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warlike implements and other objects, whether of ornament 
or for domestic purposes, which have been valued by the 
deceased, or presumed to be required in the world of spirits 
by their original or former owners. Hence we find necklaces, 
amulets, fibula, caskets, drinking cups, needles, celts, spears, 
knives, bosses of shields, horse harness, portions of war 
chariots, fragments of the funeral repast, trophies of the 
chase, and various other relics of unknown use. 
A most remarkable instance of this kind has been discovered 
in JN"ew Zealand during the past year. A man in the employ 
of Mr. Davidson Fyffe, of Kai Koras, near Wellington, 
while digging for the foundation of a house on the side of a 
small mound, suddenly came upon a human skeleton, doubt- 
less that of a Maori, wmich appears to have been buried in a 
sitting posture, with the arms extended towards the mouth, 
near w T hich was the entire egg of a Moa, and between the 
legs numerous tools made of jade — including a spear, an axe, 
and several other implements. Here, as is most probable, 
the egg was intended as food for the deceased, as it is barely 
possible an empty shell would have been so deposited, unless 
in some way transformed into a drinking vessel or personal 
ornament, which in this instance did not appear to have been 
the case. Under the former supposition it affords indubitable 
evidence that the Maori and Moa were contemporary inhabi- 
tants of New Zealand, and that the latter had probably been 
used as food by the former. 
Again, we know that even among people so highly civilized 
as the ancient Egyptians, they commonly interred with the 
dead small emblematical representations of the different 
divinities who were supposed to have influence over the eter- 
nal destinies of the deceased; and various other objects, even 
dolls, personal ornaments, corn, bulbous roots, &c. 
Supposing, however, that evidence, apparently the most 
conclusive, may eventually be adduced of their having all been 
