6 Transactions. —Miscellaneous. 
numberless boiling springs and steam-holes which occur over the whole 
surface—appear to occupy every inch of available space, the scene being 
completed by Maori women preparing food, naked men and boys lying in 
the open baths, and ancient females squatted on the warm stones used for 
drying the berries of the tawa. In fact, it is difficult to describe the state 
of filth and demoralization into which the Maori population of this and the 
adjacent settlement of Wairau are gradually sliding; and it is certainly to 
be regretted that the efforts and self-denial of the early missionaries, in 
their attempts to introduce civilized habits amongst these people, should 
have been neutralized by the drunkenness and vice into which they have 
lapsed, as the result of contact with brandy-sellers and Pakeha-Maoris, and 
from their own abandonment of habits of industry in reliance upon extraneous 
means of support. In keeping with this lowering of character, is the pre- 
sent appearance of the Rey. Mr. Spencer’s once beautiful residence, at Te 
Temu, formerly kept in order by the members of his Maori flock, but which, 
in its decay and desolation, appears to keep pace with the degradation of 
the neighbouring Maori people. 
But Ohinemutu, though no longer’ possessing its former characteristics 
as a famous Maori pah, still affords to the contemplation of the visitor 
objects of the very highest interest. There is not a square rod of the lower 
ground that is not occupied by one or more of the hot springs and 
fumaroles, which give it so peculiar an appearance when the whole are 
in high activity. This was the case on the second morning after my 
arrival there; and as the whares and enclosures, with the people moving 
about them, were only dimly visible through the dense clouds of steam 
which rose on all sides, the scene presented a weird appearance to which no 
mere description can fully do justice. I propose, in the sequel, to refer 
. to these intermittent accessions of activity, without, however, being able to 
afford any explanation of them ; but certainly nothing can be more striking 
than the difference in the appearance of the settlement when these 
phenomena are quiescent, and when they are in full, active operation. 
I was also much interested by discovering, amongst the ancient carvings 
which once decorated the palisading of the pah, a couple of grotesque 
carved figures in the ordinary style of Maori art, but which had, to my 
surprise, the full complement of fingers and toes. On inspection of the 
carvings in the Maori House annexed to the Museum at Wellington, and 
of those to be seen elsewhere, it will be found that, in every case, the num- 
ber of fingers and toes on the figures is limited to three; and, until I noticed 
the peculiarity in the figures referred to, at Ohinemutu, I had never seen 
any Maori carving in which the number of fingers and toes was complete. 
Upon this subject I do not hesitate to quote the following passage from 
