S64 Essays. 



miglit be tliat the people in the canoe had all got safely to land, or were 

 coming by special invitation to visit that very village, perhaps to lament over 

 their dead. Strangest of all, the (unfortunate ?) people in the upset canoe 

 would be the very first to resent — even to fighting — any kind alleviation of 

 this strange law ! so that such conduct, vphile appearing to us (as Blackstone 

 says) to be " consonant neither ' to reason nor humanity,' was not to them 

 the ' adding of sorrow to sorrow.' " So also, goods floating at sea (a canoe, 

 &c.), or found on the high-road, or anywhere dropped, not hidden, became 

 the property of the finder. Eecently hidden property, if discovered, was 

 restored to its OAvner, on its being clearly identified ; but anciently hidden 

 property (mostly stone axes and stone ornaments) became the property of 

 the lord of the manor, who sometimes gave it {ex proprio oyioiu) to the 

 descendants of the person, when known, to whom it had belonged. 



(2.) Of common rights. — Such everywhere existed, both to — (i.) movable 

 and to (ii.) immovable property : (i.) As where several joined together to 

 build a village, to build a large house, to make a large net, to fell a forest, 

 and to plant the ground, to fish with a seine net, or to snare birds in 

 company, to make a large eel-weir, &c., &c. (ii.) To land, including what it 

 spontaneously produced (which latter was often of the greater moment to 

 them) ; such was common and unrestricted for every purpose to all the tribe, 

 and to their relatives by marriage of other tribes, and to their friends; 

 always excepting any such isolated peculiar claims and rights as those already 

 mentioned. Hence, any one of the tribe or sub-tribe would clear a portion 

 of the forest for planting, or set fire to the fern or swamp, or select and mark 

 for himself a tree in the wood, to be hereafter felled by him and made into 

 a canoe, &c. 



21. Their treatment of internal diseases, excepting, perhaps, rheumatism, 

 was altogether bad, yet ignorantly so, as they wholly relied on the efficacy of 

 the objurgations or exorcisms of the "priest," or skilled man. In rheumatic 

 affections, however, among other remedies, they often resorted to a rude hot 

 vapour bath; and both in rheumatism, and in some obstinate cutaneous 

 diseases, the tribes living near to hot springs and hot sulphurous mud wells 

 used them advantageously. But, while bad physicians, they were tolerably 

 good surgeons, especially in reducing dislocations and setting broken bones, 

 as they knew well the economy of the human frame, from their too often 

 cannibal feasts, as well as from their practice of cleaning the bones of the 

 dead. They set broken bones admirably, using splints of totara bark, or of 

 the broad green bases of the large flax leaves. They also managed to cut off 

 crushed fingers and toes, and even badly maimed hands, feet, and fore-arms, 

 in a creditable manner, although wholly ignorant of the arterial system. 

 Spearheads broken off within and perceived, they managed to cut out ; but, if 



