82 Transactions. — Miscellaneous i 



gives his son as Kongokako, whose son was Tamatea, whose son was 

 Kahungunu, and from this man (the founder of their tribe) down to the 

 present generation are just twenty-one generations. In another old story 

 we have the following : — " When Tamatea arrived, he burnt up the tangled 

 mass of herbage and scrub from the surface, then it was that man, possessing 

 useful land, dwelt and lived well." 



3. Of the " Feathers" etc., of the Moa. 



On my reading the first part of my paper on the Moa,* a discussion 

 ensued ; when Mr. Locke, who was present, said that he had formerly heard 

 when travelling in the interior among the Urewera tribe, a very similar 

 relation from them in reply to his enquiries respecting the Moa ; and that 

 he had also heard more than once from the old chiefs on the East Coast, 

 south of Hawke's Bay, that they had themselves seen the feathers of the 

 Moa, which were anciently used for head decoration. As this, about the 

 feathers and theu' use, was new to me (as coming from these persons), I 

 lost no time in making further enquiries in that direction, and the following 

 (extracted from several letters) is the result : — 



1. (May 7, 1879. J " This is a return to your questions concerning the 

 Moa. I have made diligent enquiry of the chief Hawea and others. At 

 that very time, too (when the letter arrived), the chief James Waiparera 

 was here staying ; he had come from his place at Patangata to conduct 

 hither certain visitors from Eotorua and fi.-om Tauranga. They all heard 

 me read to the chief Hawea your long letter of enquiries, even unto 

 the end of it. Then they said, to take up each question separately ; and 

 this was also done. Then they all, including Hawea, said to me : Write to 

 him (Colenso), and say. No man of old ever saw the Moa ; the last of men, 

 perhaps, who ever saw the Moa, was in the time of Noah ;f because it was 

 at the time of the overturning in the days of (or by) Mataoho:]: that the race 

 of Moas died, whose bones are now seen. The men of the after times did 

 not (see it) ; the men also who preceded Wahotapatm'angi§ did not see it, 

 down to the times of Te Heheu ; and now here also am I, an old man, 

 relating this. All those men never saw the Moa, also myself I never saw it. 



* Trans. N. Z. Inst., Vol. XI., p. 568. 

 t This, of course, is from Genesis, and refers to the Deluge. 



\ Thus referred to in the very old legend of Tawhaki : — " Tawhaki, having recovered 

 from his wounds, left that place, and went and built a fort on the top of the mountain for 

 himself and tribe, where they dwelt. Then it came to pass that the rain was let down 

 from the sky, and the land was overwhelmed, and all men died ; from which circumstance 

 (that flood) was named — ' The overturning of Mataoho ;' and so they perished." (See this 

 amplified in " Polynesian Mythology," p. 61.) 



§ This was Hawea's grandfather, who, with his son Te Heheu, saw Cook. Te Heheu 

 died about thirty years ago, old and full of days. 



