MYSTERIOUS MUMMIES.

Gisborne Times, Volume V, Issue 114, 23 May 1901, Page 4

MYSTERIOUS MUMMIES.

Thsi following is from the Kawhia Settler :—“ At intervals, ever since the early entry of Europeans into the harbor of Kawhia, occasional rumours have been heard of the existence of catacombs containing mummies of a race unknown to the Maoris. Recently two tourists from Auckland undertook the difficult and somewhat perilous journey to the high limestone rooks near the head of the Awaroa River, where the embalmed remains are said to repose in their secret sarcophagus, These explorers aver that with the assistance of a guide they succeeded in reaching several cavernous catacombs far up on a high cliff which they ascended with much difficulty and some little danger. In the dark recesses of a cave into which they peered they beheld some mummified human remains swathed in much decayed vestments. Scattered locks of long black hair were on the heads of some, and some of the bodies, upon closer inspection, proved iilinost as complete as when laid away shortly after death in the unknown past. These remains, it is said, are not held sacred by the Maoris as with their own dead —there is no tapu over these vestiges of an extinct race. The reason why such tombs have remained so long unexplored is, doubtless, because of the difficulty of ascending a vertical cliff, on the face of which are the entrances to the tombs, hidden by such vegetation as clings to the least fissure or crevice in rocks of high altitude, and partially closed at the mouth by the debris of rock disintegration —the accumulation of time. It is said that the late Captain Fairchild always expressed a doubt as to the existence of these mummies, and some of the oldest European residents here have shared in his disbelief; but from the necessarily superficial peep into the catacombs mentioned and what was then seen, there is sufficient warrant for further investigation.”