been ashore at a spot where were many deserted Indian houses here he had seen several things tied up to the branches of trees, particularly human hair, which he brought away with him, enough to have made a sizable wig. This induced him to think that the place was consecrated to religious purposes; possibly it was, as they certainly have such places among them, though I have not yet been lucky enough to meet with them.

24th. Went to-day to the heppah or town, to see our friends the Indians, who received us with much confidence and civility, and showed us every part of their habitations, which were neat enough. The town was situated upon a small island or rock separated from the main by a breach in the rock, so small that a man might almost jump over it; the sides were everywhere so steep as to render fortifications, even in their fashion, almost totally unnecessary; accordingly there was nothing but a slight palisade, and one small fighting stage at one end where the rock was most accessible. The people brought us several bones of men, the flesh of which they had eaten. These are now become a kind of article of trade among our people, who constantly ask for and purchase them for whatever trifles they have. In one part we observed a kind of wooden cross ornamented with feathers, made exactly in the form of a crucifix. This engaged our attention, and we were told that it was a monument to a dead man; maybe a cenotaph, as the body was not there. This much they told us, but would not let us know where the body was.

25th. Dr. Solander and I (who have now nearly exhausted all the plants in our neighbourhood) went to-day to search for mosses and small things, in which we had great success, gathering several very remarkable ones. In the evening we went out in the pinnace, and fell in with a large family of Indians, who have now begun to disperse themselves, as is, I believe, their custom, into the different creeks and coves where fish are most plentiful. A few only remain in the heppah, to which they all fly in times of danger. These people came a good way to meet us at a

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place where we were shooting shags, and invited us to join the rest of them, twenty or thirty in number, men, women, and children, dogs, etc. We went, and were received with all possible demonstrations of friendship, if the numberless hugs and kisses we got from both sexes, old and young, in return for our ribbons and beads may be accounted such.

26th. Went to-day to take another view of our new straits, as the captain was not quite sure of the westernmost end. We found a hill in a tolerably convenient situation, and climbing it, saw the strait quite open, and four or five leagues wide. We then erected a small monument of stone, such as five stout men could do in half an hour, and laid in it musket balls, beads, shot, etc., so that if perchance any Europeans should find and pull it down, they will be sure it is not of Indian workmanship.

5th February. Our old man, Topaa, was on board, and Tupia asked him many questions concerning the land, etc. His answers were nearly as follows: "That the straits

we had seen from the hills were a passage into the eastern sea; that the land to the south consisted of two or several islands round which their canoes might sail in three or four days; that he knew of no other great land than that we had been upon (Aehie no Mauwe), of which Tera Whitte was the southern part; that he believed his ancestors were not born there, but came originally from Heawije (from whence Tupia and the islanders also derive their origin), "which lay to the northwards where were many lands; that neither himself, his father, nor his grandfather had ever heard of ships as large as this being here before, but that they have a tradition of two large vessels, much larger than theirs, which some time or other came here, and were totally destroyed by the inhabitants, and all the people belonging to them killed."

This last Tupia says is a very old tradition, much older

1 Cook's Straits.

2 The Maoris are by some authorities supposed to have originally come from Hawaii, the direction of which agrees very fairly with that given by the natives to Banks. The Sandwich Islands really lie N.N. E. from New Zealand.

than his great-grandfather, and relates to two large canoes which came from Olimaroa, one of the islands he has mentioned. Whether he is right, or whether this is a tradition of Tasman's ships (which they could not well compare with their own by tradition, and which their warlike ancestors had told them they had destroyed), is difficult to say. Tupia has all along warned us not to put too much faith in anything these people tell us, " for," for," says he, "they are given to lying; they told you that one of their people was killed by a musket and buried, which was absolutely false."

