100 Transactions. 
the foot taps, the head is inclined, the shoulders and the hips sway, the 
eyes are expressive, the lips—not a portion of the body but enters into 
the movements. As different songs are sung, one is astonished at the 
variety of the gestures, and the diffierence of the gestures accompanying 
the different songs, at the unison of the performers. They give whole- 
hearted expression to their feelings, whatever they may be, and the 
listener-observer is continually tempted to join in, so powerful is the 
I have to thank Mr. George Graham, of Auckland, and Te Rangi Hiroa 
for much information used in this paper: the Hon. A. T. Ngata and the 
people of Ngati-Porou for details regarding singing ; Mr. Elsdon Best for 
continual assistance and advice; the Directors of the Auckland, Dunedin, 
and Wellington Museums for permission to test instruments in their col-. 
lections ; and Mr. Н. Hamilton for the extreme trouble taken in making 
the illustration of the tohetohe and the roria. 
The Early Reclamations and Harbour-works of Wellington. 
By Неквект Battie, Librarian, Wellington Municipal Library. 
[Read before the Wellington Philosophical Society, 18th September, 1923 ; received by 
Editor, 19th September, 1923 ; issued separately, 28th August, 1924.] 
Plate 71. 
Тнк story of the discovery, rediscovery, and settlement of Port Nicholson 
has been fully told by Mr. Elsdon Best and others. It is proposed here 
to record what was done in the way of introducing shipping facilities and 
creating the port as at present existing. 
The first official mention of Port Nicholson was in a parliamentary 
paper laid before the House of Commons on the 31st August, 1835, in 
assistance on the 20th June, arriving at Port Nicholson by way of Blin 
ay and Queen Charlotte Sound on the 3Oth June. Here he found the 
on which he secured a passage to Sydney, 
where he laid his case before the Governor, Sir Richard Bourke. This 
resulted in H.M.S. * Alligator " being sent to New Zealand to recover the 
ent. 
Captain Hobson, later Governor of the colony, visited Cook Strait in 
H.M.S. “ Rattlesnake ” during 1837, but he does not even mention the 
rt. 
Port Nicholson thus took an insignificant part in the story of New 
Zealand: until 1840; but with the advent of the New Zealand Company 
the Cook Strait districts and the port showed promise of future 
