Wellington Philosophical Society. 415 
some baptized natives, and, though they found no live Moa, they found some 
huge bones, which they declared to be those of the true Moa. These had been 
collected by the natives apparently as a matter of course, for the manufacture 
of fish-hooks, for he obtained such hooks. 
Mr. Colenso then proceeded himself to the mountains, and made inquiries 
at a native village, where he was informed that the Moa still lived, though he 
had not been seen. The bones were, however, stated to be common. Similar 
inquiries in another district—Tiwhiti—also reported to be inhabited by Moas, 
gave the same result, the natives proving their knowledge of the bones, and 
that they belonged to the Moa, but without being able to afford any proof 
that they were justified in believing that he still lived, These inquiries 
stimulated the natives to search, so that in a short time the bones of nearly 
thirty birds, all of one gigantic species, were obtained. 
After thus recounting his experiences, Mr. Colenso proceeds to infer that 
the above knowledge of the existence of this bird must have been merely 
traditionary ; but I do not think this a fair deduction, because Mr. Colenso 
evidently hoped to be shown the live bird by the natives he employed, and 
though the natives could not do so, they yet had no difficulty in finding the 
bones for him in large numbers and in perfect preservation. It must also be 
remembered that the natives with whom Mr. Colenso communicated on the 
subject lived in a district which was the first settled by their ancestors, and 
that, although the Moa may there have been extinct for many generations, 
this is no reason why it may not even at that date have been existing in the 
South Island for all they knew to the contrary. 
Having in a former communication on the subject referred to the interior 
of Otago as probably the part of New Zealand in which the Moa survived 
longest, and feeling anxious to discover the condition in which that district 
was found by the first European @xplorers, I applied to my friend Mr. John 
Buchanan, who is as distinguished for his power of accurate observation as he 
is for the skilfully executed lithographs which illustrate our Transactions and 
Natural History publications. 
Mr. Buchanan was attached to the first surveying—I may call it exploring 
—party sent out by the Otago Government in 1856 into the district where 
the best preserved Moa remains have since been discovered, the surveyor in 
charge being Mr. Garvie, who was at the time in bad health, and did not long 
survive the hardships the party underwent. 
They penetrated as far as what is now the Cromwell township, at the 
upper end of the Dunstan gorge, or almost seventy-five miles west from the 
coast in a direct line, the settled country, or rather that which had been 
taken up as sheep runs, not extending at the time beyond the depression 
between the Manguatua or Lammerlaw ranges, or a distance of twenty-five 
