AN EXTRAORDINARY TOMB.

Kumara Times, Issue 1603, 16 November 1881, Page 2

AN EXTRAORDINARY TOMB.

The Opotiki correspondent of the Bay of Plenty Times writes :—An incident of considerable interest to local archaeologists has transpired here. Some distance up the Otara Gorge, on a ponion of the estate of Mr Thomas Black, an enormous puketca tree, pro-' ! aMy many hundred years old, has been blown down, disclosing the astounding fact that the whole of the ludlow interior, extending from the roots to the first fork, about forty-five feet, luts been filled with human bodies, Siiic<> its fall these have burst out at the butt of the tree in the form of a confused heap of skeletons. A more extraordinary sight than this monarch of the forest lying prone and dischargin" 1 a perfect hecatomb of human skeletons can scarcely be conceived. Some are nearly perfect, while otheis are mixed, up in a chaotic mass of hend, hands} feet, arms, and legs indiscriminately; All the Maoris here seem to have been quite Unaware of this natural charnelhouse, and declare that it must have" happened long before their or their* fathers' time. Indeed, the appearance of the tree fully justified the supposition that it must have been some hundreds of years since this novel family vault was filled tfith its ghastly occupants.