AUCKLAND, IN ITS EARLY DAYS. 
CHAPTER XXIX. 
MEANS OF SUPPORT. 
The New Zealanders have always been an agricultural people; 
their country not naturally affording the means of subsist- 
ence in sufficient abundance to support them, without the 
cultivation of the soil. 
Their ancestors brought the or sweet potatoe — - 
the taro — an arum — and the hue, or calabash with them from 
Hawaiki : these were the only vegetables they possessed, 
and they carefully cultivated them until the arrival of Euro- 
peans, who introduced the potatoe, the value of which was 
early discovered, so that now it may be said to be their 
staple article of food ; it is more generally cultivated than 
the humara, from its taking less labour in planting, and 
yielding a more certain and larger return ; for that tuber 
requires not only a warm aspect, but an artificial soil, sand 
