To Mr A. Wilson.

King Country Chronicle, Volume III, Issue 163, 10 June 1909, Page 2

To Mr A. Wilson.

—I o~c* owr.ec. Mr Taylor's book, ie ma-a-}., an;. ar.a can endorse your quotations. i_s.pTs:r. Co-who was the r.rs: wr.irejr:-:: .oror to become intimate-:;.- acquainted -.vith the'-Indians" of New Zealand, in. the ;:urn.a; of his first voyage. 17 r ?5. say;: ''ln this country tr.ere are no quadrupeds but cozs and rat; . . . The'dogs live with the neonle. *.vh;. it reed them for no other rurtose than to eat." In the journal ci his second novate.l773 under "Transactions in C.'ueen Charlotte's Sound. " c-cntir.uss : On tne secon:; o: -rune . . I sent on shore on the east side of the sound, tw .° ?? ats > r; " a -s £"d female .. . CapAdventure. also nut on sree "a n C Jr and tivo breeding sows that' •><* have reason to none tnis count v v wi'l in time.be stocked v.'ith these animals. • if they are not destroyed bv the Natives before they become wiid : do- afi terwaris they will he in n: tangs'-, j But as the Natives l:new no thine cf ! their being left, it may he some tirr.e j before they are discovered." Tn the journal of his third, and last visit. 1774, to the same localitv he savs: .. . These tw- enters became suitors to me for some goats and hogs. Accordingly I gave to Matahoua, two goats, male and female . . . and to the j other a boar and a sow. Thev made | me a promise not to kill them.:' though I must own I put no great faith in this. The animals which Cantain Turneaux sent ashore here, and which soon after fell into the hands cf the Natives.l was now told were ail dead . . .hut am not su'-e ..." For its probable interest to vour j readers I will further wrote what he ! says upon his final denarture from New ' Zealand:—"On my ::resent arrival at ; his place, I hat. it..v interoeu to have | left, not only the goats and hogs, but | sheep, and a ycung hull,with two heif- ! ers, if I couid have found either a : chief powerful enough, to nrttect and ' keep them, or a place where there i might be a probability of their being concealed from those who would antly attempt to destroy them. But neither the one nor the other nresented itself to me . . . For in a counrrv like this, where no man's trotertv is secure, they would soon have fallen a prey to different tarries, v: been either separated or killed : most likelv both .... I have, at different times, left in New Zealand, no less than ten or a dozen hogs, besides those nut on shore by Capt. Turneaux.. It will be a little extraordinary, therefore, if this race should not increase and be preserved here, either in a wild or domestic state, or in both." As I have mentioned before of the Polynesian group: Wain's, Bougainville, Carteret, Admiral Byron, Cook, and others, refreshed there upon pork. But upon the how. or when, cf their introduction, both legend and history are silpnt. Probably pigs formed part of the migration baggage. \Ye can confidently adopt Captain Cock's narrative as exact, impartial and above cricicsmatic cavillings.—l am. etc., W.B. Te Kuiti, June 7th.