The doctor and I went ashore to-day, and fell in by accident with the most agreeable Indian family we had seen upon the coast, indeed the only one in which we have observed any order or subordination. It consisted of seventeen people; the head of it was a pretty boy of about ten years old, who, they told us, was the owner of the land about where we wooded. This is the only instance of property we have met with among these people. He and his mother (who mourned for her husband with tears of blood, according to their custom) sat upon mats, the rest sat round them: houses they had none, nor did they attempt to make for themselves any shelter against the inclemencies of the weather, which I suppose they by custom very easily endure. Their whole behaviour was so affable, obliging, and unsuspicious, that I should certainly have accepted their invitation to stay the night with them, were not the ship to sail in the morning. Most unlucky shall I always esteem it that we did not sooner make acquaintance with these people, from whom we might have learnt more in a day of their manners and dispositions than from all we have yet seen.

6th. Foul wind continued, but we contrived to get into the straits, which are to be called Cook's Straits. Here we were becalmed, and almost imperceptibly drawn by the tide near the land. The lead was dropped, and gave seventy fathoms; soon after we saw an appearance like breakers, towards which we drove fast. It was now sunset, and night came on apace; the ship drove into the rough water,

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which proved to be a strong tide, and which set her directly upon a rock. We had approached very near to this when the anchor was dropped, and she was brought up about a cable's length from it. We were now sensible of the force of the tide, which roared like a mill-stream, and ran at four knots at least when it flowed the fastest, for the rate varied much. It ran in this manner till twelve o'clock, when, with the slack water, we got up the anchor with great difficulty, and a light breeze from the northward soon cleared us from our dangers.

8th. As some of the officers declared last night that they thought it probable that the land we have been round might communicate by an isthmus situated somewhere between where we now are and Cape Turnagain (though the whole distance is estimated at no more than ninety miles), the captain resolved to stand to the northward till he should see that cape, which was accordingly done.

Three canoes put off from the shore, and with very little invitation came on board. The people appeared richer and more cleanly than any we have seen since we were in the Bay of Islands; their canoes also were ornamented in the same manner as those we had formerly seen in the north of the island. They were always more civil in their behaviour, and on having presents made them, immediately made presents to us in return (an instance we have not before met with in this island). All these things inclined me to believe that we were again come to the dominions of Teratu, but on asking they said that he was not their king.

9th. By eleven o'clock Cape Turnagain was in sight, which convinced everybody that the land was really an island, on which we once more turned the ship's head to the southward.

14th. I had two or three opportunities this evening of seeing albatrosses rise from the water, which they did with great ease; maybe they are not able to do so (as I have seen) when they are gorged with food.

17th. This morning we were close to a new island 1 which

1 Banks' Peninsula: it is not an island.

made in ridges not unlike the South Sea Islands (between the tropics); the tops of these were bare, but in the valleys was plenty of wood.

23rd. As we have now been four days upon nearly the same part of the coast without seeing any signs of inhabitants, I think there is no doubt that this part at least is without inhabitants.

In the evening the land1 inclined a good deal to the west. We on board were now of two parties, one who wished that the land in sight might, the other that it might not, be a continent. I myself have always been most firm in the former wish, though sorry I am to say that my party is so small, that I firmly believe that there are none more heartily of it than myself and one poor midshipman: the rest begin to sigh for roast beef.

4th March. A large smoke was seen, and proved to be an immense fire on the side of a hill which we supposed to have been set on fire by the natives, for though this is the only sign of people we have seen, yet I think it must be an indisputable proof that there are inhabitants, though probably very thinly scattered over the face of this very large country.

9th. The land 2 appeared barren, and seemed to end in a point to which the hills gradually declined, much to the regret of us continent-mongers, who could not help thinking that the great swell from the south-west and the broken ground without it were a pretty sure mark of some remarkable cape being here. By noon we were near the land, which was uncommonly barren; the few flat places we saw seemingly produced little or nothing, and the rest was all bare rocks which were amazingly full of large veins, and patches of some mineral that shone as if it had been polished, or rather looked as if the rocks were really paved with glass; what it was I could not at all guess, but it was certainly some mineral, and seemed to argue by its immense abundance a country abounding in minerals, where, if one may judge 1 Near Otago Harbour.

2 Stewart Island, which was supposed to be a peninsula.