FIJI-NEW ZEALAND EXPEDITION 233 
monographs, the manuscript of which I saw and which, when 
published, will be a monument to his industry and learning. He 
impresses me as being a man of the very first rank among the 
scientists of New Zealand. 
This museum is badly handicapped by the building in which 
it is housed, a wooden structure altogether unworthy of its con- 
tents and a potential fire-trap. It makes cold chills run down 
one’s back to think of what will happen in ease of a conflagration, 
and experience warns us that such a disaster is almost inevitable 
in course of time. In ease of fire, the life work of some of New 
Zealand’s foremost scientists will be wiped out and the Dominion 
Government will suffer a serious loss. The whole building is so 
crowded with almost priceless collections that very little could be 
saved in such an emergency. 
The Director of this museum, Mr. J. Allen Thomson, F.G.S., 
is an outstanding man of science, being for many years a most 
prolific investigator, who has published a great many valuable 
papers on geological and ethnological subjects. He was, unfor- 
tunately, ill at the time of our visit and we therefore failed to 
meet him, much to our loss and regret. He is the son of the 
member of Parliament who gave the lunch in Parliament Building 
at which we were the guests of honor. 
The Dominion Museum should be the best in New Zealand as 
it has the backing of the Government; but it is impossible to pass 
on its real merits on account of the crowded condition of its eol- 
lections and the practical inaccessibility of much of the material. 
We can only hope that this state of affairs is but temporary and 
that it will have a home appropriately spacious, safe and dignified 
before disaster overtakes it. The scientific productivity of its 
staff is sufficient proof that the collections are well used, and that 
the material is by no means lying idle. 
Of the Canterbury Museum it may be said that it has the best 
building and the most extensive ethnological collection, including 
much Maori work of great interest and value. Its moa remains 
are of special interest and seem to include a greater number of 
species of that giant bird than we saw elsewhere. It also exhibits 
the largest series of mammalian skeletons and mounted specimens. 
Most of the latter, however, are in poor condition, although the 
latter accessions, both of mammals and birds, are fully up to 
modern standards. I understand that since our visit it has ac- 
quired some notable collections, especially in the ornithological 
