2*76 Canadian Record of Science. 



vailed almost without Government control until 1840, gradu- 

 ally was ripened for the colonist, is familiar to all. The 

 new era may be said to have begun with Dieffenbach, a 

 naturalist, who was employed by the New Zealand Com- 

 pany. He travelled and obtained much information, but 

 did not collect to any great extent, and, in fact, appears 

 not to have anticipated that much remained to be discovered. 

 For his conclusion is that the smallness of the number of 

 the species of animals and plants then known — about one- 

 tenth of our present lists — was not due to want of acquaint- 

 ance with the country, but to paucity of life forms. The 

 chief scientific value of his published work is in the ap- 

 pendix, giving the first systematic list of the fauna and 

 flora of the country, the former being compiled by the late 

 Dr. Gray, of the British Museum. 



The next great scientific work done for New Zea- 

 land was the Admiralty survey of the coast line, which 

 is a perfect mai'vel of accurate topography, and one 

 of the greatest boons the colony has received from 

 the Mother Country. The enormous labor and expense 

 which was incurred on this survey at an early date 

 in the history of the colony is a substantial evidence of the 

 confidence in its future development and commercial re- 

 quirements which animated the Home Government. On 

 the visit of the Austrian exploring ship Novara to Auckland 

 in 1859, Von Hochstetter was left behind, at the request of 

 the Government, to make a prolonged excursion to the North 

 Island and in Nelson ; and he it was who laid the foundation 

 of our knowledge of the stratigraphical geology of New 

 Zealand. Since then the work of scientific research has 

 been chiefly the result of State surveys, aided materially 

 by the zeal of members of the New Zealand Institute, and 

 of late years by an increasing band of young students, who 

 are fast coming to the front under the careful science train- 

 ing that is afforded by our University Colleges. 



In the epoch of their development the Australasian colo- 

 nies have been singularly fortunate. The period that applies 

 to New Zealand is contemporaneous with the reign of Her 



