346 Essays. 
dog-fish, mackerel, and other fish which swim in shoals, of which (especially 
of dog-fish and of mackerel) they dried immense quantities for winter use. 
They would also fish from rocks with hook and line, and scoop-nets ; or, 
singly, in the summer, in small canoes manned by one man and kept con- 
stantly paddling, with a hook baited with mother-of-pearl shell, take plenty 
of kahawai ; or with a chip of tawhai wood attached to a hook, as a bait, they 
took the barracouta in large quantities. Very fine crayfish were taken in 
great numbers by diving, and sometimes by sinking baited wicker traps. 
Heaps of this fish, with mussels, cockles, and other bivalves, were collected 
in the summer, and prepared and dried ; and of eels also, and of severa. 
delicate fresh-water fishes, large quantities were taken in the summer, and 
dried for future use. 
(2.) Birds, such as quail, rail, and ground parrot, also the pigeon and 
parson-bird, and various species of wild duck, they ingeniously snared ; 
although they often speared the pigeon. The large brown parrot was first 
decoyed to a stand fixed on the top of a high tree by the cry of a tame one, 
and then suddenly trapped and killed by the concealed native. The kiwi 
was caught by night, through successfully imitating its ery; and the fat 
frugivorous and harmless indigenous rat was both trapped and dug out of 
its burrow in several ways. 
(3.) A large portion of their time and attention was necessarily given to 
their cultivations, especially as the few plants they cultivated—two edible 
roots, the kumara (Batatas edulis) and taro (Caladium esculentum), and a 
gourd-like fruit called Aue, and the cloth plant, or paper mulberry tree, aute 
(Broussonetia papyrifera)—each required a different soil to bring it to per- 
fection; added to which they always wisely preferred cultivating in patches 
far apart, so as perchance to save one or more in case of a sudden inroad 
from a aua (a legal or illegal honouring, stripping, or fighting party), which 
visit was perfectly sure to take place at least two or three times a year. 
The kumara, or sweet potato, was planted with much ceremony and regularity 
in little hillocks in sheltered dry ground facing the sun, carefully prepared, 
and heavily gravelled with fresh gravel obtained from some gravel pit, or 
from the bed of a neighbouring stream ; this annual gravelling of their 
kumara grounds was alone a heavy service. Among some tribes (as at 
Rotorua), the kumara root was not planted until the sprout had gained some 
length, which caused additional care and labour. It had to be constantly 
watched when in leaf, or it would be destroyed by a large caterpillar which 
fed on the plant, and which was continually being gathered and destroyed 
