342 
Mythology of 
to prove its frequent and recent production. What I 
have examined appears to be of old character, and the 
debris of a source long ago erupted. 
I have been informed that it has been also found 
along the shore of Bass’s Strait; and that one piece, 
perfectly water-worn, was found upon a high mountain 
full 25 miles inland from the mouth of the Clarence 
River. Unless it was carried thither from the coast by 
one of the Aborigines, who fill their bags with all kinds 
of substances, which are dropped about the country, it 
would seem that pumice used to drift to these shores long 
before the present coast attained its elevation above the 
ocean ; and this, if a fact, would alone render an enquiry 
into the subject one of great value and interest to the 
history of New Holland. In the volcanic district north 
west of Port Phillip, it is said pumice is found upon 
some of the hills; but whether, if it be the case, the 
pumice is drift, or in situ , does not appear to have been 
determined. An investigation of the range of this drift 
pumice along the shores of Australia and Tasmania, 
would not be an unimportant employment. Captain 
Stanley, of H.M.S. Britomart , was so obliging as to take 
a note of the occurrence, and to promise to look out 
for it in the examination of the coasts which he is now 
engaged in exploring. Should any further information 
reach me, I will lay it before the Society. 
Art. II. On the Mythology of the New Zealanders . 
By James Hamlin, Missionary, Orooa, New Zealand. 
(Continued from page 204.) 
I cannot find, so far as my inquiries have hitherto gone, 
that the natives are able to give any kind of history of their 
wars, either connected of disconnected, general or parti- 
