THE MAORI’S PLACE IN HISTORY. 287 
from that cause the gradual cessation of the art has come about 
until it has died out from national use altogether. 
Then as to navigation, Something is said with respect to this 
in the paper, and it has been hinted, though not expressly stated, 
I think, in so many words, that the islands of Polynesia have been 
populated by navigators who have been of such an order that 
they, like the Pheenicians, could launch their vessels and sail right 
away into the trackless ocean in search of other lands. The 
traditions amongst the Samoans go to show that these islands 
have been populated by chance, 7.e., the canoes, some of them of 
immense size and capable of taking 200 or 300, have started out 
from their own homes with the intention of, perhaps, making for 
an island, which, after they had sailed a few miles, became 
visible, Storms came on and the canoe drifted along, carried by 
the trade winds until it grounded on some new island. As a 
matter of fact some of those near the equator, in the South 
Pacific have, within historic times, been populated in that very 
way; and I think it is begging the question to suppose that the 
Polynesians were, in the olden times, such splendid navigators, 
that they could launch forth from the Eastern Islands to make 
for new islands, as is implied in the paper. And again, from my 
knowledge of the Eastern Polynesians, I think that their “system,” 
as it is called in the paper, of astronomy will not account for their 
cleverness in navigation. At any rate, if it ever existed, it has 
died out. The natives do not now sail or paddle by either sun or 
star, but, practically, their one compass is the trade wind. 
Then, with regard to the weapons indicated as uniting the 
people under one class, it is quite true that the blow-pipe or blow- 
tube, has been used as stated, and it is used still by one or two of 
the tribes living in the forests of Madagascar. It is used not as 
a weapon, in the ordinary sense of the term, which seems to mele) 
a warlike weapon, but simply as a means for the chase. 
One other point. The author refers to the topa, or felted bark 
cloth, which I think is somewhat misleading. Cloth in the South 
Pacific is not felted, according to my idea of the term. It is 
really welded. The bark is taken from the paper mulberry and 
soaked in water, then beaten into flat strips on pieces of wood. 
Two strips are laid overlapping at the edges, and they are then 
welded together: but it is not done in Madagascar. It is used in 
the paper to indicate a connection between Madagascar and the 
