312 



waters teem with ships busily engaged in the peaceful work of commerce, 

 whilst lai-ge and valuable works in our various ports give facilities for the 

 carrying on and development of that commerce. Instead of our great tracts 

 of native pasture lying idle, and yielding sustenance to no useful living thing, 

 they are now roamed over by and maintain large herds of cattle and flocks of 

 sheep. Instead of the desolate, but luxuriant vegetation of the swampy ground 

 along many parts of our sea board, and the impenetrable forests of many of 

 our valleys, we have rich fields, producing the grain and other crops of tempe- 

 rate Europe. Instead of the narrow bush track, along which the savage 

 travelled on his mission of revenge, we have roads penetrating the country in 

 all directions, facilitating the maintenance of that intercourse, which is essential 

 to the progress of the community in wealth and civilization. Instead of the 

 mineral resources of the country lying idle, we have thousands of men busily 

 engaged in extracting them from the soil, and thus, whilst enriching themselves, 

 contributing by their labours to the wealth of others. We have, indeed, on 

 all sides of us abundant evidence that the energies of a European race are 

 rapidly converting a country which in its natural state scarcely afforded means 

 for the sustenance of man, into one capable not only of maintaining a con- 

 tented population, but of affording the materials for an extended foreign 

 commerce. 



But it is not merely these more material and directly apparent effects that 

 concern lis. Many, if not all of you, have heard of the Darwinian theory as applied 

 to the origin of species. This theory teaches us that a struggle for existence 

 is constantly going on between all the varied organisms, both animal and vege- 

 table, which occupy any particular Zoological or Botanical province, and that 

 only such organisms can ultimately succeed in maintaining a place, as may happen, 

 for the time being, to possess some point of vantage beyond the rest. Of course 

 time is an important factor in this theory, and in order to appreciate its bearing 

 upon the origin of species, the observer must be prepared to admit millions of 

 years for the work. In a country like New Zealand, placed at such a distance 

 from other countries as to preclude the risk of invasion, except through the 

 agency of man, it must be manifest that this struggle, would be carried on under 

 peculiarities little likely to be observed in other places, and the results already 

 caused by the introduction of new and rival organisms satisfies me that the 

 indigenous flora and fauna even on their own ground, are unable to cope with 

 the intruders. I cannot but think that the former had reached a point at which, 

 like a house built of incoherent materials, a blow struck anywhere shakes and 

 damages the whole fabric. The " Kiore" has been replaced, if not destroyed, by 

 the European rat ; the European honey bee now swarms in our forests, taking 

 the food of the meliphagous birds, which are already diminishing palpably in 

 numbers, whilst the facility afforded by the immense epiphytical growth upon 

 the forest trees enables the rat also to aid in this destruction by devouring the 

 eggs and young birds. The forests too contain large numbers of wild pigs, 

 cattle, and goats. The former root up the ground, destroying the seedling 

 trees, whilst the latter browse i^pon the young shoots and foliage, and even eat 

 the bark of the smaller trees in a manner tending greatly to limit their growth. 

 Following in their wake come many of the hardy vegetable organisms of 

 Europe which spring up on all sides as rivals to the remaining indigenous 

 plants, and thus the latter are exposed to a contest under circumstances in 

 which defeat is almost certain. Such in effect, is the activity with which the 

 introduced plants Eire doing their work, that I believe if every human 

 being were at once removed from the Islands for even a limited number of 

 years, looking at the matter from a geological point of view, the introduced 

 would succeed in displacing the indigenous fauna and flora. 



I must now bring my task to a close, and in doing so again apologize to 



