MAMMALS WAITK. 173 



" Tamangoru, a solitary cannibal, on one occasion discovered 

 two boys roasting a number of rats over a fire, a joyful sight 

 for a famishing Mangaian, he ambiguously remarked, ' cooked 

 rats are capital eating.' The word ' rats ' thus used might apply 

 to the lads as well as to the little quadrupeds. A cooked boy 

 would be indifferently called a ( fish ' or a ' rat.' 



"These two brothers subsisted chiefly by rat-catching, in which 

 they were adepts. 



" On the previous evening they dug a deep hole in the earth 

 and covered the bottom of it with candlenuts, of which rats are 

 excessively fond. A narrow pathway was made on either side 

 for the rats to get down and eat. The lads lay in wait at a little 

 distance, until they thought that the hole must be pretty full. 

 Each lad carried a lighted torch in one hand, and a stout iron- 

 wood stick in the other. They quickly killed a large number 

 of rats. 



"The boys now made a fire to roast the spoil. They then 

 thrust long green reeds (previously prepared) through the rats, 

 eight on each reed, and grilled them over the fire. There were 

 four skewers or reeds of rats, that is, thirty-two in all. When 

 the rats were done, the elder took two reeds of rats (sixteen) to 

 Tamangoru ; the famished man greedily devoured them and 

 called for the remaining two reeds." 



The same author 9 informs us that in the neighbouring island 

 of Raratonga, rats were not eaten, the inhabitants reviling the 

 natives of Mangaia as the rat-eating Mangaians. 



It would, however, appear that rats were not eaten when fish 

 was procurable, for Gill relates how, when the sea was too rough 

 for fishing, the boys set fire to the mountain fern, so that the rats 

 rushing out of the fern, half blinded with fire and smoke, were 

 easily killed with long sticks. 



In Tonga (Hoonga Island) the rats formed an article of food 

 with the lower orders of people, but in the account above referred 

 to, Mariner 16 says they are not allowed to make a sport of 

 shooting them, this privilege being reserved for " chiefs, mata- 

 booles, and mooas." 



Of the rat in New Zealand, Dieffenbach 6 tells us that the 

 frugivorous Kiore Maori was formerly largely eaten by the 

 natives, but that it had in 1843 become so scarce, owing to the 

 extermination carried on against it by the European rat, that he 

 could never obtain one. 



Buller 4 describes how during certain seasons the New Zealand 

 rat was captured by thousands and eaten, or potted down in 

 their own fat for future use. 



At Penhryn Island, Smith 21 informs us that the only animal on 

 the atoll was a small rat, which was not eaten. 



