Saturday a ,
manner. It is therefore very probable, that rats are indigenous
in New Zeeland, or at leaft that their arrival there,
is prior to its difcovery by European navigators. Captain
Furneaux fhewed us feveral fpots of ground on the top
of this rock, which he had ordered to be dug, and on
which he had fown a great variety of garden-feeds ; thefe
fucceeded fo well that we frequently had fallads, and many
diflies of European greens at our table, notwithftanding
the feafon of winter was now far advanced. But the
climate in this part of New Zeeland is extremely mild,
when compared to that of Dulky Bay ; and notwithftanding
the vicinity of the fnowy mountains, I am inclined to believe
it feldom freezes hard in Queen Charlotte s Sound $
at leaft we experienced no froft during our continuance
there to the 6 th of June.
On the 2ad we went oyer to an ifland in the found,
to which captain Cook had given the name of Long Ifland
in his former vpyage. It confifts of one long ridge, of
which the fides are fteep, and the back or top nearly level,
though in moft places very narrow. On its N. W. fide
we faw a fine beach, furrounding a little piece of flat land',
of which the greateft part was marlhy, and covered with
various grafies ; the reft was full of antifcorbutics, and the
New Zeeland flax-plant (fhormium}, growing round fome
old abandoned huts of the natives. We cleared fome fpots
of ground here, and fowed European garden feeds on them,
which
203
which we thought were likely to thrive in this place. We
alfo climbed to the top of the ridge, which we found
covered with dry grafies, intermixed with fome low,
flirubby plants ; and among them a number of quails exactly
like thofe of Europe, had their refidence. Several
deep and narrow glens which ran down the fides of the
ridge to the fea, were filled with trees, fhrubs, and climbers,
the haunt of numerous fmall birds, and of feveral falcons;
but where the cliffs were perpendicular, or hanging over
the water, great flocks of a beautiful fort of fhags, built
their nefts on every little broken rock, or if poflible in
fmall cavities about a foot fquare, which feemed in a few
inftances to be enlarged by the birds themfelves. The
argillaceous ftone, of which moft of the hills about Queen
Charlotte’s Sound confifted, is fometimes fufficiently foft
for that purpofe. It runs in oblique ftrata, commonly
dipping a little towards the fouth, is of a greenifh-grey,
or bluifh, or yellowifh-brown colour, and fometimes contains
veins of white quartz. A green talcous or nephritic
ftone, is alfo found in this kind of rock, and when very
hard, capable of polifii, and femi-tranfparent; it is ufed by
the natives forchiflels, hatchets, and fometimes for pattoo-
pattoos : it is of the fame fpecies which jewellers call the
jadde. Several fofter forts of this ftone, perfectly opaque,
and of a pale green colour, are more numerous than the
flinty femi-tranfparent kind; and feveral fpecies of horn-
D d 2 ftone