DR. HAAST'S PAPER ON ROCK PAINTINGS.

Globe, Volume VIII, Issue 885, 26 April 1877, Page 3

DR. HAAST'S PAPER ON ROCK PAINTINGS.

(From the New Zealand Herald.) The paper of Dr. Ilaast on the rock paintings in the South Island has attracted some attention here, and we think the judgment of those entitled io give an opinion on the subject is, that he is mistaken in his conclusions. In the first place, Dr. Ilaast says that the black paintings seem to have been done by a different race from the red paintings. Dr. Ilaast is not explicit in stating any reason for thinking that a race existed in New Zealand prior to the Maori. The native tradition on the subject is very dim. The Maoris say that when they landed on the North Island there were here horalto, or albinoes, who ran into the woods, and were associated with the pafupaiarehe or fairies. On the South Island there were not even the Iwrahos. What these horalios were, or whether they were at all, has never been determined, but. they were evidently not the race of men who executed the rock paintings. As to the red paintings Dr. Ilaast says: “It appears that these paintings are attributed to the Ngapuhi. the oldest inhabitant of this (the South) Island, of which there are any traditions; in fact, the Ngapuhi are a somewhat mythical people, to whom, besides those drawings, the destruction of the moa, or anything the origin of which is unknown, is also attributed.” This statement is made on the authority of a Maori at Moeraki, but he must surely have been misunderstood, as the only Ngapuhi known to Maori tradition or Maori history is the tribe now in the North, which is by no means a mythical tribe. The earliest residents in the South Island were the Ngatimamoe, and the likelihood is that they executed all the paintings, the “kokowai,” or red oxide of iron, with which they are done, being commonly used by them. Dr. Ilaast says, speaking of the paintings at a rock shelter near the Opihi River :—“ It is evident at a first glance that they are quite distinct from t hose of the Maoris, which always consist of curved lines and scroll-work.” Howslender a foundation will sulliee for a scientific man to base a positive assertion upon ? .ft would have been much better for Dr. Ilaast to have confessed his inability Irom want of knowledge to make a positive statement. Dr liaast’s paper is exceedingly unsatisfactory. We are tempted to suspect t hat , after all, it may be a case like the inscription A.D.L.L. of Scott’s “Antiquary,” which, after having attached to it an important Latin sentence, showing that Agricola had there marshalled. In's army for the battle of Mons Grampius, turned "out to mean “Aiken Drum’s Lang Ladle,” and quite a modern work. Then we have the familiar case in “Pickwick,” of “ Bill Stumps X his mark and in the present. instance, there seems really less foundation for the theories put forward t han in these (wo famous examples. We have never heard of rock paintings in the North Island, and perhaps Dr Hector’s first idea is the right one, that these markings arc the work of some idle shepherd, lie identities the paintings thus;—“Only two representations of man can be recognised, but they are full of movement and evidently in the act of running away, whilst the figure of the bird is very suggestive.” Suggestive of what ? Again, “ No, 8 is, doubtless, a quadruped, probably a dog.” “ Approaching the middle portion of the wall, we find here a well-arranged group of paintings, the centre of which has all the appearance of a hat ornamented on the crown. The rim of this broad brimmed relique measures two feet across.” Are we to understand that the people who preceded the Maoris, or the first Maoris, who killed the moa 800 years ago, for the Maoris have been that lime on the island, had broad-brimmed hats, after the manner of Quakers? Respecting No. 17, we have a wide choice as we are told it “might represent a tree on fire, a Limp, or an altar with incense offering,” or, we might say, a thousand other things, or anything, or nothing. We do not, wonder that the Canterbury philosophers expressed their opinion “ that the evidence before them could scarcely be deemed conclusive.” How are we to put faith in Dr. Ilaast or other scientific men when we find them so ready to come to rash conclusions ?