66 BIRDS OF THE WATER 



On Tutira the numbers of the Weka 

 fluctuate very considerably, and I have 

 elsewhere described the two irruptions that 

 have occurred on the run during my occu- 

 pation. The species has, however, more 

 than held its own during the last quarter 

 century. 



to the Weka. In theory, at any rate, he is the best-known bird 

 of the Dominion; everybody has at least read of him, and the 

 Anglican Church has peculiarly taken him to her bosom. None 

 of her many imported curates can withstand him. He never 

 fails to draw and to awaken, and no newly-arrived young 

 Church of England divine's sermon can be considered quite 

 complete without him. As surely as texts of a certain character 

 are given out, we listen eagerly for the coming allusion. The 

 bird is never, of course, named, but allowed to steal upon us 

 perhaps as "a small brown bird, my brethren, whom all of us 

 know," or, "my friends, one of our deeply interesting flightless 

 species." The poor bird is then made to fulfil one, no doubt, 

 of his purposes in the scheme of Nature, and is castigated as 

 a decadent, and held up as an awful warning to the con- 

 gregation. It is pleasant to believe that while Tutira, and 

 no doubt other runs preserve, the honourable, numerical posi- 

 tion of the Church of England is assured. 



