104 JOURNAL OF SCIENCE. 



men from death, Maiu was slain. At page 558 we find the New 

 Zealand Deluge Legends, and also the very curious Marquesan version of 

 Te Tai Toko, or the Flood, with its remarkable parallelism with the 

 Chaldean accounts. 



The materials here indicated are carefully put together and the 

 needful references duly given. One very useful part of the book is the 

 list of works consulted by the author, as it gives in a handy form a list 

 of the chief authorities on the general Ethnology of the South Seas. 

 The whole of the readers of this Journal will, I am sure, sympathise 

 with Mr. Tregear's note on page XII., concerning Mr. Colenso's great 

 Lexicon of the Maori language, and will, with him, continue to hope 

 that the patient, earnest and scholarly labour of a long and well spent 

 life will yet be " born into the world of letters." Although dealing 

 more strictly with the word forms of the Maori language, Mr. Colenso's 

 Maori Lexicon must contain much of that special knowledge of the 

 Maori race, of which, in New Zealand, he is the sole possessor. 



Of the philological value of the kindred words brought together 

 by Mr. Tregear, it will be for the student of philology to judge in the 

 light of the ever advancing knowledge of the national psychology of the 

 races of the Pacific. From the great island of New Guinea we may 

 expect much valuable material for the philologist, as that area seems to 

 be a definite point of contact between a conquering and a conquered 

 race. We are as yet only in the dawn of the light which will be thrown 

 by philological research on the race problems of existing nations. 



Turning to another branch of the enquiry we find that at the end 

 of the book are given "endless genealogies"— extracts from the "Burke 

 and Debrett " of Polynesia. Beside these lines of ancestry, those who 

 " came over with the Conqueror " are mushrooms indeed. Look at that 

 of Minirapa Tamahiwaki of the Chatham Islands, who proudly counts 

 180 generations of forefathers; of Beha of the Uriwera tribe, with 135 

 ancestors ; of the Chiefs of Hawaii, and of the Kings of Barotonga and 

 Raiatea. Here we have linguistic monuments of past ages equal in 

 interest to the dynasties of Egypt, and lights though dim, on the 

 childhood of the world. 



As a contribution to the general history of the Maori people the 

 book is of special value, and now that the author of the " History of 

 the Maori" has passed to his rest, it is to be hoped that the Government 

 will see their way to place the remainder of the work of the late Mr. 

 John White in the hands of Mr. Tregear for publication. It is to be 

 desired however, that at some future time the volumes already issued of 

 that work will be re-edited, and the plates which at present disgrace 

 the work be replaced by some more suited to its character. 



Mr. Tregear-, and the public generally, are much indebted to the 

 publishers for the extremely creditable form in which the Maori 

 Comparative Dictionary is issued; considering the difficulties of the 

 work the errors and defects are trifling, and its publication marks an 

 era in the literary history of the colony. 



Mr. Tregear's patient labour of many years is thus launched on the 

 sea of literature, but before leaving the subject it will be as well to 

 ditect the attention of all interested in Maori matters to a paper on 



