Maiu. — On a Find of Kauri-gum in Rangitikei. 499 



Art. LV. — Notes upon a Find of Kauri-gum in Rangitikei, 



Wellington Province. 



By S. A. E. Mair. 



[Read before the Auckland Institute, 9th October, 1905.] 

 Some five-and-twenty years ago a broad expanse of dense bush 

 separated the lower Rangitikei from the extensive plains of 

 Murimotu, or Inland Patea, lying to the south of Ruapehu. 

 Right from the Whanganui River to the Ruahine Ranges did 

 this forest extend, and, except for occasional canoe services 

 down the Rangitikei River, it completely barred all communica- 

 tion with the ports of Cook Strait. Many acres of the plains 

 had even then long been used for grazing sheep, brought in 

 overland from either Hawke's Bay or Taupo, by which routes 

 wool, &c, had to be packed out. This led to an agitation to 

 open communication through to Rangitikei, as the Maoris were 

 supposed to have previously had a track through the intervening 

 thirty or forty miles of bush. With this object the Govern- 

 ment and Rangitikei County offered a reward of £250 for the 

 best line of road, and by this means the bush was thoroughly 

 explored by Natives and pioneer settlers, with the result that 

 a track was opened through about midway between Turakina 

 and Rangitikei Rivers. This line, known as Murimotu Road 

 and Murray's Track, was only one of several routes offered 

 for the reward, and evidently, by being adopted, was considered 

 to be most serviceable. Leaving the lower Rangitikei it fol- 

 lowed up the Pourewa, a large feeder of the Rangitikei River, 

 and, climbing out of its source over the Te Kumu Ridge, about 

 2,500 ft. high, it rapidly descended a sharp ridge into the Manga- 

 one Stream, a feeder of the Mangapapa, which in turn flows into 

 the Turakina. Rising out of the Mangaone up and over a west - 

 ern ridge off the high Matawa Range, the track traversed some 

 miles of gorgy and hillocky country, emerging into the Patekete 

 clearing, and then into the vaUey of the Hautapu, up which 

 it wound to Ngaurukehu and Turangarere, where the Ruanui, 

 Taupo, and Moawhango-Napier Roads were intercepted. 



Whether the explorers of Murray's Track had known of the 

 previous existence of any ancient Maori track between the 

 Rangitikei and Patea I am not aware, but have since been in- 

 formed by Major Mair that such a track did exist, and was used 

 from the very earliest times by the interior Maoris visiting 

 those on the south-west coast. From Major Mair's testimony 

 I find this track from Turangarere to the Mangaone was almost 

 identical with Murray's Track. From there it rose the spur 

 to Te Kumu Ridge and there divided, the western branch head- 



