1873-1874.] 2 9 



Such a complete list does not exist ; but we have something almost 

 as good — the County Electoral Roll. This, it is true, contains the 

 names of those only whose tenements are valued above ^12 per 

 annum — a very small proportion of the entire inhabitants ; but 

 then it is selective, and represents fairly enough the number of 

 names and their relative distribution in the county. From private 

 inquiries made through clerical friends and others, I have found 

 that the number of names in the county omitted from this list is 

 not very great, and that the names which do not appear in it are 

 confined to one or two localities, where the inhabitants are too 

 poor to be enrolled as voters. This is the fact chiefly with the old 

 native population, which, like the oldest fauna and flora of a 

 country, are to be found generally in its mountainous and inhos- 

 pitable parts. 



The Electoral Roll gives the names of the voters as they appear 

 in the twenty-one electoral districts recently laid down. I found 

 it necessary, in the first place, to make from this an alphabetical 

 list of the names of all the electors in the county, and to place 

 opposite each name the particular district and the number of times 

 in which it appears. If each surname bore upon its face the his- 

 tory of its origin, one could readily determine from such a table 

 the various elements and their relative distribution in the county. 

 But this is not always the case. Very often, indeed, it is no easy 

 matter to find out the indication and origin of a name. Names 

 suffer from time and wear as everything else, and become so meta- 

 morphosed in the process of years that their original owners would 

 hardly recognise them. Indeed, a tedious preparation is neces- 

 sary in order to arrive at anything like correct results. It is need- 

 ful, in the first place, to study carefully the different modes of 

 name-giving among the various races of the west, and the changes 

 to which they are liable, before one can proceed to determine from 

 surnames alone the mixed elements in such a heterogenous popu- 

 lation as we find in this country. It will not be out of place here 

 to give a short sketch of these different methods of nomenclature. 

 You must know, in the first place, that surnames are of compara- 



