120 Transactions. 
bay at the north end of the island, and at the head of which is the residence 
of Mr. Frederick Hunt, an Englishman, who has been settled there for 
nearly twenty years. Immediately opposite Mr. Hunt's house is a rock 
called the Flower-pot, which forms a shelter for boats engaged in landing 
or shipping goods. Mr. Hunt’s house is close to the beach, and is sur- 
rounded by about two hundred and fifty acres of cleared land, mostly laid 
down to English grasses, and divided into paddocks, forming a very compact 
and well-cultivated farm. With the exception of these clearings, and of 
insignificant patches of open land in various parts of the island, the whole 
of Pitt's Island is covered with bush. I was received with much civility by 
Mr. Hunt and his family, who invited me to stay with them during the time 
I should be engaged in collecting plants, &c. On this occasion, however, 
I remained on Pitt’s Island for a week only, having been detained by a 
tremendous gale from the north-west. 
“We left on the 26th, and reached Waitangi (a Maori settlement on 
Chatham Island) on the following day. Here I presented my letters to 
Captain Thomas, the Collector of Customs, by whom I was treated most 
courteously, and who promised to give me every assistance in his power in 
carrying out the objects of my journey. Waitangi is the chief Maori settle- 
ment on the Chatham Islands, and is situated at the south-eastern extremity 
of Petre Bay, which forms an indentation some forty miles broad on the 
south-west side of the island. But for this bay the shape of the island 
would have been nearly that of an isosceles triangle, of which the south- 
western side would have formed the base. A small but deep river flows 
into the bay close to Waitangi, washing on its western side the foot of some 
low ridges of reddish sandstone. The river drains a considerable tract of 
hilly ground on the south side of the bay, and is also fed by a stream 
running from a lagoon close to the settlement. Were it not for a bar 
at its mouth, vessels of from forty to fifty tons burthen might enter it, as 
inside the bar the water is deep for a considerable distance inland. , 
“The huts of the Maoris and the residence of Captain Thomas are 
situated on low ground on the east side of the river. The Maori huts are 
built of fern posts lashed together with supplejacks, and thatched with toi 
grass, resembling in all respects those found in the old pahs in New Zealand. 
Captain Thomas's residence is built in the same way with the exception of 
the roof, which is shingled ; but it is plastered inside and out with clay, and 
whitewashed. A chapel belonging to the Church of England natives is a 
very handsome specimen of their style of building: the inside walls are lined 
with fronds of tree ferns, from which the pinnules have been stripped, and 
i me hear in a curious manner with leaves of Phormium tena. 
with cus white scrolls minio on a red ground, 
