough, the two 

 other specimens had been found in tbe same little bay. Tne Mesoplodon 

 might be regarded as a miniature species of the family of which tbe great 

 sperm whale was the type. A northern species was known, differing in 

 several points from the New Zealand species. 



Sir James Hector directed the attention of the meeting 

 to a collection of some forty or fifty out of a large collection 

 of water-colour drawings of our native fishes by the late Mr. 

 F. E. Clarke, a member of the Society. 



He said Mr. Clarke's knowledge of fish was minute and accurate, and 

 it would be difficult to exaggerate the beauty and scientific fidelity of his 

 drawings. A special value attached to these drawings inasmuch as some 

 represented rare and others absolutely unique specimens which had come 

 under Mr. Clarke's observation — one of these, notably, a large shark of a 

 kind which Sir James had never seeu, and which was undescribed save 

 by Mr. Clarke, while it differed remarkably from any other known species. 

 At some distant day, perhaps, these valuable drawings might be repro- 

 duced and issued in book form — that was, if they could be secured for the 

 Museum ; as it was, they were in danger of being lost or dispersed. Mrs. 

 Clarke was willing to dispose of them, and he hoped the collection would 

 be purchased in its complete form by the colony. 



The meeting expressed its concurrence. 



Sir James, in continuing his remarks, said that something more than 

 accurate delineation of our fishes was needed. We had sull much to 

 learn of their habits and life-history, though we knew far more about 

 them than might be supposed from occasional reports published at 

 public expense, in which, it was not too much to say, a great deal of non- 

 sense might be found. One fact we could not escape — tnat New Zealand 

 was an island, and that the surrounding hun Ired-fathom limit within 

 which fishing operations could be conducted was a narrow one. It was 

 impossible, in the absence of breeding-grouids such as the North Sea or 

 the banks off Newfoundland, that New Zealand could ever establish 

 a great fishing industry. He then called attention to some curious facts 



