206 Transactions. — 'Zoology. 



black rat, while the larger animal would be simply the European black rat 

 modified to some extent by climate and other differences during the course 

 of perhaps a hundred years. 



The statement is frequently made that the Maori rat is extinct. Surely this 

 is a gratuitous assumption. It is at all events an assertion very difficult to 

 prove, inasmuch as it virtually involves a universal negative. That one 

 species of the so-called Maori rat may have disappeared before the in- 

 vaders, I have no difficulty in granting. But there are wide tracts in New 

 Zealand where there is room enough for millions of rats to disport them- 

 selves without let or hindrance of pakeha or pakeha rat. Old settlers in 

 this province who knew the interior 40 years ago, and have known it ever 

 since, tell me that during the whole of that period a small species of rat 

 has been commonly met with in the bush at all altitudes. One of our 

 members (Mr. Browning) has seen it when on his professional duties at a 

 height of 4,500 feet. Mr. Saxton says it climbs trees. Some people say it 

 lives in them. It certainly eats fruit and vegetation, and is a very clean 

 wholesome animal compared with the brown rat of our civilization. It lives 

 largely amongst the fern. Why not call it by way of distinction the Fern 

 Eat. Understand me, I do not look upon this as another variety additional 

 to those I have mentioned, I believe this is the true Maori rat — the Mus 

 maorium of Professor Hutton — the Kiore Maori — the rat with whose presence 

 we now are so largely favoured. 



It is fair to say, per contra, that Professor Haast in his " Beport of 

 Exploration in the Western part of the Nelson Province, 1861," states that 

 although the native rat (which he calls "Mus rattus") was said in some 

 places still to exist in large numbers, he failed to find any ; while, on the other 

 hand, the Kiore Pakeha was found everywhere in large numbers and of 

 large size. 



It must also be said that mention has been made more than once of 

 some species of rat living in communities — like rabbits living in their 

 burrows, or ants on their hills. The deserted holes were frequently 

 found on the Canterbury plains and in the Nelson interior some years 

 ago, but there is no evidence to show what species of rat inhabited 

 them. 



Well then you see the opinion to which I incline is that our rat — 

 whether the true Kiore Maori or not — is an indigenous rodent, the same 

 which Professor Hutton calls the Mus maorium, and which we may familiarly 

 name the Fern Bat, in reference to its usual habitat. So far from its being 

 extinct, this rat, as Dr. Hector says v Trans., vol. xvi., p. 555), " is very 

 common in the bush country," feeding on the bark of the patete, and 

 relishing the honey of the puriri, by which it is frequently stupefied and 



