COLLECTING BIRD BONES 87 



pleasant and intelligent lady, and everything about 

 their home indicated education and refinement. 



While I remained at Takaka it rained almost con- 

 stantly; but we managed two or three times to get out 

 and visit the caves. In one, into which we lowered 

 ourselves by a block and tackle from a beam placed 

 over the opening, we found almost the entire skeleton 

 of a Moa, together with the scattered bones of several 

 other birds. This discovery greatly pleased me, as the 

 skeleton was in a good state of preservation. We 

 found about a quart of small pebbles, rounded and 

 polished, which had evidently served to grind the food 

 in the bird's gizzard ; and intermixed with the pebbles 

 were fragments of land shells that it may have fed 

 upon. 



There were many skeletons of small birds, and parts 

 of a large lizard near the Moa, which probably lived 

 and died at the same time. We had a hard time pull- 

 ing ourselves and the bones up the thirty feet to the 

 opening; and, as we had remained in the cave longer 

 than we intended, one of the neighbors had come out 

 in search of us. 



I devoted the remainder of my time in Takaka to 

 collecting birds and insects. One of the most interest- 

 ing of these was the Weta, a very large, spiny cricket 

 with ferocious-looking jaws. We found them under 

 the bark of trees, and they always showed fight on 

 being disturbed. 



