NEW ZEALAND. 



PART I. 



CHAPTER I. 



The Natives of New Zealand. 



BEFORE giving an account of the aboriginal inha- 

 bitants of New Zealand, it may not be uninteresting 

 to take a cursory view of those varieties of the 

 human race which inhabit the numerous islands in 

 that immense space of the great ocean which has 

 Asia, Africa, America, and the Southern Pacific for 

 its boundaries. In some cases these islands are of 

 the size of continents, in others they are merely 

 small coral formations, or of a volcanic nature. 

 Man inhabits most of them ; the easternmost of 

 those inhabited is r Easter Island, the westernmost 

 Madagascar, and the southernmost the southern 

 island of New Zealand. In spite of the impedi- 

 ments which distance must have created, he has, 

 even with his feeble resources, surmounted all ob- 

 stacles in the most mysterious manner, and has 

 traversed seas often stormy and boisterous, not fol- 

 lowing in his labyrinthic migrations that course 



VOL. II. B 



