Travers.—Notes on the Hatinction of the Moa. 81 
last Moa hunt known or remembered was on the North Island at or near 
Whakatane, in the Bay of Plenty; the feathers of the birds killed there 
were, till a late period, in the possession of a chief called Apanui, an 
uncle of the half-caste, James Fulloon, who was murdered by the Hau- 
haus at that place, and it was also at or a little time before killed on 
the plains near the foot of the Ruahine mountains, north-east of Waipu- 
kurau at Napier. The wood used in cooking the Moa is the timber of the 
Koromiko, and hence the juice, when seen in that stump, is called ‘Te 
ngako o te Moa.’ There is a bird called the Kokako, which is said by the 
Maoris to have been an attendant on the ‘ Moa,’ and was in most instances 
the informer of the vicinity of the Moa by its ery. I have heard this bird 
ery, which is a prolonged sound as if it called Mo-o-o-a. The Moa, it is 
also said, lived on the fern roots (roi), but there are three sorts of good roi; 
one is found near the edges of the swamps, one on deep black soil, and one 
at the edge of the forests, which is called ‘ Renga ;’ this was dug up by the 
beak of the Moa, and was the food most eaten by them. Again, the bird 
was known to swallow stones, which the Maori says was only of a certain 
sort, and hence, when they see a turkey oil-stone, they call it ‘ Moa,’ as the 
stones swallowed by the Moa. This sort of stone was that used in polishing 
the Pounamu, and called a ‘Hoanga Moa,’ from which (the Moa swallows 
the stones) also comes the saying when a heap of stones are seen on & 
plain where no other stones are seen, ‘He tutae Moa’ (Moa excrement.) 
Again, as the Maori after his arrival here was the cause of the extinction 
of the Moa, hence, when a tribe has been cut off by war, and not an indi- 
vidual has been saved, the tribe is said to be ‘ Ngoro i te ngaro a te Moa,’ 
“lost as the extinction of the Moa.’ You must excuse, me my dear sir, in 
giving you so little, but I dare not go more into the matter till Iamagain in 
communion with my old collection of MSS., which I hope, if the House of 
Representatives will be good enough to help me, while I sit down and write 
from these MSS., I shall be able to give a full and, I hope, a perfect 
account of the Moa in some one of the books I wish to write. 
‘‘T am, dear Sir, 
‘‘ Yours very truly, 
‘“‘ Joun WHITE. 
“W. T. L. Travers, Esq., Wellington.” 
‘« Naprer, July 23rd, 1875. 
“* My pear Sir,—I forgot to say in my last letter that I have seen many 
old chiefs who have seen the Moa feathers worn in the heads of the old 
chiefs when the relators were boys. ‘These men describe them as in some 
instances about two feet long, some eighteen inches, some twelve inches, 
some six inches long, with the down from the top of the quill to within the 
K 
