CoLENSO. — On the Maori Races of Neio Zealand. 343 



lose their milk at au early period, but of late years it has become common. 

 If the mother's milk failed while the infant was still very young, small birds 

 were snared, and their flesh chewed as food for it. 



8. Children born blind, or idiots, or deaf and dumb, were all but unheard 

 of ; tongue-tied or lisping children were also extremely rare ; so were stam- 

 merers, though these have certainly increased with civilization. A hare-lipped 

 child was unknown ; children, however, with six fingers and six toes were not 

 unfrequent ; so were some without any fingers on one hand, yet generally 

 having a thumb, and with very small rudimentary nails on the fingerless 

 stump, at the end of the metacarpal bones. Left-handed persons were not 

 uncommon. Hunchbacks wei-e not unfrequently met with, caused (it is 

 believed by the writer) by their having been injured in passing through their 

 low doors while being borne on the parent's back ; although the natives 

 would never allow it. The fairer children would often be strongly marked 

 with ncsvus viaternus or mole ; such ncevi, however, were almost always 

 pigmentary, rarely hairy, and never vascular. Albinos, too, though rare, 

 were sometimes born ; in their weak reddish-pink eyes and light flaxen hair 

 much resembling the albinos of other nations. 



9. Their diseases were but few ; and among them only one which could 

 properly be styled mortal, and at the same time general. That, however, was 

 a fatal species of consumption, which alone carried off half of those who died 

 from natural causes. A fever, of a typhoid character, was also prevalent in 

 marshy districts in the summer, which also annually took away several 

 victims, more, however, owing to want of proper food and aid when beginning 

 to rally than to the disease itself. Scrofula, of a very serious nature, often 

 attacked some of the fairest and finest children, particularly at the northern 

 parts of New Zealand ; if, however, they survived till years of puberty, they 

 generally recovered. Sometimes it (or a kindred disease, perhaps a severe 

 species of leprosy, not unlike elephantiasis, and confined to the north) 

 attacked the miserable patient in the hands or feet, causing the fingers and 

 toes, and even the hands and feet, to drop off at the joints. Fortunately for 

 the poor sufferer, this disease gave little or no pain. Eheumatism, especially 

 in the back, was very common ; so also was ophthalmia, increased sometimes 

 to cataract and to utter blindness through the smoke of their close huts, the 

 dust, and the glare of the sun. Amaurosis Avas occasionally met with. 

 Dropsy was known, but rare; so was hydrocele. Their principal skin 

 diseases were — a virulent species of itch (Psora) ; boils of two kinds, and 

 often of large size (Ftirimcle and Anthrax) ; shingles, which, however was 

 not common; an obstinate kind of scald-head {Tinea granulata ?) ; and 

 ringworm {Ilerpes circinatus) ; the two last-mentioned were confined to 

 children. Worms, especially Ascarides, were not unfrequent. Fits, of an 



