Corenso.—On the Maori Races of New Zealand. 343 
lose their milk at an early period, but of late years it has become common. 
If the mother’s milk failed while the infant was still very young, small birds 
were snared, and their flesh chewed as food for it. 
8. Children born blind, or idiots, or deaf and dumb, were all but unheard 
of ; tongue-tied or lisping children were also extremely rare ; so were stam- 
merers, though these haye certainly increased with civilization. A hare-lipped 
child was unknown; children, however, with six fingers and six toes were not 
unfrequent ; so were some without any fingers on one hand, yet generally 
having a thumb, and with very small rudimentary nails on the fingerless 
stump, at the end of the metacarpal bones. Left-handed persons were not 
uncommon. Hunchbacks were not unfrequently met with, caused (it is 
believed by the writer) by their having been injured in passing through their 
low doors while being borne on the parent’s back; although the natives 
would never allow it. The fairer children would often be strongly marked 
With nevus maternus or mole; such nevi, however, were almost always 
pigmentary, rarely hairy, and never vascular. Albinos, too, though rare, 
were sometimes born; in their weak reddish-pink eyes and light flaxen hair 
much resembling the albinos of other nations. 
9. Their diseases were but few; and among them only one which could 
properly be styled mortal, and at the same time general. That, however, was 
a fatal species of consumption, which alone carried off half of those who died 
from natural causes. A fever, of a typhoid character, was also prevalent in 
marshy districts in the summer, which also annually took away several 
Victims, more, however, owing to want of proper food and aid when beginning 
to rally than to the disease itself. Scrofula, of a very serious nature, often 
attacked some of the fairest and finest children, particularly at the northern 
parts of New Zealand; if, however, they survived till years of puberty, they 
generally recovered. Sometimes it (or a kindred disease, perhaps a severe 
species of leprosy, not unlike elephantiasis, and confined to the north) 
attacked the miserable patient in the hands or feet, causing the fingers and 
toes, and even the hands and feet, to drop off at the joints. Fortunately for 
the poor sufferer, this disease gave little or no pain. Rheumatism, especially 
in the back, was very common ; so also was ophthalmia, inereased sometimes 
to cataract and to utter blindness through the smoke of their close huts, the 
dust, and the glare of the sun. Amaurosis was occasionally met with. 
Dropsy was known, but rare; so was hydrocele. Their principal skin 
diseases were—a virulent species of itch (Psora) ; boils of two kinds, and 
often of large size (Furuncle and Anthrax) ; shingles, which, however, was 
not common; an obstinate kind of scald-head (Tinea granulata ?); and 
ringworm (Herpes cireinatus) ; the two last-mentioned were confined to 
children. Worms, especially Ascarides, were not unfrequent. Fits, of an 
